[HCDX] Fwd: Africa: the radio scene tells all
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[HCDX] Fwd: Africa: the radio scene tells all
This article mostly focuses on FM, but that certainly has some
significance to the SW and MW scene as well.
--- "George(s) Lessard" <media@xxxxxxx> wrote:
> Date: Mon, 21 May 2001 17:20:13 -0400
> Reply-to: Media for Development in Democracy
> <DEVMEDIA@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> From: "George(s) Lessard" <media@xxxxxxx>
> Organization: http://mediamentor.ca
> Subject: Africa: the radio scene tells all
> To: DEVMEDIA@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>
> 15.05.2001 - Eyoum Nganguè Africa: the radio scene tells all
>
>
http://www.unesco.org/webworld/points_of_views/150501_ngangue.shtml
>
> Africa: the radio scene tells all
>
> By Eyoum Nganguè - Radio, the most widely used medium in
> Africa, can only
> flourish on democratic soil, which helps to explain why
> private stations are
> thriving in the west and not in the centre of the continent.
>
>
> Chad has only six private radio stations, while Mali boasts
> 100? What explains
> this tremendous disparity? The two countries are similar on
> several counts.
> They are the same size (a little over 1,200,000 square
> kilometres), and neither
> has access to the sea. Both were French colonies and lived
> through long years
> of military dictatorship after achieving independence in 1960.
> And last year,
> they ranked among the world?s poorest countries, with a per
> capita income of
> $261 for Mali and $240 for Chad. ?An unfavourable political
> environment and
> socio-cultural factors? slow down the development of radio
> pluralism, says
> Gilbert Maoundodji, director of FM Liberté, Chad?s second
> independent radio
> station, launched last year. ?The people who govern here have
> not yet
> completely assimilated the values of collective action,
> freedom, tolerance and
> democracy. That sets up a roadblock to initiative.?
> A country?s political
> context rubs off on its airwaves. Mali, which held free
> elections in 1992 and
> has set up democratic institutions that function reasonably
> well, launched its
> first private radio station in March 1991. Radio Bamakan paved
> the way for a
> host of others, including Radio Liberté, Radio Kayira and
> Klédu FM.
>
> In early 1993, Chad settled for a parody of a ?national
> conference,? generally
> intended as a broad policy consultation. Yet it only
> strengthened the power of
> President Idriss Déby, who took the reins through armed force.
> As a result,
> even religious stations found it difficult to make a
> breakthrough. The first
> Catholic station, La Voix du Paysan (?Voice of the peasants?),
> started
> broadcasting in 1996. The lay station Dja FM followed suit
> only three years
> later. Other stations, including FM Liberté, Radio Brakos, and
> the brand new
> Duji Lokar FM (?Morning Star?) came later. And plans for a
> private weekly radio
> station, L?Observateur, are on the verge of fruition.
>
> Confiscating equipment ?needing repair?
>
>
> Chad?s example is emblematic of Central Africa as a whole,
> which seemed to have
> a lead over its western neighbours when Africa N°1, the first
> and only French-
> language pan-African radio station, began broadcasting in
> Gabon in 1980. But
> since African states began turning to democracy in the early
> 1990s, West Africa
> has witnessed an explosion of independent radio stations:
> their number has
> soared to over 400. In Central Africa, however, private
> investment in
> broadcasting remains minimal. Chronic instability has set the
> region ten years
> back. Most countries there, including the Central African
> Republic and the
> Republic of the Congo, are beleaguered by simmering armed
> conflicts, if not all-
> out war, as in Rwanda, Burundi and the Democratic Republic of
> the Congo (DRC).
> In the eastern part of the DRC, for example, rebels have
> confiscated the few
> private radio stations that existed before the August 1998
> war. Radio
> Muungano?s transmitter was taken to Uganda in October 2000 on
> the pretext that
> it needed repairs, and to date has not been returned. When
> they don?t control
> programme content, insurgent groups simply do away with the
> equipment. The
> government?s methods are just as drastic. In September 2000,
> Radio Télévision
> Kin Malébo (RTKM) was nationalized outright and three private
> television
> networks closed down. Only religious radio stations are
> allowed to broadcast,
> as long as they steer clear of politics. In countries at
> peace, such as
> Equatorial Guinea, Gabon and Cameroon, the brakes on pluralism
> are often
> intitutional. Since 1990, when a law on broadcasting freedom
> was passed, the
> Cameroon government has used all kinds of subterfuge to
> prevent the emergence
> of private radio, with the exception of rural and community
> stations launched
> by Unesco or the Intergovernmental Francophone Agency. For
> example, Radio
> France Internationale (RFI), which broadcasts throughout
> Africa, could not be
> received on FM in Yaoundé until February this year. ?We had
> been in contact
> with Cameroon since 1992, as part of a cooperation agreement
> to include RFI in
> the national radio station?s technical structure,? says Hugues
> Salord, RFI?s
> director for international affairs. ?But we were unable to
> clinch the deal
> until the decree of April 3, 2000, which benefited not only
> RFI, but Africa
> N°1, the BBC, and other local private radio stations.? It took
> ten years for
> the decree to be signed, but the obstacles remain. Officials
> have increased
> administrative complications, imposed very short application
> deadlines (four
> months) and demanded exorbitant fees for operating
> licenses?$15,400 in a
> country where a civil servant?s average monthly salary is
> $120. Most of the
> proposed projects were therefore eliminated, and one of the
> stations that had
> operated until then on an experimental basis, Radio Soleil,
> had to stop
> broadcasting in June 2000.
