Political economy influence on media content in Zimbabwe: The pre-2018 election discourse

The right to freedom of choice, expression and information are fundamental principles of democracy and good governance. However, these concepts are applied differently from country to country and they can be easily identified through free press reportage as to whether they are upheld or not. Democracy in essence breeds good governance and the free press has to act as watchdogs to the systems that are responsible to ensure and enable democracy. The first step to democracy in Zimbabwe and many other countries is believed to be the electoral process which ushers in new governments after every given time frame. In Zimbabwe the term of office of an elected government is five years after which elections are conducted. Before the elections are physically conducted they are usually played in the media. Thus, political parties vying for positions to be the next government use the media as tools to rally support from the electorate. Zimbabwe held harmonised elections in 2018. The political parties in the country got into an election mood ahead of the polls and the media diverted its attention from other issues to focus much on election related reporting. In their reportage two major influences shaped their content and these are the political economy (ownership and funding) and agenda setting. In Zimbabwe there are two folds to media ownership, namely the state and private media. However, their role of setting public agenda usually influences their content at a larger extent.