Vague in that the media self-regulation mechanism envisaged in terms of the principle of coregulation, would be at the pleasure of the statutory Zimbabwe Media Commission. It is MISA Zimbabwe’s strong view, the government’s oft-repeated ‘new dispensation’ mantra will remain hollow if it is not followed through by democratic media law reforms backed by revamped and transformed public media including the boards and regulatory bodies under its firm grip. Parliament should therefore fulfil its obligations by ensuring that gazetted bills such as the Freedom of Information Bill and Zimbabwe Media Commission Bill are in sync with the Constitution and other democratic regional and international instruments that Zimbabwe is party to. ❖ Broadcasting/Telecommunications/ICTs As part of its reform agenda, the government promised to licence six new television stations by the end of 2019. However, that promise did not materialise thereby perpetuating the Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation’s monopoly and ownership of the country’s sole television station, Zimbabwe Television (ZTV). Minister of Information, Publicity and Broadcasting Services, Monica Mutsvangwa, in a question and answer session in the Senate, said these were now expected in the first three months of 2020. While the country now has ‘private’ commercial radio stations, in 2019 it was still to licence community radio stations, despite the government’s commitment to further free the airwaves and increase access to information. The government had previously attributed its failure to licence community radio stations to the absence of a board for the Broadcasting Authority of Zimbabwe (BAZ). BAZ had gone for five years without a substantive board before the appointment of the new 12-member board in July 2019. Meanwhile, during the course of the year, the permanent secretary in the Ministry of Information, Publicity and Broadcasting Services, Nick Mangwana, said Zimbabwe had completed 37% of its migration process to digital migration. The digitisation process offers 20