Zim government moves to control cyberspace

According to a report in The Daily Mirror, 9 December 2003, this move, if successfully completed, means that the government will be able to monitor individual information, messages and letters leading to the arrest of all those involved in circulating information that the government says undermines the sovereignty of the country.

The Daily Mirror reported that government through the Department of Information and Publicity is set to purchase equioment to the value of $4 billion to enable it to access the cyberspace.

Furthermore the paper revealed that the Department of Information and Publicity led by Professor Jonathan Moyo is at an advanced stage of setting up 24-hour short wave and medium wave radio news station.

The government has so far accused SW Radio Africa - a United Kingdom based radio station and Washington's Voice of America's Studio 7 of disseminating negative information about the country. The paper said the government intends to counter the short-wave radio stations by launching its own 24-hour news broadcast.

Speaking at the World Summit on the Information Society in Geneva on December 10, President Robert Mugabe echoed similar sentiments as expressed in the paper saying Britain and the United States of America are using their superiority in information technologies to destabilise Zimbabwe and other small and poor states.

"I say this because my country Zimbabwe continues to be a victim of such aggression, with both the United Kingdom and the United States using their information technologies superiority to challenge our sovereignty through hostile and malicious broadcasts calculated to foment instability and destroy the state through divisions," Mugabe said.