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Global Social Media Platforms Threaten Our Sovereignty – Zimbabwe Government Minister

Staff Writer

Local innovators need to develop social media platforms to curb the threat of global companies such as Meta and ByteDance on Zimbabwe’s sovereignty, a government minister said this week.

The minister, Dr Jenfan Muswere was speaking at a conference at one of Zimbabwe’s oldest universities, NUST, where he warned against the continued reliance on social media platforms owned by “international giants”.

Muswere is Zimbabwe’s Information, Publicity and Broadcasting Services Minister. He said the traditional print media industry, which had a lot of influence on public opinion in the past, no longer held sway and their business is threatened by social media. Readership of newspapers in Zimbabwe has dropped from over 100,000 to less than 10,000 per day, he said.

Said Muswere:

“The phone, artificial intelligence, broadband and information science have completely transformed the way we live, handle transactions, and make decisions as countries and individuals.

“There is a total shift in marketing from the old print and broadcasting media to social media platforms, which now control and dominate advertising and marketing.

“Social media now dominates international trade and marketing, so it is very important for researchers and academics to work together to achieve data sovereignty.

“Universities must take the lead for Zimbabwe to develop its own social media platforms, as reliance on social media platforms owned by international giants will continue to threaten the sovereignty of our nation and other African countries.”

While newspapers are still read by older generations, younger people do not buy newspapers or read news websites anymore. They get their updates of local events and entertainment content from social media apps like Instagram, X, and WhatsApp plus global video platforms like YouTube, and TikTok.

Even a section of older Zimbabweans get their news on platforms such as Facebook and X.

This has shifted the control of information and influence on populations from country governments and traditional media to global companies like Meta, X, Google and ByteDance.

The global companies themselves are generally incentivised by business objectives and the algorithms determining spread and reach of information on the platforms are designed with those goals. However, the companies also answer to their own governments and owner’s non-business objectives.

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16 comments

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  1. D.K.

    The world has become a global village which only the newer generations can understand forty four years later. We can no longer isolate or insulate ourselves from the rest of the world to have a people who only use can influence. With not much activity happening now compared to a few years ago, the youth are curious to know and want to be involved in what makes the global world go round, they want to know and be involved in the making of cloth and clothes after David Whitehead Textiles as it was closed, in the making of cars after Willowvale Mazda closed, in the making of international quality motor tyres after Dunlop closed, the making of electronic gadgets after Philips, Supersonic and WRS closed, they want to follow and be in the spaces they could have been involved in in NRZ, Lever Brothers and the international banks and audit companies that left. As far the media, most of it has been bought by people with lots of money who have their interests to prop and protect, to the extent that newspapers have become tools and mouthpieces.
    While we want to follow the Chinese in localisation, we do not have the numbers of people or the resources. Even if we include the SADC, it will still not be feasible.
    Things will get worse for those for localisation with the coming in of the international telecommunications giant who is able to work in the country for the citizens without a physical presence in the country.
    In case they didn’t know, we used to buy newspapers mostly for the paid for adverts where we got the news we wanted. We would know who had died, when and where they will be cremated or buried, we would know what jobs are on offer, we would know about houses on sale, etc.
    The world is now for the new generation, and we, the older generation should adapt to keep our blood pressure from shooting.

    Reply
  2. JC

    I am enjoying my Econet bundle of unlimited data and 200 minutes just for $15

    Reply
    1. T ccoki

      How do you get it like the ussd code is pliz

      Reply
    2. Voltron

      Tipei ma USSD code acho nesu titenge ma bundle acho

      Reply
  3. Tkt

    Econet Family launched Sasai, & the people chose not to accept

    Saka umm, ma1 chaiwo

    Reply
    1. Anonymous

      Services can’t be just accepted like that , it takes an innovative product for people to accept it in tech.

      Reply
  4. Dalfpin

    Ana herald ngavavhare ma papers acho vogadzira ma tissue coz news dzavo ndedze ku murmur

    Reply
  5. rubbish stuff

    i bought a herald newspaper in 2001, it was a waste of whatever the currency was called and a load of rubbish (the currency and the newspaper were both a load of rubbish) so i never bought one again, my mental health has improved a lot since 2001 when i last read the herald…

    Reply
  6. Just barking

    Tuma statements twema Caveman being made by muswere. Social media apps are far too sophisticated for zim gvt to run. Imagine the gvt cannot keep its own websites running and updated vozoda kutaura abt these platforms way beyond their reach. Iyo sovereignty yavanoda kutaura ndeipi when they are freely giving china, russia, belarus etc unfettered access.

    Reply
  7. Mukanya

    Social media is the way to go please advise Muswere, I neither read nor listen from the the so-called official media which distorts what I would have seen live with my own eyes..

    Reply
  8. X

    Econet could have done it with Sasai, because they had all the right ingredients, a telecommunication company with the largest subscriber base, they could have allowed people to use Sasai for free, it would have been expensive for them at the beginning but would be profitable on the long term because Sasai is not just a social media app its a mixture of services and that would have opened up many revenue avenues for econet, they would have a far greater monopoly than they have today but econet being econet they missed out on that opportunity because of greed

    Reply
    1. Me

      True. Sasai was supposed to be zero rated on econet, Marketed in Schools (highschools and tertiary) because the younger generation was goingg to give it even more popularity on a wider scale

      They were also supposed to promote it more during the covid era, which they failed

      Reply
  9. Zondo

    Herald, ZBC Tv etc are mouthpieces of a political party that lives and survives on propaganda. Gone are the days, now information is no longer easily controlled and manipulated.

    Reply
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