The bridges.org/IICD Case Study Series on ICT-Enabled Development sets out to illustrate how ICT contributes to development in Africa. The aim of this series is to help ground level initiatives imagine the possibilities of what can happen if they use ICT successfully to overcome development obstacles, and to contribute to the existing body of knowledge on the digital divide.

I. Overview: The Kubatana Project of Zimbabwe

Initiative: The Kubatana Project manages Kubatana.net, a website portal that provides Zimbabwean civil society organisations with an online presence and a platform to voice their concerns about human rights abuses in their country. The project also offers courses that teach civil society organisations to use information communication technology (ICT) to further their goals.

Implemented by: The Kubatana Project was founded by two Zimbabwean women, Bev Clark and Brenda Burrell. They still run the organisation, but are now helped by a part-time administrative assistant and freelancer writers.

Funding or financial model: The project is a non-profit, non-governmental organisation (NGO) supported by foreign donor funding.

Timeframe: Established in March 2001.

Local context: During recent years, Zimbabwe has been increasingly recognised as a country where free expression and human rights are at risk. During most of President Robert Mugabe's 22-year rule in Zimbabwe, freedom of the press was imperfect, but better than in most African nations. However, that began to change when the independent press started to challenge President Mugabe. The Government, threatened by loss of power, responded by cracking down on the press. Last year, barely a month before the elections in March, the Government enacted the Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act that imposes heavy fines and jail terms of up to two years for "abuse of journalistic privilege", including the publication of "falsehoods", or statements that the Government deems to be untrue. Eight local and foreign journalists have since been charged under this clause. The Act also bars foreigners from working in Zimbabwe as correspondents, and requires journalists to be accredited by the government-appointed Media and Information Commission. The Government was criticised earlier this year for declaring that The Daily News was operating illegally because it had not registered with the Commission. Zimbabwean Minister of Information Jonathan Moyo said the paper had chosen not to register, but others report that the Commission refused to accredit the newspaper.

According to renowned human rights organisation Amnesty International, over the last three years the Zimbabwean Government security forces and state-sponsored militia have been responsible for numerous human rights violations in Zimbabwe. Amnesty charges that "the ultimate responsibility for the deliberate state-sponsored campaign of harassment and acts of violence, including torture, lies with the Zimbabwean authorities".   And it calls for an end to "the cycle of harassment, arrest and torture of those who peacefully express their opinion, and those in opposition to the government views." Transparency International (TI), an international NGO devoted to combating corruption, has also condemned the Zimbabwean authorities' treatment of human rights activists.

The development problem/obstacle addressed: Because the Zimbabwean Government is increasingly undermining press freedom, it has become more difficult to expose human rights abuses and threats to democracy.

How ICT is used to overcome the problem/obstacle: The Kubatana Project's website, Kubatana.net, provides a web presence to 230 civil and community based organisations of Zimbabwe. Given the clamp down on the print press in Zimbabwe, Kubatana.net --with the help of its members -- has become an important conduit for accurate, up-to-date information about Zimbabwe, both locally and internationally. Each organisation listed in Kubatana.net's online directory has an electronic fact sheet and a link to its website (if it has one). The project also carries information about important legislation. It uses its front page and diverse email address list to provide breaking news, advertise public meetings, mobilise support for campaigns, and distribute information about a range of civil society issues. For instance, recently it alerted readers of the diaries of political prisoners that were hosted on its website. The email list was also used to provide Zimbabweans with information about the voter registration process during Zimbabwe's elections in March 2002.

To raise the profile of the issues it cares about and promote traffic to the website, the Kubatana Project actively markets its services. It has placed advertisements containing information on a variety of civic and human rights issues in national newspapers, inviting people to read more about it on their portal. Young people are targeted through graphics, song lyrics, and poetry that inspire them to join the Kubatana network. Free stamped postcards with non-violent messages advertising Kubatana.net are distributed from service stations, urban municipal offices, libraries, schools, Internet cafés and restaurants. By sending the postcards to their friends and families, Zimbabweans are using the postal service to spread civil rights messages, but also helping to market the Kubatana Project and its members.

In addition, the project facilitates "electronic activism" training workshops. It hires Internet cafés (and in the process support these local businesses), brings together young student activists from colleges and universities, housewives, retired men and women, representatives from CSOs, and political activists, and teaches them how to use ICT to advocate, lobby, and mobilise. A significant amount of time is also allocated on discussing people's fears about using email, and government interference with their communications.

