National Radio Project

MAKING CONTACT

Transcript: #09-01 Community Radio: A Tool for Social Change
February 28, 2001

Program description, guest contact information and audio files at http://www.radioproject.org/archive/2001/0901.html

Shereen Marisol Meraji: This week on Making Contact...

Jose Aleman: Misinformation, ignorance come from the fact that we are either not informed, or informed not properly. So what we are trying to do is to bring the voices of the people themselves, and the radio is serving that purpose.

Maria Nicolasa Rivas: I know that, I know the power of having your own voice on the radio. Ten years ago, I didn't even dream of this... Latino-Americanos, como Colombia, Chile, Paraguay, ya lo estan haciendo.

Shereen Marisol Meraji: Radio has been a central tool used by grassroots movements world wide. On this program we take a look at international struggles for democracy and the uses of community radio.

I'm Shereen Marisol Meraji -- your host this week on Making Contact --an international radio program seeking to create connections between people, vital ideas and important information...

In Bolivia in 1940, during a tin miners strike, the first community radio station began broadcasting. Today, an estimated 8 to 10,000 community radio stations are in existence all over the world. No two stations are alike. They vary in program content, listening audience, locality... some are small and meagerly funded, while others work with up to date equipment and a large pool of volunteers. However, the key element to all these radio stations is the involvement and participation of community members themselves.

Today, low-power community stations are cropping up all over the developing world as a vehicle for empowerment in sectors of society where people don't have a voice and are left out of the political process. East Timor, Chiapas, Mexico and Somalia -- places with very little resources -- are using radio to inform and create dialogue about social, political and economic issues.

In Haiti, the end of nearly four decades of brutal dictatorship opened the doors for Haitian citizens to have more of a voice in their country's affairs. I spoke with Pierre La Bosierre of the Bay Area Haitian American Council about the role community radio plays in Haiti's popular movements.

Pierre La Bosierre: The popular movement in Haiti, the people's movement, is a movement from the grassroots, and the image of Lavalas, which means "The Flood," is actually, each one of us is a drop of rain, there's a song that says each one of us is a drop of rain, all together, we form the flood. So you have a number of women's organizations, peasant organizations, trade unions, community organizations, they all have different issues, aspects of the various injustices and the issues that need to be addressed. So that Haiti can be a society based on justice. And radio has played a very important role from the very beginning.

For example, even during the Baby Doc dictatorship, during the Papa Doc dictatorship, there was at least one underground radio station, radio program that we used to get early in the morning and you had to really keep it low, you know, and put your ear to the radio so you could hear it cause you didn't want neighbors or other people to know. So everybody had the same reaction, everybody was watching everybody else, not wanting them to know, but it was understood that everybody was tuning in. So, radio has had this really central role in the resistance against oppression in Haiti. So that's very important, it wasn't always like that.

There was always a vibrant media in Haiti, the print media, but it was the purview of only those who spoke French, that tiny little elite. And with the advent of radio there was a potential there for there to be really broad communication. But what has happened is because it was restricted only to French -- French was the only language spoken on the radio and also in the print media -- the information wasn't targeted to the mass audience, to the majority of the people, because the people in Haiti speak Creole. Hundred percent speak Creole, only 15 percent understand French. And there was a logic behind this whole thing in French only, because it denied the people access to information. For example, a peasant didn't have any idea what the prices were of commodities, coffee or sugar, on the world market. So it was a way to keep people in the dark. They were kept systematically outside. So radio, particularly the use of Creole in the radio, and from the 70's on, it started to become a mobilizing tool around which people could listen to the news, come together and then decide with that information, what do we do, how do we move forward.

So to bring it to the present, and on the evolution, and radio people have been targeted in Haiti, disappeared, killed. During the coup d'etat, a number of the radio stations were shut down. And that was one of the reasons why the coup d'etat succeeded in the early days. They invaded many of the radio stations, killed a number of journalists, and so the only station that remained on the air was under the control of the putschists, of the coup people. And they were putting out wrong information, misinformation, telling people that this was there was nothing happening, they didn't need to be alarmed. And so people could not really get the right information, so this created confusion. Since that time, there have been a number of networks -- I might call it people's networks -- that have cropped up all over the country and you have a number of localities with their own radio station. They're actually the voice of the community. They give out news and analysis, disseminate that kind of information from a community perspective, both international and local.

Shereen Marisol Meraji: I was just wondering if you could paint a picture of what those community stations look like. Who's involved, is it young people, is it older folks? Who's involved in creating the radio?

