Zimbabwean civic groups said yesterday they plan to meet this week to find alternative means of publishing information following the closure of the country's sole independent daily paper, threatening a boycott of one of the state-run newspapers.

President Robert Mugabe's government shut down the Daily News last week on grounds that it was operating without a license, provoking major international condemnation.

The paper's subsequent application to register was rejected.

The head of the Crisis in Zimbabwe Coalition, Brian Raftopoulous told a news conference the group would discuss this week how to go forward from here, with one possibility the boycott of the state-run Herald.

"If you are in a situation where your so-called government prevents you having the right to seek alternative sources of information, then we have the right to call for the boycott of the existing monopoly of information sources," he said.

The Herald is the only mass circulation daily paper remaining in Zimbabwe, along with its sister paper, the Chronicle, published in the country's second city of Bulawayo.

There are however five independent weeklies.

The coalition said the banning of the Daily News "deprives large numbers of Zimbabweans of a daily source of information and an alternative to the virulent propaganda disseminated by the state-controlled media".

"There is no doubt that the primary objective of the Mugabe regime in banning the Daily News is to ensure that Zimbabweans, and indeed the international community, do not receive information about the regime's continued abuse of power, repression, violence and grave abuse of human rights," said the coalition.

Civic organisations deploring the closure of the paper, expressed fears that they might be the next target in the crackdown on dissent.

"The next likely target of the ongoing campaign to snuff out alternative voices will be civil society organisations," said the group.

More than 100 pro-democracy demonstrators were last week arrested and charged for taking to the streets to protest against the closure of the Daily News.

The government is working on a new law, which non-governmental organisations say is aimed at increasing state control of civic groups.

Last year the government enacted a strict new law - the Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act (AIPPA) - aimed at governing the operations of media organisations.

"AIPPA was intended to strangle the private press by subjecting it to stifling controls and restrictions and by creating various serious criminal offences that can be committed by media houses and journalists," the coalition charged.

Publishers of the Daily News were yesterday questioned and charged with operating a media house without licence, as police again raided the paper's offices.

The paper was closed after the Supreme Court ruled that it was operating illegally.

An application for registration was submitted immediately after the closure, but it was turned down straightaway.

Officials at the Daily News said they will appeal against the decision to deny them a licence.

"Without an independent daily newspaper to comment on and expose... injustices, attacks on human rights and constitutional freedoms are likely to intensify," said the Crisis Coalition. – Sapa-AFP.