Next steps: In 2003 the project intends to extend its electronic activism workshops nationally and specifically target tertiary education institutions. It also intends to play a role in revitalising community libraries by providing computer equipment, email and Internet connectivity; training librarians in the use of email and Internet; helping design Internet and email training materials for the community; and disseminating a wide range of literature collected from local NGOs and international organisations on topics such as HIV/AIDS, healthcare, and legal issues. There are also plans to replicate the Kubatana model in other African and South American countries by introducing the concept to national NGO networks, and discussion have begun with potential partners in Brazil, Angola and Mozambique.

Geographical area targeted: At this stage the Kubatana Project focuses solely on Zimbabwe.

Contact information:
Contact person: Bev Clark
URL: http://www.kubatana.net
Tel: +263 (0) 4 495484
Fax: +263 (0) 4 495484
Email: nnap@kubatana.org.zw

II. Gauging Real Impact

This section considers whether and how the Kubatana Project has made a Real Impact at the ground level by looking through the lens of basic best practice guidelines for successful initiatives. The bridges.org 7 Habits of Highly Effective ICT-Enabled Development Initiatives are used here as a framework to highlight what the project has done well.

The 7 Habits of Highly Effective ICT-for-Development Initiatives

1. Implement and disseminate best practice
Before launching their own portal, the two founders reviewed various information portals to learn about the best ways to deliver information. They are also experienced activists and ardent supporters of freedom of speech who previously confronted the Zimbabwean Government on gay and lesbian rights and have used their mobilising skills acquired during the period to start up the Kubatana Project. By creating a network of community based organisations and human rights activists, both within Zimbabwe and also linked to the outside world, the Kubatana Project is offering a wide range of people the opportunity to share information and learn from each others' lessons.

2. Ensure ownership, get local buy-in, find a champion
The founders conducted many face-to-face interviews with NGOs to explain the project and record needs. They also showed NGOs a mock-up of the site design so that it could be visualised more easily.
They continuously encourage NGOs to publish their reports and opinions on the site. They also give their partners a sense of ownership in Kubatana.net by promoting the work of partners on their website front page and sending out email alerts about partners' work to their wide network of contacts.

3. Do a needs assessment
During their initial interviews with community-based organisations, they used questionnaires to conduct a needs assessment. Recently they have also conducted a needs assessment of smaller community-based organisations.

4. Set concrete goals and take small achievable steps
The Kubatana Project focuses solely on the problems in Zimbabwe, instead of trying to cover Southern Africa or the whole of Africa. Kubatana's goal is to move website visitors to the important substantive information. According to Bev Clark of Kubatana, their statistics now show that visitors to their site spend more time within the "directory" -- reading about NGOs and downloading legislation -- than visiting Kubatana.net's front page.

5. Critically evaluate efforts, report back to clients and supporters, and adapt as needed
Although no independent evaluation has been conducted, the project team writes internal programme reports that force them to evaluate themselves on a monthly basis. They use a statistical package to track the visits to organisations listed on their site and the number of times that their resources have been downloaded.

6. Address key external challenges
Kubatana.net is hosted outside of Zimbabwe to put it beyond the reach of government authorities that might want to close it down. So far the Kubatana Project's biggest obstacle has been NGOs' fear of sharing and publicising their information. The fact that NGOs often do not budget a provision for integrating ICT into their work has also been an obstacle, because it has meant that the network effect that the Kubatana Project is trying to create cannot come to fruition. The Kubatana Project is therefore encouraging NGOs to include a budget line for ICT in their proposals and to ensure that personnel are trained in the use of ICT.

7. Make it sustainable
The project is predominantly reliant on donor funding. The team realises this is a shortcoming and is seeking assistance in this regard. However, at this stage the Kubatana Project is meeting the objectives of its funders and serves a much needed purpose in Zimbabwe, which hopefully means that it will remain funded in the near future.

III. Lessons Learned

We invited Bev Clark from the Kubatana Project to share her views on Kubatana's greatest success, the challenges they have faced, key constraints and dependencies that affect the initiative, opportunities for future improvement of what they do, and other lessons they have learned.

