CONDOLENCE MESSAGE BY THE MINISTER OF INFORMATION, PUBLICITY AND BROADCASTING SERVICES, SENATOR MONICA MUTSVANGWA, ON THE PASSING ON OF THE SECRETARY GENERAL OF THE ZIMBABWE UNION OF JOURNALISTS, FOSTER VULINDLELA DONGOZI
I am deeply saddened by the passing on of Foster Dongozi, the Secretary General of the Zimbabwe Union of Journalists (ZUJ) on Wednesday night of 23 December 2020. Mr Dongozi started feeling unwell on Saturday 19 December 2020 after attending a Media Training workshop on the ‘Transitional Stabilisation Programme Successes and National Development Strategy 1 Reporting’ in Gweru and succumbed to breathing complications on admission at Parirenyatwa Hospital.
A towering figure in the media industry, Foster’s journey in the media sector began when he trained in journalism at the Harare Polytechnic. Over the years, he horned his skill at various institutions across the globe including Cairo, Egypt; Berlin, Germany and Cardiff, Wales, in the United Kingdom.
He worked as a journalist at The Standard, Daily News and The Chronicle. As he grew in the industry, he worked as Editor for: Disability Rights Up; Sexual Harassment in the Media Research; and, Women Walk Silently to Parliament. Foster also worked as a correspondent to: the Drum Magazine; United Nations Integrated Regional Information Networks (IRIN); and, New York Times. As testimony of his excellence in the journalism profession, Foster was the Environmental Journalist of the Year in 1998 and the News Reporter of the Year in 2003.
In recognition of his leadership qualities, Foster was elected General Council Member of the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU); Executive Committee Member of the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ); Executive Member of the Federation of African Journalists (FAJ); and, President of ZUJ and later its Secretary General, a post he held till his untimely demise.
At a time when Zimbabwe was under siege from some Western media houses that were working in cahoots with countries that had been miffed by Zimbabwe’s Land Reform Programme, Foster as President of ZUJ, worked with the then Ministry of Media, Information and Publicity to host the Federation of African Journalists congress in Zimbabwe in 2010. The event helped to reveal the true story of Zimbabwe, including the Land Reform Programme, to African media.
Foster was a unifying and harmonising figure in the media industry whose main focus was press freedom and the welfare of journalists. In fact one of my first meetings as Minister of Information, Publicity and Broadcasting Services was with Foster in his capacity as ZUJ Secretary General. He seemingly had come to assess if really as the Second Republic we were serious about media reform or just paying lip service. Out of that first engagement came successive meetings; a new cordial and professional relationship between Government and the media; participation and cooperation in outreach programmes that sought to reform the media sector in Zimbabwe leading to the repeal of the Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act (AIPPA) as well as the enactment process of the successor acts.
May I on behalf of the Ministry of Information, Publicity and Broadcasting Services, the Government of Zimbabwe and my family express my deep and profound condolences to the Dongozi family, his friends and the media fraternity at large. The loss is not only to his family and friends but to the whole nation. May his soul rest in internal peace.
Monica Mutsvangwa, Senator
Minister of Information, Publicity and Broadcasting Services
24/12/2020