Mugabe propagandist just the guy for SABC boss

Mugabe propagandist just the guy for SABC boss

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By Jacob Dlamini

IT'S a pity Reuben Barwe is not looking for a job because the veteran Zimbabwean hack seems to be just the kind of journalist SABC news commissar Snuki Zikalala wants in his newsroom.

Zikalala has reportedly told his staff at the SABC that he wants only "cadres who can work with government" - not free thinkers and independent-minded folks who might (again) cost him his job and pension.

What better move for Dr Zikalala - as he was so fondly introduced before his
interview with Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe on SABC 3 on Sunday - to make than to bring Barwe to the SABC?

Barwe would not need any training. A conscientious cadre who has been working with the Zimbabwean regime for almost as long as it has been in power, Barwe would know what to do.

He works so well with the Zimbabwean regime that he sometimes uses the term "we" to describe it in his reports, which are often full of hyperbole.

In fact, Barwe's missives are so blatantly one-sided that a viewer often cannot tell where the ruling Zanu (PF) ends and Mugabe's government begins.

Reporting on Mugabe casting his vote at the Cyril Jennings Hall in the poor
Harare township of Highfields last Thursday, Barwe regaled viewers with dramatic tales of Mugabe's heroic past and struggle adventures.

"Barwe is so open in his slavish support for Mugabe and the ruling Zanu (PF) that he does not seem to care what the world thinks of him"

JACOB DLAMINI

He told viewers about Mugabe using the hall in the 1950s to plot the downfall of imperialism and making "plans to dislodge settler colonialism". Gripping television.

And also the sort of television that would have Zikalala winning the ratings race with margins as huge as Zanu (PF)'s emphatic victory last week.

Barwe speaks with such zeal and passion in his reports you cannot miss his love for his job.

Foreign journalists who watched Zimbabwean television before and during last
week's election will tell you that Barwe was as passionate about Zanu (PF) and his hero Mugabe as he was venomous and downright scathing about the
opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC).

What's more, Barwe is so open in his slavish support for Mugabe and the ruling Zanu (PF) that he does not seem to care what the world thinks of him.

Why should he? Barwe has been handsomely rewarded for his sterling cadreship
by Zanu (PF) and Mugabe. He was among the few well-connected individuals who
were given formerly white-owned farms during the violent land grabs of the late 1990s.

Zikalala might have trouble enticing Barwe away from his cushy Harare life but he should at least give it a try. There is the hopelessly weak Zimbabwean dollar and Mugabe's uncertain political afterlife to count in Zikalala's favour.

The nice thing about having Barwe at the SABC would be that Zikalala at least would not have to worry about which journalist to send out to interview Mugabe.

Barwe would be the obvious and automatic choice. You want to send someone to interview Labour Minister Membathisi Mdladlana, who also happens to be Zikalala's former boss, about Zimbabwe's proud democratic traditions or maybe nothing in particular - hey there's Barwe.

You know that Barwe would not embarrass you and the comrade minister with silly and reactionary questions about human rights abuses and other such
bourgeois obsessions.

I suspect it is because Zikalala does not trust his political reporters that he chose to personally conduct the interview with Mugabe on Sunday.

Having Barwe at the SABC would take care of the trust issue and free up
Zikalala to go about searching for more cadres who could work with government.

Zikalala could, of course, opt to send his current team to a political re-education camp. But that would cause too much of a stink and, possibly, cost him his job. Not even the SABC board would, I hope, endorse Stalinist practices. But who knows?

I hear that Zikalala tells journalists who dare disagree with his diktats that he does not question his board - so why should they question him?

Zikalala is obviously working on the assumption that the African National Congress (ANC) is going to be in power forever and that it is his sacred duty to support the party. Just like Barwe is doing with Zanu (PF) in Zimbabwe.

Barwe can neither make sense of nor explain the MDC. To him the MDC is an aberration that cannot be explained rationally. I mean, who in their right mind would challenge Mugabe?

It seems to be the same with Zikalala. Who in their right mind would dare
challenge the ANC? You would have to be mad to do that. Barwe understands that kind of thinking.
Dlamini is the Business Day's political editor, and this article was originally published by the Business Day
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