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HIGHER Education Minister and Zanu PF politburo member Professor Jonathan Moyo hammered the NewsDay Friday, accusing the newspaper of dishonesty and twisting his comments about police attacks on protesters.
At the centre of the row is an article published by NewsDay titled “Moyo slams police brutality”, in which the paper says President Robert Mugabe’s former propaganda chief “has joined the growing list of people publicly condemning police brutality against peaceful protesters that has left several people injured as demonstrations against Mugabe’s alleged misrule gather momentum.”
The report was based in part on comments Moyo made on Twitter, where the minister was baited into commenting on a picture of a bloodied man who came out looking the worst from an encounter with riot police in Harare.
Moyo, condemning the protesters for “provocative antics”, also said the police response must be lawful, adding: “Pictures of unlawful violence can change everything for the worse as did this on March 11, 2007.”
In March 2007, police broke up a protest and bashed opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai – sparking an international outcry when pictures of his swollen face emerged.
The NewsDay report also carried a quote, which the newspaper obtained in an e-mail to Moyo. The Tsholotsho North MP now says the newspaper removed part of the quotation which did not favour its “police brutality” slant.
Moyo posted a screen grab of his e-mailed comments in response to questions by a NewsDay reporter, while tagging the newspaper’s managing director Vincent Kahiya.
He said: “I gave you this response. You doctored and bastardised it. Unprofessional and unethical!”
In another post, he asked: “Are you honest journalists?”
His full comment to NewsDay said: “Your emotive reference to alleged police brutality has nothing to do with any of my tweets, not least because it generalises both the police and brutality in a manner that creates a false collectivity when at issue is a specific and isolated incident involving unlawful violence that deserves to be wholly condemned as a specific incident without any reservation whatsoever since it violates constitutional rights and risks tarnishing the image of both the police and the country.”
The minister says, in their story, NewsDay left out the first part of his response in which he appeared to accuse the paper of wrongly framing his tweets.
Reported the paper: “When asked to clarify his tweets, Moyo told NewsDay: ‘… at issue is a specific and isolated incident involving unlawful violence that deserves to be wholly condemned as a specific incident without any reservation whatsoever since it violates constitutional rights and risks tarnishing the image of both the police and the country’.”
Moyo’s attempts to frame the police attacks on protesters as “isolated” and not a reflection of the whole police force’s tactics drew fire from some Zimbabweans on his timeline.
@RaphaelGoredema said: “The police is (sic) fully responsible for this unlawful violence. All of them!” Another Twitter user, @TariroKamuti weighed in: “Police brutality is what it is: police brutality.”
Police have cracked down on increasing wildcat street protests against the Zimbabwe government, with Commissioner General Augustine Chihuri warning that protests not sanctioned by the police will be broken up by force. The police chief says Zimbabwe cannot be in a permanent state of protest, saying this is disturbing the peace.
“We’ll force you to respect peace and orderliness. People must not complain and say police are brutal,” Chihuri said. “We’re not brutal, we’re there to ensure that peace prevails. If you want to cause disorder, blame yourself.”
Source-Newsday
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