Pierre La Bossiere: Yes. For example, I'll give you one of the radio stations. It's called Radio Timon. And Timon is little kids, and kids radio. This one was founded by President Aristide when he left office. Kids radio is actually a radio station run and operated by the youth themselves. And these are children, street children. They started a radio station where the youth outreach to other youth on the streets. It's popular education, giving news and information, kids as young as 10, 12 years old do their own programming and it's fascinating. I visited there. Then you have also some of the peasant organizations, they have their own radio station where they give information that is relevant to the community. Since the end of the coup d'etat in 1994 there has been a greater proliferation of the low power community stations. So it's really a vibrant movement, and as you go to Haiti, you see that people are in communities that appear to be very isolated, you get the sense that people aren't really so isolated anymore, talking to them, hearing their voices and their awareness of the broad situation, of the international situation and the national issues as well. So it's a very different country, you know, thanks in large part to the work of radio, and what radio is doing in the country. I say stay tuned and let's support this movement in Haiti and in other communities throughout the world.

Shereen Marisol Meraji: Pierre La Bossiere of the Bay Area Haitian-American Council, based in Oakland, California.

In countries undergoing vast internal upheaval for social justice, radio stations are often created to bring news from military combatants to people in mass movements. When struggles later take on a political dimension the radio stations change to meet listeners new needs. Women are often drawn to the role of radio communicators as a way to build their communities in times of war and peace. In this special report from the National Radio Project's Women's Desk, Lisa Rudman reports on a coalition of radio stations and women's radio programs in El Salvador.

Lisa Rudman: At 4 feet 9 inches tall, Maria Nicolasa Rivas rises in her chair and leans forward to speak into the microphone, greeting her union sisters over the air. Rivas, an indigenous woman and former combatant turned union organizer, explained how women's organizing in El Salvador grew after the government and rebel forces signed peace accords in 1992.

Maria Nicolasa Rivas: We have 13 groups, women's groups in Acahutla, of informal sector, organized. And then we went national, because we joined efforts with a national women's movement, Melida Anaya, and in that way, our capacity grew nationally, and we have over a hundred groups now operating in the country. We mean informal sector, in this case commerce, we are talking about the vendors, we're talking about the women who come from the rural towns to sell in the markets and local urban markets. We're talking about women who have their food stalls there on the streets selling food they make right there and then, we're talking about small businesses, which are mostly run in the streets. And there, in this coordinating that the need for community radio was born.

Lisa Rudman: Nicolasa Rivas lives in El Salvador's only port town-- Acahutla. She is the general secretary of the Union of Informal Merchants, a labor union for women, mainly single mothers who are street vendors. The union owns the radio station, Radio Acaxual, and Rivas directs the station as part of her union work. Radio Acaxual is a member of the Association of Participatory Radio Stations of El Salvador known as ARPAS. Jose Aleman is the executive director of ARPAS, a Salvadoran coalition of community stations. Aleman, like Rivas, also remembers how the needs of listeners changed after the long war.

Jose Aleman: The civil war in El Salvador ended in 1992. There were two official voices of the guerrilla, of the Farabundo Marti National Front for Liberation (FMLN) and they got acknowledgment from the government so that they could broadcast legally. But two radios didn't represent the whole variety of communities which were in need of their own voices. That's why they gathered and demanded from the government the recognition of other frequencies so that they could broadcast. The government said 'no' and so the radios realized a pretty basic principle if we are not united, if we don't act together, we will miss the opportunity and we will fail. So initially, in 1994 ten community radio stations and one production center got together and formed ARPAS. And since then, more communities have decided to form radios as a way to break isolation and to participate in politics and give voice to the communities. ARPAS-- Association of Participatory Radio Stations and Programs of El Salvador. "This is the debate in the community, organized by ARPAS Newsnet. Today's subject: Women In Sweatshops. "I think we should say something. They can't keep treating us like this in this sweatshop." "I agree, I think you're right, we have to do something. They don't even want to pay us our health care." "We work two shifts and they pay us just for one."

Lisa Rudman: In July 2000 the government recognized ARPAS and the coalition has grown to 24 stations. Nicolasa Rivas says that listener participation is crucial.

Maria Nicolasa Rivas: Radio is a part of our lives. When you open those doors, we got responses not only from women, the women there that we work with but also from young people, old people, even you know. We have a lot of problems and issues in Acahutla, we have prostitution, we have high rates of delinquency, activities, and the community wants to talk about it, they want to put it out there. And they approached us and in this way we got enormous response to the community radio project. So in this way communities were able to plug into this project, and their participation was such that we were able to ask the communities, "What time do you listen to the news hour? What's the best time for us to conduct a news hour?" And they gave us 1:30 and 5:00 pm. And so now we have those two times that we know everybody's tuned in.

Lisa Rudman: The ARPAS promotional CD features the voices of supportive listeners.

For us, participatory radio in El Salvador is a new model of communication for the people because in this country the mass media is not accessible because it is owned and run by the wealthy. Community radio is an option for the people.

Lisa Rudman: Rivas says the Women's Station, Radio Acaxual, has a deep effect on the women of the street vendors union, and upon all women who listen to the program.