"Publishing is a very courageous exercise, especially in countries where media repression exists. Without the courage of the civil society organisations that have participated in our project, Kubatana would not stand for very much at all. In everything we do in life, collaborative efforts more often than not are the most fulfilling and productive. Kubatana is an example of this. We work with civil society organisations and the general public -- a very powerful combination. One of our biggest challenges has been to bridge the divide between the general public and the NGO community. And to encourage the NGO community to make sure that their important information reaches ordinary Zimbabwean citizens. We have also emphasised the need for national information portals that service the needs of the country in question.

Kubatana reviewed the variety of information portals in existence and noted that generally they tried to do too much. Often national information is marginalised in preference to "breaking news" from other countries. Kubatana has taken a different approach and has remained committed to Zimbabwean information. This we believe to be our greatest success. Our greatest challenge has been to maintain optimism in the face of increasing repression in Zimbabwe, with publishing initiatives being the most threatened. As Zimbabwe becomes poorer and basic commodities and freedoms more difficult to find, an ICT project like Kubatana stands out as a beacon of hope for the future. Kubatana and similar projects will be integral to Zimbabwe's recovery."

IV. The Story

This section presents a narrative description of the Kubatana Project that highlights why this use of ICT for development is particularly interesting.

A quote on Kubatana.net's website reads: "Every man has his own courage and is betrayed because he seeks in himself the courage of other persons". However, it is when reading the diaries of political prisoners on this Zimbabwean website that the weight of these words sinks in…

"I was then beaten on the soles of my feet and on the ankles whilst an officer stood on my knees. Burning cigarettes were applied to my soles. I was also whipped across the back and later received an open-handed blow to the face by a crazed office.... Most of my fellow suspects had been beaten so severely on the soles of their feet that they could barely walk. This was a blatant attempt by the police, obviously at the behest of higher authorities, to silence leading opposition campaigners though detention."

Thanks to the Kubatana Project, the words of this political activist arrested for allegedly setting a government vehicle on fire, did not merely bounce off the prison walls, but were relayed to Zimbabweans and the international community. By publishing the prison diaries on its website and e-mailing them to various organisations and individuals, the Kubatana Project has encouraged Zimbabweans to start speaking out and protesting the treatment of political prisoners. During the last two years, Kubatana.net has become a platform for free speech that is increasingly valued, as press freedom is threatened by the Zimbabwean Government and human rights abuses are on the increase -- a fact that is highlighted by international human rights organisations such as Amnesty International and Transparency International. The Kubatana Project has also developed a "Friendship Tree", a web of at least 100 Zimbabweans. Once news is received of the arrest of a political activist, the "Friendship Tree" is activated through email or the telephone to ensure that the court appearances of those detained are witnessed. "One of the most powerful things we can do in situations of chaos is to become a witness." says Bev Clark, who along with Brenda Burrell began Kubatana.

The Project combines its online work with traditional media campaigns to create more effect. Their voter education campaign, launched during the March 2002 elections, serves as a good example. Because the government did very little about voter education, many Zimbabweans were unclear and confused about the voting process. The Kubatana Project placed advertisements in the press alerting the public that they could access voter registration information from Kubatana.net. It published the lists of polling stations and telephone numbers of volunteers assisting with the voting process on their website, and fielded hundreds of email queries. Factory managers downloaded the voter information from the website, printed it, and pinned it up on their workplace notice boards.

Since it started two years ago, visits to Kubatana.net have grown dramatically. Today the website boasts 124,000 visitors that regularly come back to the site. NGOs contacted by bridges.org praised the Kubatana Project for providing an essential service because they not only provide a directory of CSOs and NGOs, but also supply them with up-to-date information on developments in Zimbabwe. Kubatana ascribes much of this growth to the increasing number of Internet cafés opening in Zimbabwe, which is giving access to the Internet and email to people who do not have a computer at home or work. To stay at the cutting edge, the Kubatana Project has recently invested in a digital camcorder that will enable the project to stream live footage on the website. Kubatana has already taken video clips of the burnt out remains of the Voice of the People radio station in Harare.

In addition to providing and publishing crucial information, the Kubatana Project also educates ordinary Zimbabweans about Internet activism and has started running workshops on this topic. Brenda Burrell said: "The future for us revolves around making these tools better understood by the general public, established NGOs and civil society organisations. The main issue is that Zimbabweans must fight self-censorship and question the parameters that constrain them. They have a right to say what they think and make their voices be heard."