88th birthday, has called for elections to be held this year. Mugabe’s party, ZANUPF, has strongly opposed proposed media reforms in the country even though regional institutions such as the Southern African Development Community (SADC) have encouraged such reforms as a precondition for the holding of free, transparent and credible elections. $OHUW Date: March 3, 2012 Person/ institution: MISA-Zimbabwe Violation/ issue: Other The Zimbabwe chapter of the Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA-Zimbabwe) has dismissed allegations made by state media that it is clandestinely collecting signatures from people ‘bused-in’ from various communities in its bid to ‘create’ community radio stations. The allegations were published in the statecontrolled The Herald and featured in the Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation’s news bulletins of 1 March 2012. Further allegations are that the signatories would become trustees that would run the radio stations. In a statement, MISAZimbabwe Chairperson, Njabulo Ncube reaffirmed that MISA-Zimbabwe “has no intention of establishing community radio stations that operate outside the ambit of the Broadcasting Services Act (BSA)” as was being alleged by the statecontrolled media. $OHUW News has reportedly been banned from circulating in Mashonaland East province’s Mutoko and Murehwa areas. In a front-page story published on 8 March 2012, the newspaper said the ban was allegedly being effected by former ruling party, Zanu-PF supporters who were forcing people to read only state-owned publications. Councilor Shama Kativhu, of Ward 20 in Mutoko said the “thugs” were hostile to all independent newspapers circulating in the areas. The paper also reported that copies of its newspaper were torn in Kadoma by “identified Zanu PF supporters” after they accused a vendor of selling the newspaper close to a shop owned by a Zanu-PF official. Kadoma is in the Midlands province of Zimbabwe. $OHUW Date: March 8, 2012 Person/ institution: NewsDay Violation/ issue: Threatened Leaders of the Zimbabwe National Liberation War Veterans Association (ZNLWVA) in Harare on 7 March 2012 threatened to shut down the privately-owned newspaper NewsDay unless the daily discloses the sources of a story alleging the former liberation war fighters had attempted to dig up the remains of Cecil John Rhodes from Matobo Hills, a UNESCO World Heritage site. $OHUW Date: March 8, 2012 Person/ institution: Daily News Violation/ issue: Censored The privately-owned newspaper, Daily Date: March 8, 2012 Person/ institution: Activists Violation/ issue: Legislation The Minister of Media, Information and Publicity, Webster Shamu, has been sum- 6R7KLVLV'HPRFUDF\"