Southern Times demise predictable

MOSES MAGADZATHE phone rings. The number is not familiar. However, from the country code, it is clear the caller is in Zimbabwe. After a brief exchange of pleasantries, I recognise the voice as that of Innocent Gore, an affable man who was my workmate when I worked as assistant editor of The Herald between 2002 and 2004.

“By now you have probably heard that the Southern Times is folding. We are working on the last edition. We were wondering if – as the paper’s founding editor – you could say a few words,” he says calmly.

So this is it? After nearly 15 years of flickering like a candle in the wind, The Southern Times is bowing out of the regional media landscape.

I tell him that I have not heard the news, but I agree to say something. A conviction informs my decision that the life and death of Southern Times offer valuable lessons on how to and not to set up a regional newspaper.

For yours truly and those who set up this paper, its demise, although somewhat predictable, is like a death in the family.

Flashback to 2004, I am sitting in my office in The Herald, writing. The phone rings. The caller is Pikirayi Deketeke (then editor of The Herald and now Zimpapers chief executive officer) Do I have a moment? He is my boss. For him, I will always have a moment. I save my work and before you could say ‘Oh really,’ I am on a chair in Deketeke’s imposing office.

Zimbabwe and Namibia want to start a regional newspaper that can tell the African story from an African perspective; he tells me. The lot has fallen on me to set up this regional newspaper. He instructs me to think about a name for the paper as well as what form or shape it might take. I am honoured and humbled. The brief meeting ends.

A few days later, I come up with two possible names: The Zambezi Times and The Southern Times. The Zambezi River flows through nine southern African countries, sustaining more than 40 million lives. I envisage a newspaper that can quench the information thirst of the peoples of the SADC region the same way the Zambezi does. I reckon that since the paper will cover southern Africa, alternatively calling it The Southern Times would be appropriate.

The two names are shot down. There is a burning desire to counter South Africa’s Sunday Times. It is suggested that the upcoming regional newspaper be called The New Sunday Times. Word goes out, and the decision stirs a hornet’s nest. The proprietors of the Sunday Times are livid. A protracted legal fight over the proposed name looms. We back-off and go back to The Southern Times.

Work to set up the paper in earnest begins. Working with The Herald senior assistant editor Gareth Willard and a team of The Herald sub-editors, I superintend over the production of the first dummy for the newspaper. It is good.

In Namibia, where The Southern Times is to be headquartered, New Era hires energetic investigative journalist Max Hamata as my deputy. He comes to live with me briefly in my flat in Harare as we prepare to launch the newspaper. He has a sharp nose for news, this Hamata chap. Working closely with Tawanda Kanhema (then cub-reporter at The Herald and now with Al Jazeera), Hamata reels off The Southern Times’ first lead story: “Who feeds dogs of war? I am thrilled. The Southern Times is launched amid pomp and fanfare in Zimbabwe’s picturesque tourist city of Victoria Falls.

In September 2004, I pack my few belongings and board the aeroplane for Windhoek, Namibia, to take up the post of founding editor. It is a baptism of fire. There is no budget to hire editorial, marketing, circulation and other ancillary staff to support the fledgeling newspaper. The Herald and New Era staff are routinely roped in to perform these functions.

It becomes apparent to me that for The Southern Times to survive, it must offer more than the daily newspapers and radio stations. In other words, rather than break the news, The Southern Times should strive to EXPLAIN the news and answer the question: “So What?”

I decide to engage veteran journalists and other writers as contributors to The Southern Times. In no time, we have a star-studded team of writers from all over SADC. They include Bashi Letsididi, Botswana’s veteran investigative journalist; Memory Chirere, Jairos Kangira, Wonder Guchu, Zvisinei Sandi, Vimbai Chivaura, Lovemore Banda, Sheuneni Kurasha, Celia Winter-Irving and Collin Gardner from Zimbabwe; Sam Zulu, Melusi Kapatamoyo, Kiss Abrahams (a cartoonist) and Mervin Syafunko (chief writer), from Zambia; Steve Chimombo and the late Chinyeke Tembo from Malawi; Kenneth Chikanga from South Africa; Charles Mangwiro from Mozambique; Charles Tjatindi Kazhila Chinsembu, Confidence Musariri and Laureka Williams from Namibia. There are many other ghostwriters and moonlighters.

The editorial team is impressive. Our articles attract attention far and wide. For example, Chirere’s article on the late Zimbabwean Writer Dambudzo Marechera earns him a front-row seat at a major international conference celebrating the legacy of Marechera at Oxford University in the United Kingdom. Chinsembu’s Scientifically-Speaking column spurs him on to do a PhD in HIV and AIDS. A series of my articles catapult me to the regional podium as a recipient of the SADC Media Award. Most of The Southern Times writers are very established names, and their stature promotes the paper.

The paper offers them a bit of extra income so, in that sense, it is a symbiotic relationship. The articles are well-researched. Many read like journal articles rather than news articles!

Still, the paper lacks its dedicated team to drive advertising and circulation. It has no money. Zimbabwe, a key partner, is squirming under sanctions and is unable to put money on the table for meaningful initial capitalisation. The paper dodders on, supported by The Herald and New Era newspapers.

I often wonder if the paper is not holding on thanks mainly to the long and warm relationship between former presidents Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe and Sam Nujoma of Namibia. There is an unsettling perception that it is a mouthpiece of the governments of Zimbabwe and Namibia, but it plods on.

It fails to bring on board the other SADC member states, which would make it a genuinely regional initiative. It woefully fails to wow the SADC region’s business community, who do not advertise through it. Although well-written, its stories appear limited to where meagre resources are: Zimbabwe and Namibia. The subeditors and graphic designers helping out on the paper are good but helping out on a part-time basis.

Accordingly, there is a limit to how much they can do to improve the paper in terms of design and outlook. Aesthetically, it is no match for The Herald or The Sunday Times.

In 2008, my fixed four-year contract at The Southern Times ends. I decide to broaden my forehead and register for a BA honours degree in media studies and later for a master’s degree in the same field. I am an occasional contributor of news articles to The Southern Times and nearly 30 other publications within the SADC region and beyond.

In about five years after my departure, The Southern Times appoints and dis-appoints editors no less than five times.

I wonder what this does to continuity and public confidence in the paper. There are other senior appointments within the paper, some of them quite remarkable. People grow within The Southern Times, and there are remarkable instances of hitherto low-ranking staff breaking through the proverbial glass ceiling.

I am intrigued by the high-turnover of editors. At some point, I run into one respected editor at a watering hole somewhere in Windhoek’s Katutura location. He tells me he is in the country helping out at The Southern Times. I respect his writing, and I hope that his experience will grow the paper.

A few years later, I run into highly enterprising Mduduzi Matutu of NewZimbabwe.com fame. Over the liquid fire, he tells me he is the new broom at The Southern Times. I congratulate him and offer my support. It is clear that the hard copy or print edition of The Southern Times is not heading anywhere. I suggest to Mduduzi that he strengthen the online version. Sadly, he does not stay long with the paper.

Now, it appears that the proprietors of The Southern Times have had it, and have decided to pull the plug. Several people have asked me what The Southern Times can do differently should it ever be resurrected. I am not sure.

One that does not shy away from speaking truth to power; offer constructive criticism and hold regional and continental bodies to account to make them work better for the citizens of SADC.

I doubt very strongly though, that a print version of a regional newspaper will do the trick. It is my considered view that the hard copy newspaper is slowly and surely going the way that the post office and snail mail went. Online news sources appear to be the in thing.

* Moses Magadza is a PhD fellow with research interests in the manner in which the print media (re) present key populations.

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