Shoko Festival Artist Info and Profile

NATTY

The dreadlocked Reggae artist from North London posses a thoughtful take on what it is to be young in the inner city today with soulful accuracy.
He is born of a mother from Lesotho,a tiny kingdom that is found in the borders and an English father of Italian descent.
He learnt playing the guitar at 10 and he spent his teenage years creating beats for rapping mates.His bedroom mastery of music production earned him a job at premier recording studio Sphere,in Battersea,London.He worked at the studio for four years and everyone passed through that studio from Duran Duran to Mos Def,he says.He then picked up his guitar when he turned 18 beginning to write his own tracks during the studio's downtime.After leaving Sphere,Natty started gigging around London around London attracting a buzz that resulted in his starting the Vibes and Pressure Nights,a magnet for the underground music scene.Things quickly picked up for Natty with a recording contract with Atlantic Records,the release of "Man Like I",his debut album and it had a #1 hit single "Badman" in Japan.Thats when he embarked on his first European tour including gigs with Adele,Lee Perry and Baaba Maal.  
Natty's band comprises of his collaborater and guitar player,Jahmel,a bass and percussion player with Reggae roots and of course him on the vocals.
He is one of the international artist's who will be gracing the the much anticipated Shoko Festival.To follow him check him out on @nattymusic on twitter and Natty on Facebook.

Women Demand Media Rights

Influential women such as Human rights and media Lawyer Beatrice Mutetwa and chairperson of the Women Coalition of Zimbabwe (WCOZ) Virginia Muwanigwa  blasted the media for not  honouring the women's rights in the media while addressing journalists at the Quill Club recently.

Beatrice said that media has to give women a voice and it should work hand in glove with women human rights defenders to help stand for the rights of the women and create security for women.

Virginia said that they want to be seen as equal members of the community who need the same coverage of media that other men,members of the community are getting.

She said that the media has objective coverage of women and for instance if the Prime Minister would claim that women are clogging drainage system with the sand they  use when they clean pots,the media would ask them to comment about that issue and not to comment the more important issues like the new constitutional draft.

Beatrice also said the media has to empower  women and not undermine the women like what they do when they are covering only women for loitering and prostitution but they do not also say who they are loitering for who happen to be men.

They also said that they are disapointed in the media and they are hoping that the media will change towards the benefit of the women.

Taking Over The Town

Taking over the town is the theme for this year's Shoko Festival and looking at what it is promising to be,it is the appropriate theme for the occasion. The first Shoko Festival was launched last year and it was history in the making because nothing like the festival had ever happened.Also looking at how the Festival came to be,we can see that the event was born from Community events and Spoken word poetry slams and also live music and hip hop events.
The community had been taken over,the street corners had been taken over and with the way the movement was and is  growing the Town was the next victim.I am perfectly sure that the next theme of the Festival is taking over the country and after that the continent.

Community Radio Festival

The Media institute of Southern Africa (MISA)Zimbabwe in collaboration with (ZACRAS) Zimbabwe  Association Of Community Radio Stations,hosted a Community Radio festival in honour of various broadcasting stations in the country recntly.
The theme was "A decade of waiting,Give the communities a voice". and the festival comes in a time when talk is about to free the airwaves.MISA programmes officer Koliwe Majama said the media institute is making a statement."We are making a political statement.At a time whereby commercial radio licences are being licensed community ones are being ignored.Some of these community radios have been in existence for more than ten years but they are not recognised.So this is only to question and address the awarding of the broadcasting licences,"she said.
Majama added  that the stations have come together to celebrate the accomplishments achieved so far by stations,despite being denied licenses opportunities."We brought out all the community radio stations in the country.There are about seven rural and twelve urban.They exhibited their works at the Media Centre.These radios have no proper listenership and we can only talk of listenership when they are licensed.They were pre-recorded programmes which communities would listen to in groups".she said.
Radio stations that participated include Radio FM,Corah,Kwelaz,Wezhira and others.A training workshop targeted at well-equiped community radios with existing relations with the public also took place.The training intends to ensure that the community  radio stations come up with business plans which will then ensure sustainability beyond the funding era.
The issue of freeing the airwaves has been a hot topic with many private players acccusing the Broadcasting Authority of Zimbabwe (BAZ) of being biased towards state-affiliated players.In November last year there was a call for commercial radio licences and they were awarded to AB Communications' Zi Radio and Zimpapers'  Talk Radio now Star FM making them the first two commercial private radios.
BAZ had received 14 aplications from different players commercial radio licences.In March this year Vox Media productions,owners of Radio Voice of the People (Vop) re-applied for the license after being denied last year.The organisation was among four potential broadcasters that were called for interviews but did not succeed.
Vox Media has since approached the courts to challenge the BAZ decision.Ministry of media,Information and Publicity Webster Shamu has been under fire from some parliamentarians over several issues to do with broadcasting.
They accused him of personalising the ministry and stalling the issue of media reforms.

ZambeziNews Advertorial

Zimbabwe needs a Saviour

Looking at the political deadlock and a lot of other hindrances that are causing the country not to develop it is clear that we need a saviour or two with supernatural powers in Zimbabwe.
We have tried putting trust in men and in politics and it seems as if the main agenda of every politician is power and money and on the other hand the people and the betterment of the community are not on their mind.The only thing that can be talked about that has been done by the politicians for the people is the attainment of "freedom and independence" and because there is nothing else they have done,that same fact of putting their lives on the line has been highly exploited to the maximum that we have nothing else to do but to live in the past.
Because we are in living in the past or in other words we are driving a car while looking in the view mirror and not in the front we have seen that we have made a lot of fatal crashes and there is something that is telling me that we have to brace ourselves for more is install for us.
It is obvious that we need a saviour,a sanctuary,someone to put trust in,someone who is not selfish and has the people's interests at heart,someone who would take a bullet for someone.
In search of hope we met up with Superman and Batman and they so happened to be taking a stroll in the neighbourhood.

Arts and Democracy Part 2

According to Dr Lovemore Madhuku " The world of Arts can never make sense if it does not relate to the day to livelihood of a community".He was quoted saying this at Performing Democracy workshop that was held at the Media House Centre  in Harare recently.

Dr Madhuku  said that Politicians are dictators by telling people what to do and what not to do and also controlling what to happen and what not to happen and the  role of Arts is to show the people that out of every situation there is an alternative.He also stated that the society is not free because of human effort and it is the role of arts to make an effort and make the society a better place.

Dr Madhuku said that in a society everyone has a role to play and no one is supposed to be told what to do but everything that is done is because of the pursuit of happiness.He said that everyone has the mandate to give back to the community and if you have a talent it has to be exploited  for the betterment of the community.

He concluded saying that "Yes indeed Art is very vital in Democratic Development because it is about life and how else can one talk about life without including Freedom and Democracy".