Like most industries in Zimbabwe, the news media sector is all but in recession.
While there is a semblance of life - albeit the sustained production of news products on a daily basis, the reality is that running a news media enterprise in Zimbabwe is becoming more of a vocation than it is a profitable venture.
The power and sphere of influence of the media is facing stiff competition from the growing influencer culture, rise of podcasters and masquerades feasting on audience vulnerabilities in this post truth era.
This then poses a definitional challenge for journalism and locating its role thereof in this information age.
The generational moot roles of informing, educating and entertaining have since lost lustre due to the multiplicity of fora for audiences to access such services.
Even the watchdog role and holding power in all its manifestations accountable has been transforming as a speciality of journalists and organised media to being a space for anyone and everyone that can intellectually and emotionally appeal to audiences.
There is also a rapidly growing informal market for news and journalism amid shifting trends in gatekeeping and quality assurance of news products.
There can, as an example be very little if at all gatekeeping and quality assurance in breaking news on social media and responsibilities of running those rarely controlled by editors.
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The newsroom structure and process of news production have in turn naturally changed.
This has been made worse by convergence. Journalists now have to be multi-skilled and media roles have largely been conflated.
Other roles are actually now defunct with the emergence of atificial intelligence (AI) tools replacing some of the functions that were necessary in newsrooms in the not so distant past.
All these factors require strategic reflection on what would be the role of a journalist union, on who should unionise and why there is still a need to defend the rights of journalists as professional workers.
To give a little context, it was easier to respond to these questions when the country's sole journalistic union, the Zimbabwe Union of Journalists (ZUJ) was conceived transitioning from the then Rhodesian Guild.
Membership to the Union was a preserve of journalists in established media organizations and the mandate to negotiate for better working conditions.
Line editors going up the hierarchy in the newsroom were considered managers and would not sit in at the same negotiating table as journalists.
The assumption, which I believe is no longer relevant in this context being that there was a noticeable difference in the welfare of such line editors and journalists.
While this may vary from one media organisation to the other, the sustainability challenges are cross cutting and job as well as salary cuts are affecting all and sundry in the newsroom. Including non-payment of salaries.
Journalists have also been organizing themselves in setting up start ups and producing editorially independent content in navigating the complex Zimbabwe's media political economy.
Technically it makes these journalists employers on account of them commissioning journalistic work.
The same applies to podcasters and influencers, particularly those that are trained as journalists.
The moment they commission work, they become employers.
But are they really employers, when they themselves also often depend on negotiating the selling of their content and services.
Can they associate and unionise?
By the same measure what could realistically be the role of a union in negotiating that which isn't there.
To put it more graphically to negotiate where there is no money.
Surely, the standpoint cannot just merely be the easy way out of closing media organisations.
There has to be strategic thinking, which a journalist union should be best placed to proffer.
Even if it is just to create platforms of strengthening solidarity and support systems.
Beyond the definitional and bread and butter challenges, there are broader contextual and environmental challenges.
Most of these challenges are operational and affect the safety of journalists.
From arbitrary arrests of journalists to political victimisation, repressive legislation and sexual harassment, there is need to upscale advocacy in creating a conducive operating environment for the media sector.
Yet still there are opportunities for unionising journalism.
Three such opportunities are low hanging fruits that strategic multi stakeholders approach can facilitate for progressive development.
First, the national media policy launched at the highest office on the land fully supports a National Employment Council (Nec) for journalists.
The standardisation of conditions of service and a collective bargaining platform for journalists will certainly add value in co-creating solutions to media sustainability challenges.
Secondly, the very same policy suggests the operationalisation of a media fund as a stimulus package for the media and to promote innovation and digital convergence.
While the current legislation provides for the establishment of such a fund, the policy gives impetus to the operationalization of such investment into the sector and it could be an opportunity to support journalism.
Third and finally for this instalment, they are ongoing policy dialogues to give effect to co-regulation of the media.
This is not only obtained in the policy but in Cabinet principles to the Media Practitioners Bill, which is currently at drafting stage.
It is noteworthy that government recognizes the empirical need for the media to self-regulate.
ZUJ and its partners in the Media Alliance of Zimbabwe (MAZ) established a self-regulatory mechanism and the recognition of this mechanism by government should assist in framing the output of the process in implementing a democratic regulatory framework for the media in Zimbabwe.
It is notable that the journalistic union was able to convene an elective general meeting to galvanise and mobilise members towards rethinking priorities.
The big question though is not about the convening being elective, a potentially divisive agenda item if the focus is on personalities and not institutional building.
The real deal is addressing the fundamental challenges threatening the very existence of journalism and unionism. And how to leverage on the opportunities that are currently presenting themselves to take Zimbabwean journalism to posterity.
*Nigel Nyamutumbu is a media development practitioner serving as the Coordinator of a network of journalistic professional associations and media support organisations the Media Alliance of Zimbabwe. He can be contacted on [email protected] or +263 772 501 557
