Public relations key in rebuilding Zimbabwe
INFORMATION, Publicity and Broadcasting Services minister Monica Mutsvangwa, has made a clarion call for public relations personnel to rebuild a positive image for the nation through disseminating correct and concise information.
Speaking during the Institute of Public Relations and Communication Zimbabwe (Prcz)’s excellence awards in Harare recently, the minister said she held in high regard the institute as it dovetailed with the ministry’s mandate of informing the nation and the international community about Zimbabwe for a better image.
“Public relations of our nation cannot be the preserve of one ministry alone, but a collective responsibility in which we should unite and collaborate to gain a positive image for the country,” she said.
The minister said the awards had come at a time COVID-19 was causing havoc across the globe.
“It is in times like these that government and the private sector and indeed the entirety of the Zimbabwe populace must find each other more in order to win the war against the virus and forge ahead with our national goals,” Mutsvangwa said, adding that the public relations and communication excellence awards were a demonstration of the endurance of the practitioners.
“They have had to press on during the devastating COVID-19 pandemic. Some were infected, while others were affected one way or the other.”
She said business was equally hard hit due to a lockdown, which required people to regroup and refocus.
“Indeed the year 2020 has not been easy for all of us. While we are slowly getting back on our feet we want to appreciate the various essential and non-essential business entities that have shown great resilience by continuing to believe in the Zimbabwean vision that of an upper-middle income society by 2030,” she said.
“The theme Resilience and Retention — Overcoming hardships and challenges of COVID-19 calls upon public relations and communication practitioners to be resilient in the face of the pandemic.
Paying tribute to the public relations and communication practitioners she said: “So as we honour the men and women in the public relations and communications industry tonight, let us be reminded that the challenges we are facing as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic are a shared responsibility.
These whom we are honouring this evening have made exceptional contributions to nation-building in their various fields and capacities. Some have adopted new and innovative ways of spreading messages.”
Meanwhile the minister also spoke on the achievements by government in the agricultural and energy sectors.
Government is championing a private sector-led economic growth under the National Development Strategy 1, a five-year economic blueprint that runs from 2021 to 2025.
The NDS1 replaces the Transitional Stabilisation Programme, which ran from October 2018 until December 2020.
“As I always say, the sharing of information that fosters nation building, social cohesion and economic development, is not the burden of the ministry alone. My ministry is seized with the opening avenues for engagement with private and public sectors to ensure we all pull together in making Zimbabwe better and stronger.”
Also present at the event was president of the African Public Relations Association, Yomi Badejo Okusanya.
“His ( Okusanya) presence here tonight is testimony of Zimbabwe’s engagement and re-engagement thrust to cement our ties with friends and other progressive nations of the world,” she said.
Mutsvangwa also said President Emmerson Mnangagwa emphasised that aspect which forms the basis upon which the second republic is anchored.
PRCZ is a private institution specialising primarily in public relations, media and presentation training, and imparting communication skills.
The organisation goes further to interrogate the science beneath the art of public relations and focus on key issues that matter to the practice, providing timely insights and applied intelligence that public relations professionals can put to immediate use.
PRCZ aims to promote social, business and economic integration and is committed to selling positive images of individuals, organisations and the nation as a whole, through the instrumentality of the public relations profession.