Defiant Mandaza takes fight to High Court

Defiant Mandaza takes fight to High Court

• Independent wary of CIO media infiltrators

• Mandaza suspended from Mirror

• Journalists targeted in CIOGATE

• Mandaza fires Mirror board

• Mandaza admits to CIO ownership

• Hollow tales full of sound and fury

• Parliament probes Mediagate

• Media scandal deepens

• CIOGATE: Mandaza muzzled

• Panic as Zim rocked by media scandal

• Newspapers sell their souls for survival

• Scandal rocks Zim media industry

• Sex pest Kaseke forced to resign

• Mujuru rape scandal causes stir

• Mujuru sucked into rape scandal

By Staff Reporter

IBBO Mandaza on Tuesday took his battle to fight-off a take-over of the Zimbabwe Mirror Newspapers Group to the High Court, a day after he was suspended.

A leading privately-owned weekly, The Zimbabwe Independent, has revealed that Mandaza was squeezed out by the Central Intelligence Organisation in a covert operation bankrolled by public funds.

Another weekly paper, the Financial Gazette, is now said to be 100% owned by the CIO in the biggest media scandal in independent Zimbabwe.

The Mirror Group publishes The Daily Mirror and Sunday Mirror.

A brief press statement released Monday by Mirror Group chairman Jonathan Kadzura and vice-chairman Jonathan Marangwanda said: "May the public be advised that Doctor Ibbo Mandaza has today, the 3rd October 2005, been suspended from the positions of Editor-in-chief and chief executive of the Zimbabwe Mirror Group of Newspapers.

"His suspension follows the forensic report published to the board by Ernst and Young auditors.

"Dr I Mandaza is not and cannot be authorised to carry out any business in the name of or on behalf of the Zimbabwe Mirror Group of Newspapers. After this public announcement, the group shall not be held responsible for any transactions entered into by Dr I Mandaza."

But Mandaza was in defiant mood on Tuesday, instructing his lawyers to fight his dismissal and re-establish his control of the Group now thought to be 70 percent-owned by the intelligence services.

"That's impossible (suspension). I am the sole owner of the group. I own the newspaper. It's my company.

"I don't know who has the authority to fire me. I cannot be fired or evicted. It is clear to everybody," railed Mandaza.

Mandaza was summoned by National Security Minister Didymus Mutasa on September 19 for an emergency meeting at his office. The meeting was also attended by CIO director-general Happyton Bonyongwe and the disputed Mirror chair Jonathan Kadzura.

At the same meeting, the veteran journalist and author was accused of siphoning close to $540 million from the Mirror and had been given a December 31 deadline to quit the organisation he founded in 1997.

It was not immediately clear what sparked his dramatic ouster this week.

The Independent which says it got its information from "high level intelligence sources" revealed that the CIO started manoeuvres to muscle into the Financial Gazette and the Mirror Newspapers Group's two titles in 2002. Billions of taxpayers' funds were poured in to the project. They already control the Financial Gazette.

"The CIO controls those three newspapers (Financial Gazette and Mirror titles)," The Independent reported. "They control a large stake, if not 100% of the Fingaz, and 70% of the Mirror group. Mandaza (Mirror chief executive and editor-in-chief) owns 30%."
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