By Farisai Gonye 

HARARE - President Robert Mugabe's spokesman has ordered state media editors to impose a partial blackout on Vice President Joice Mujuru, whose camp within the ruling ZANU-PF party has been actively seeking the veteran leader's ouster, ZimOnline established yesterday. 

Authoritative sources told ZimOnline that George Charamba summoned top editors from Harare-based state media last Thursday and ordered a blackout on Mujuru and her known allies. 

Editors of the state media’s print flagship The Herald, its sister The Sunday Mail as well as the Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation attended the meeting held at Charamba’s Munhumutapa offices. 

The presidential spokesman tightly controls state media entities because of his position and closeness to Mugabe. 

The sources said Charamba, who is also permanent secretary in the Ministry of Information and Publicity, told the editors that they should amplify support for Mugabe's candidature in next year’s watershed presidential elections. 

"We were told to bring to the limelight the fact that most party organs support Mugabe's candidature,” said an editor who attended the meeting but spoke on condition he was not named. 

The editor said Charamba was emphatic that the Mujuru faction should be blocked out from news coverage. 

“Mujuru herself would have her coverage reduced to a bare minimum. We can't completely ignore her because she is the vice-president," the editor said. 

Charamba was not available for comment. His boss, Information Minister Sikhanyiso Ndlovu refused to comment on the matter yesterday, insisting that he did not attend the meeting. 

"I don't even know that my secretary had a meeting with editors recently," said Ndlovu, a Mugabe loyalist. 

The partial blackout is seen as part of the bitter internal infighting in ZANU PF over who will succeed Mugabe. 

Mujuru and her husband, retired army general Solomon Mujuru, lead a ZANU PF faction that is vigorously pushing for Mugabe's retirement. 

The faction has on two occasions since last year successfully blocked Mugabe's efforts to win endorsement as the ZANU-PF candidate for next year's presidential election, forcing the necessity of a special ZANU PF congress in December to settle the matter. 

Another faction led by Rural Housing and Social Amenities Minister Emmerson Mnangagwa and supported by war veterans, has thrown its hat in with Mugabe, hoping for a swap deal. 

The state media has of late given acres of space to war veterans and other pro-Mugabe party organs such as the ZANU PF Youth League and Women's League. 

"Charamba also ordered that we should slow down on our criticism of under-performing parastatals. He mentioned that we should give more positive coverage to ZINWA (Zimbabwe National Water Authority) and ZESA (Zimbabwe Electricity Supply Authority) to protect the government's image,” the source said. 

ZINWA has come under fire recently for water shortages being experienced across the country following its take-over of water and sewerage operations of city councils. 

ZESA has failed to maintain a constant supply of power to keep industries going, citing shortages of foreign currency to buy spares and import electricity. 

Charamba is also understood to have asked the state editors to do damage control on current shortages of basic commodities. 

Zimbabwe is facing acute shortages of most commodities following an ill-conceived decision by the government to impose a freeze on price increases last June. - ZimOnline