of alternative opinions to the reading, listening and viewing public. While independent weeklies – The Standard, The Zimbabwe Independent and The Financial Gazette – are still holding fort, they are constricted by limited circulation, acute shortage of newsprint and prohibitive production and transport costs fuelled by the hyper-inflationary environment. The few Zimbabweans with access to the internet relied on online publications such as Zimonline, Zimbabwe Times, Zimdaily and NewZimbabwe.Com, in a country that is still to issue licenses to community radios, notwithstanding the serious mobile and fixed line phone connectivity problems, which has a negative impact on the free exchange of information and ideas on national issues. Projections for 2009 Chances for significant change to the country’s media landscape in 2008 look slim unless a political solution to the current impasse is found. The government will undoubtedly be proceeding with the establishment of the media council, appointed by the statutory ZMC and chaired by a member of the same commission. This flies in the face of the Banjul Declaration on the Principles of Freedom of Expression in Africa, which clearly states that “self regulation is the best system of instilling professionalism in the media”. It is against that background that delegates to a media law reform conference convened under the auspices of the Media Alliance of Zimbabwe (MAZ) in Harare on December 4 – 5, 2008 gave the statutory media council the thumbs down, saying they would not support it nor accept invitations to sit on the council. An independent, free and pluralistic media can play its role effectively in the democratic processes that inform national reconstruction and healing. The resultant domino effect is that would-be investors in the print and broadcasting sector will be guaranteed security on their investments, notwithstanding the potential for employment and economic growth. Only through a constitutional provision that protects media freedom will the media be firmly anchored and positioned to undertake its ethical and responsible obligations of informing the citizenry without fear of falling foul of AIPPA, POSA, BSA, ICA and the Criminal Law (Codification and Reform) Act, among other laws intended to suppress media freedom and freedom of expression, association and assembly. So This Is Democracy? 2008 -131- Media Institute of Southern Africa