Victoria Ruzvidzo

Career

Victoria Ruzvidzo joined Zimpapers in June 1993 and rose from being a cub reporter to Editor of The Sunday Mail. Ruzvidzo is the first female to head The Sunday Mail. According to a letter written in 2019 by Zimpapers’ editorial executive William Chikoto to the ZNCC adjudicating committee, Ruzvidzo had significantly increased The Sunday Mail's contribution to the Digital and Publishing Division the first few months after she had been appointed editor.

In 2019, Ruzvidzo was one of the African women invited to the Forbes Africa Summit in Durban South Africa to deliberate on issues affecting women. She has been a guest speaker at several local and international conferences. Ruzvidzo is also a mentor under the US Embassy Public Affairs women in Journalism Mentoring Programme and the Humanitarian Information Facilitation Centre (HIFIC) mentorship programme for young journalists.^[2]

Ruzvidzo was appointed Sunday Mail editor in 2018 taking over from Mabasa Sasa.^[3]

Controversies

Makandiwa Article

The Ministry of Information spoke to Ruzvidzo over an article claiming that Emmanuel Makandiwa foretold the Covid-19 pandemic.

Following criticism over the article, Government spokesperson, Nick Mangwana revealed that there had been a conversation over the story with the editor. He said:

"The editor has been spoken to. She has taken counsel well. It won’t happen again.”

The newspaper was accused of “promoting prophets at the expense of scientific knowledge” by journalist Pedzisai Ruhanya on Twitter.

Former Herald editor Tichaona Zindoga said the paper was “endangering readers” with “this cheap, religious point-scoring claiming.”

Ruzvidzo denied accusations that she is in Makandiwa’s “media committee”, although admitting she’s a member of the United Family International Church (UFIC). Ruzvidzo said:

“I respect your views, but for the record I’m not in the UFIC media committee and I don’t hold any leadership position."

^[4]

Comments on Nelson Chamisa

On April 18, 2021, Ruzvidzo was criticised on Twitter for calling Chamisa an errant child.

Ruzvidzo made the remarks while interviewing President Emmerson Mnangagwa on 18 April 2021. She said:

"An errant child would get a bit of a sjambok to whip them into line, either physically or through other measures, maybe counselling. What are we doing with this child of ours, Nelson Chamisa?"

Commenting on Ruzvidzo’s remarks, award-winning journalist and documentary filmmaker, Hopewell Chin'ono said her speech was devoid of journalism ethics. Chin’ono said:

"It is shocking and professionally unacceptable that the editor of the @SundayMailZim, Victoria Ruzvidzo, would equate @nelsonchamisa to a little kid that needs a sjambok! It just shows how deplorable this regime and its surrogates have descended from the gutter into the sewer!"

Alex Magaisa said the remarks reminds of the colonial era when African males, no matter their age, were called boys by Europeans. He said:

“An errant child would get a bit of a sjambok to whip them into line, either physically or through other measures, maybe counselling. What are we doing with this child of ours, Nelson Chamisa?” says the editor of state paper @SundayMailZim Victoria Ruzvidzo There’s so much that’s wrong with this. For a start, the irony is that the Black man was regarded as a “boy” during colonial times & in an interview to commemorate independence the editor of a state paper describes the opposition leader as a “child”, literally a boy!"

^[5]

Awards

In March 2021, Ruzvidzo won the balanced coverage of women’s issues in the media award at the Red Lipstick Annual Business Achievers Awards.^[6] On 29 March 2019, Victoria Ruzvidzo was named runner-up Business Leadership Award in the Zimbabwe National Chamber of Commerce (ZNCC) Mashonaland Region category.^[2]

References