Calls for change have swept North Africa. Further south, in Zimbabwe, the continent’s most brutal dictatorship arrests people for simply speaking about what’s happening in Libya. Our client is a newspaper called The Zimbabwean. For speaking-out against this regime, its vehicles are burned, and its vendors are beaten. This newspaper could not rely on street sales in Zimbabwe. They needed to target over a million Zimbabweans who have fled to South Africa and abroad.In a global news environment noisier than any in history, we had to sell subscriptions to a newspaper Robert Mugabe was desperate to silence. We contacted every photojournalist who had managed to work in Zimbabwe over the past year for images of the reality on the ground. We positioned the iconic map of Zimbabwe to appear as an empty speech bubble at the corner of the subject’s mouth, illustrating that these people were voiceless.

We approached every photojournalist who had managed to work in Zimbabwe over the past year for images. Onto these the iconic map of Zimbabwe was positioned to appear as an empty speech bubble, imploring action. Billboards, print and P.O.S posters directed consumers to a website where they could read, hear and locate the incidents. The imagery could be disseminated via social media and visitors could add their voices to the blog. They could also purchase/sponsor subscriptions. For poorer Zimbabweans without internet access to participate online, we invented an entirely new medium: VoiceBoxes were simple telephonic devices installed in safe places –enabling users to make comments orally which operators in South Africa transcribed directly to the blog.

Fear precluded media owners in Zimbabwe from running the campaign, but decals of the iconography were included copies of the paper. When Zimbabweans saw our executions, they knew exactly how to make their own.

In our first two months, The Voiceless Campaign has increased hits to The Zimbabwean website by 287%.The Zimbabwean’s subscription base is growing by 10 % weekly.Over half these subscriptions are bought for people inside Zimbabwe.

We used the silence the regime imposed, to talk to the world.