Suffice to say the government continues to trash the various charters and conventions it has signed or ratified willingly, including the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the 1991 Windhoek Declaration, the African Charter on Broadcasting and the Banjul Declaration, all of which guarantee freedom of expression, access to information and freedom of the media. The state of broadcasting and telecommunications In the broadcasting sector, the state-controlled ZBC remains the sole broadcaster in the country. Restrictions alluded to earlier under the BSA, make it difficult for the Broadcasting Authority of Zimbabwe (BAZ) to level the playing field for more private players to enter the sector in compliance with the African Charter on Broadcasting, which espouses the three-tier broadcasting comprising public, commercial and community broadcasting. In terms of clause five of the amended BSA, the appointment functions were transferred to the president who has the power to appoint nine members to the BAZ after consultation with the minister and Parliamentary Committee on Standing Rules and Orders. Fundamentally the amendments still retain restrictive provisions on issues relating to foreign funding and ownership in the otherwise capital-intensive broadcasting sector. In terms of foreign ownership and directorship, this will be decided at the absolute discretion of the minister without any well-defined criteria. These bodies need to be replaced by a truly independent communications regulator that will oversee these sectors. This new regulator’s independence must be guaranteed by the law and must have financial, structural and functional independence in order to regulate the sector effectively and impartially for the development of the information and communication technology (ICT) sector to be guaranteed. The state of print media The print media is dominated by the state-owned Zimbabwe Newspapers group, which publishes the only circulating dailies The Herald and The Chronicle. There has been no introduction of any private newspapers and banned publications, such as The Daily News, The Daily News on Sunday, The Tribune and The Weekly Times, have not been granted permission to resume publications Although the government had said the thorny issue of the registration of The Daily News was soon to be concluded, the paper’s quest for registration has dragged on before the Media and Information Commission against a labyrinth of court cases in its legal battle to be granted an operating licence. This is despite undertakings to speedily process applications for registration or re-registration of media houses in terms of Article 19 of the Global Political Agreement (GPA). It was hoped that following a meeting of minds between Zanu-PF and the two Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) formations following the signing of the GPA in Harare on September 15, 2008, there would be an opening of the media space. The GPA recognises the importance of the right to freedom of expression and communication and the crucial role that the media plays in a multi-party democracy. Parties to the agreement agreed to the expeditious processing of all applications for re-registration and registration in terms of both the BSAand AIPPA. This is still to come to fruition, increasing uncertainty about the fate of The Daily News and other banned publications. One can only surmise that there is an absolute lack of political will to open up the media landscape and provide competition to The Herald and The Chronicle, thereby providing a variety So This Is Democracy? 2008 -130- Media Institute of Southern Africa