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The First Lady Dr Grace Mugabe on Friday urged the local media to portray a positive picture of the country in order to promote investment. Dr Mugabe who was speaking at her 51st birthday celebrations and handover of goods to various children’s homes at Mazowe Children’s Home, said some media houses were in the habit of peddling lies while ignoring positive developments in the country.

This negative publicity, she said, was scaring away investors. We cannot agree more with Dr Mugabe. Portraying Zimbabwe as a doomed and failed state is counterproductive and should therefore not be tolerated. The incessant negative reporting on Zimbabwe during the past few months is a cause for concern. One could be excused for concluding that some Zimbabweans have been reduced to moving skeletons as a result of hunger.

According to private media accounts, there is a total collapse of the economy and there is no hope that the country can recover from this economic quagmire. Admitted, the country is facing economic challenges and measures are being put in place to address these challenges. The media will not be doing the country any good by being alarmists and scaring away investors.

What does the media intend to achieve by blowing the situation out of proportion? Dr Mugabe said the media is daily awash with bad coverage. “We have a role to sell our country and the way we brand Zimbabwe is very important,” she said.

The First Lady said the thrust now should be to woo investors so that they exploit Zimbabwe’s abundant natural resources to grow the economy. “How can we court investors if we are reporting negatively about Zimbabwe? Who can be attracted to bad things?” asked Dr Mugabe.

Three months ago, Minister of Information, Media and Broadcasting Services, Dr Christopher Mushohwe, said by scaring away investors, the media was shooting itself in the foot. He said the media was equally affected by the flight of investors from the country and the closure of companies. The Minister said the shrinking of the industry as a result of closure of companies impacts negatively on the media’s business because the very same people who are supposed to consume their products will be out of employment.

Many companies last year rushed to retrench thousands of workers taking advantage of the Supreme Court ruling that allowed companies to retrench workers on three months’ notice without paying severance packages and the media was not spared.

Many journalists were thrown onto the streets and many from the private media are yet to be paid their packages after the Government amended the Labour Act to force the companies to pay the packages retrospectively. It therefore boggles the mind when the same private media that was so adversely affected by the poor performance of the economy, relishes a further deterioration of the situation. The media as stated by Minister Mushohwe has a critical role to play in turning around the economy.

It is the media that can tell the world that there are abundant investment opportunities in Zimbabwe. We are cognisant of the media’s watchdog role hence we are not saying the media should not highlight the shortcomings of government. It is through the media that those corrupt individuals that are abusing state resources for their personal benefit can be exposed as well as those frustrating potential investors by demanding bribes.

It is a fact that Zimbabwe is endowed with abundant natural resources that can make a difference but this is only possible if potential investors are confident that their investments will be secure. The media therefore has a critical role to build this confidence and this includes both the public and private media.

A prosperous Zimbabwe will be enjoyed by all citizens regardless of one’s political affiliation. It is therefore incumbent upon all Zimbabweans to have a shared vision when it comes to national issues because we have no substitute for this country.

We want at this juncture to implore the media to be responsible in its reportage as it has the power to build or destroy this nation. Dr Mugabe said what we should all appreciate is that we are Zimbabweans first and foremost hence we have an obligation to contribute in making Zimbabwe a prosperous nation.

We want to once again urge the media to take heed of the wise words from the First Lady so that together as a nation we can attract the much needed foreign direct investment.