THE REPORTAGE OF LAND AND OWNERSHIP IN SELECTED PRIVATE MEDIA IN ZIMBABWE

The aim of this article is to scrutinise how the concepts of land and land ownership were discussed in the private media in Zimbabwe during the Zimbabwe land reform exercise – dubbed ‘the third Chimurenga’ that took place in the period 2000–2008. Using textual analysis, the articles argues that ownership of land, according to the so called ‘private or independent’ newspapers in Zimbabwe was supposed to be accorded to the farmer or person, regardless of the racial bias, who was more productive on the land and who was contributing more to the economic well-being of the nation (Zimbabwe). Accordingly, the private newspapers in Zimbabwe regarded land as belonging to, or as the rightful property of the white commercial farmers/settlers because they perceived them to be more productive on the land than the native people of Zimbabwe who were ultimately seen and labelled as invaders on the so-called white commercial farms. In order to substantiate the above claims and arguments, a number of The Daily News stories of the period were purposively sampled and are used as examples.