>
> The art of bureaucratic subversion
>
>
> As a free medium which reaches a wider population than print,
> partly because of
> broadcasting in local dialects, partly because of high
> illiteracy rates, radio
> arouses the mistrust and hostility of political leaders. Hence
> their
> inclination to maintain a government monopoly on broadcasting
> to foil an
> independent media that is often virulent and close to the
> opposition. The
> airwaves are strategically important for politicians, who will
> go to great
> lengths to control them by any means. For example, on February
> 22, 1994,
> Gabonese army tanks destroyed the facilities of Radio Liberté.
> The government
> later claimed it was because the opposition was using the
> station as a
> propaganda mouthpiece! ?Radio Liberté? It was the devil?s
> radio? The army and
> security services? destroyed their facilities. We?ve returned
> to the normal
> game of democracy since,? wrote Gabon?s president, Omar Bongo,
> in his recently
> published book, Blanc comme Nègre. Bongo?s comments illustrate
> the demonization
> of free radio in Central Africa. The ghost of Rwanda?s Radio
> Télévision des
> Mille Collines (RTLM), which played a key role in mobilizing
> the killers who
> perpetrated the 1994 genocide, still haunts the region. Today,
> political
> leaders disinclined to accept broadcasting freedom point to it
> as an example,
> conveniently forgetting that RTLM was initially close to the
> Kigali government.
> The result: as soon as a radio station strays from the
> official line, it is
> suspected of inciting rebellion or tribal hatred. Equatorial
> Guinea has taken
> drastic steps to avoid that risk: not a single private radio
> station has been
> allowed on its soil! Besides political factors, the weakness
> of civil society
> has clearly helped slow down the growth of independent radio
> in Central Africa.
> Local NGOs and grassroots organizations are not involved
> enough in national
> political debate. This results in indifference on the part of
> donors likely to
> help set up radio stations, especially by training staff and
> supplying
> equipment. ?I obtained a frequency last year, but can?t afford
> to purchase
> equipment,? says Begoto Oulatar, director of N?Djamena
> Bi-hebdo, Chad?s most
> famous newspaper, which is now branching onto the airwaves.
> Economic woes also
> prevent private radio from gaining a foothold in central
> Africa. Public
> networks receive the lion?s share of advertising, the only
> source of income for
> independent radio, which cannot count on user fees. To stay
> out of trouble,
> businesses avoid advertising on stations with a reputation of
> being hostile to
> the government. Take the case of Gabon?s Radio Soleil, which
> rose from the
> ashes of Radio Liberté and was suspended five times in four
> years. During a
> 1999 Yaoundé conference on pluralist media, Makaga Virginus, a
> station
> representative, explained companies? reluctance to invest on
> its airwaves: ?we
> were not subservient enough to the central government, which
> has very close
> ties to the business world.?
>
> Electronic inroads to state monopolies
>
>
> But there are reasons to be optimistic about the future of
> radio in Africa. New
> technology is making equipment lighter, smaller and less
> expensive. Direct
> access to information on the Internet will probably prompt
> officials to loosen
> their grip. And there is likely to be a change of mentality
> with the slow but
> steady influx of foreign radio networks such as RFI, the BBC
> and Voice of
> America, which may end up softening political rigidity. Local
> radio stations
> created by international and non-governmental organizations,
> such as the
> Central African Republic?s Radio Ndeke Luka, (heir to the
> United Nations radio
> in Bangui), or Burundi?s RSF-Bonesah FM (founded by veterans
> of Radio Umwizero,
> an initiative of the Association for Humanitarian Action),
> will also help along
> the process. Worldwide groups like the Panos Institute, the
> Research and
> Technology Exchange Group (Gret), the Hirondelle Foundation
> and Search for
> Common Ground, which have contributed to radio pluralism in
> West Africa, are
> beginning to focus on Central Africa. The audiovisual
> landscape is changing in
> most countries. A case in point is Cameroon, where the TV Max
> private
> television network, founded in August 2000, was barely two
> months old when the
> public network adjusted its
> programmes to compete! Why don?t private radio stations do the
> same? If the
> area acquired a network of groups and NGOs working
> to promote independent radio, there is hope that Central
> Africa would soon
> catch up with its neighbours in the west. The 2001 Free
> Frequencies festival,
> an initiative of Kinshasa?s Réveil FM (from March 19 to 22),
> was a step in the
> right direction. It brought together several Central African
> operators and has
> already laid the groundwork for a regional organization to
> defend the rights of
> private radio.
>
>
> Eyoum Nganguè is Cameroonian journalist
>
> :-) :-) Message Ends; Signature File Begins (-: (-:
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