By ZBC Reporter
Zimbabwe and Mozambique have signed two memoranda of understanding for joint ventures in the labour market and information after the 12th Session of the Joint Permanent Commission on Cooperation.
Briefing journalists at the conclusion of the session, the Minister of Information, Publicity and Broadcasting Services, Senator Monica Mutsvangwa said there is a need for greater cooperation in the media sector through exchange programmes among journalists.
“We are very excited about the signing of this MOU between Zimbabwe and Mozambique. It allows us to broaden and strengthen our very deep relations and it is historical. As for me, I am passionate about this and a lot of history is going to be told about this.
We also want to strengthen our social relationship, for example, we share the longest border of 1700 km in Manicaland and that means our people are the same. This is an opportunity to talk about our people’s aspirations to also even strengthen and protect our sovereignty as we were in the trenches together. Mozambique sacrificed a lot for us to be independent.
There is room for our journalists to understand how Mozambicans are, how they live their culture at the same time there is also need for Zimbabwean journalists to understand how we live and how they live,” she said.
One of the MOUs is in the area of the labour market and Senator Mutsvangwa is bullish the agreements will provide an opportunity to encourage investment through the media.
“So this is an opportunity for us to make sure we deepen and collaborate more especially with the signing of the MOU on information development. We want to make sure that we train our journalists, exchange programmes to make sure that our print media electronic media exchange news.
This is a time for us to tell our own stories. This is a rich history between the two countries. Zimbabweans cannot get news from Mozambique on BBC or CNN, we need our news agency to be sharing information exchanging. So we are very excited about this.
We also want the business to improve between our two countries. What is critical is information and as the media sector our job is to make sure that every Zimbabwean and Mozambican understand the opportunities which are therein both countries so this is very exciting,” she added.
Zimbabwe and Mozambique enjoy cordial relations which date back to the liberation struggle with the media having played a key role in information dissemination.