Maria Nicolasa Rivas: We have many stories of women who have, as a result of listening to our programs, changed ways that weren't working for her, you know, certain negative things or conditions that she was facing. For example, just even around women's rights, just knowing that you have rights, that you can go to this place to denounce something, if your husband is beating on you. You have other women that can come and help you out, that that's not a situation you need to be stuck with for the rest of your life. Just putting that option, putting that information out there on the radio, we've known many stories of women who have changed their lives as a result of getting this information.

Lisa Rudman: Radio Acuaxal lacks field recording equipment, so Rivas goes to villages and writes down women's testimonies, then back at the station she reads the women's words, without their actual voices. She visits the women whenever she's not busy as a street vendor. Despite their tiny budget, the women of Radio Acuaxal were on the air for five years until they were shut down in December of 2000. They are currently fighting a court battle to recover their frequency, which they say was unlawfully sold to a commercial station by the union's previous general secretary. Jose Aleman emphasizes the need for that station and all community radio.

Jose Aleman: We just don't want to hear about the voices of others, and the problems of others. We want to also hear in the radio station, and on TV and read in the newspapers, ourselves. We also have brains, we also have hopes and views of how to do better as families, as communities, as a nation.

Lisa Rudman: And in order for the women street vendors of Acahutla to hear themselves, Nicolasa Rivas has vowed to somehow return her radio station to the air.

Maria Nicolasa Rivas: "For Voices In Contact from Radio Acaxual, this has been Maria Nicolasa Rivas."

Lisa Rudman: For the Women's Desk of the National Radio Project, I'm Lisa Rudman.

Shereen Marisol Meraji: You're listening to Making Contact, a production of the National Radio Project. This program can now be heard across the United States, Canada, South Africa, and around the world on Radio For Peace international shortwave. You can also hear us on the internet, at radioproject.org, that's radioproject.org. If you want more information about the subject of this week's program please give us a call. It's toll-free: 800-529-5736. Call that same phone number for tape and transcript orders. That's 800-529-5736. We also welcome comments and suggestions for future programs...

On the global community radio landscape, when one radio station discontinues, there are always others sprouting up. For another example of trade union women using radio, Erica Bridgeman takes us to Peru for a report from the National Radio Project's Women's Desk.

Erica Bridgeman: Women who are domestic workers in Peru have been organizing to better their conditions by forming the Center for the Empowerment of Domestic Workers. One of the projects of the center is a radio program that airs throughout the city of Lima that directly addresses the issues that are of deep concern to the domestic workers themselves. Adelina Diaz-Uriarte, president of the center, describes it's focus.

Adelina Diaz-Uriarte: Basically, we are a trade union. And in our center, the Center for the Empowerment of Domestic Workers, we have five areas of work: one of which is the radio program, one of which is the advice center, the other is a job searching facility, helping people to find jobs, the other part was an empowerment office or unit, and the library.

Erica Bridgeman: Diaz-Uriarte says that perhaps the most important issue that the center is trying to face is the lack of employment for local women. In fact, Diaz-Uriarte says that the center is often swamped with women looking for housekeeping jobs: work with low wages and tough conditions.

Adelina Diaz-Uriarte: The problem is that the situation hasn't improved. In fact it's probably gotten worse through the different laws and things that have been passed. Initially, basically, we were people who migrated from the countryside into the cities to work in the houses. But now the situation is that it's not only us who do this work, it's also mothers of families, people who are very poor and quite desperate, who are working for a few hours here and a few hours there.

Erica Bridgeman: Diaz-Uriarte adds that the domestic workers make less than one hundred dollars a month.

Adelina Diaz-Uriarte: So the situation now is the lack of work. At our center, 20 or 30 women come in each day for jobs that we can't help them find, that there just isn't the work there. And basically, we end up getting paid between 60, 80, or 90 dollars a month. The other thing is that the working day is more or less the same, between 14 or 16 hours a day. But now what they are asking for is for young people, young girls between 14 and 25 years of age. The problem isn't only the fact that we aren't paid what we should be paid, but also our physical safety, the fact that we're hit, we're sexually assaulted, raped. And we're dealing a lot with that, legal cases, defending young girls and young boys who've been assaulted while working in the homes.

Erica Bridgeman: Using the radio airwaves as a tool for confronting their isolation and abuse, Diaz-Uriarte says that the women at the center broadcast regular programming as a way to empower their listening audience.

Adelina Diaz-Uriarte: We make these programs from our own experience as domestic workers, it's a program for domestic workers, by domestic workers. I think it's very important that we mention that it's not only a situation of domestic workers in Peru, it's really the situation for domestic workers, or as we would say home workers, all over the world. And it's a situation of extreme poverty.

Erica Bridgeman: Paulina Luz-Ocsa, who also works on the domestic worker campaign, is one of the center's radio producers.

Paulina Luz-Ocsa: We have space on our program for their legal rights, and information about the laws. But it's also a space where women can come and identify with the program and speak about their situation.

Erica Bridgeman: So while the women have taken their situation into their own hands by creating a radio program, according to Diaz-Uriarte, not all the listeners share the goal of empowering domestic workers.

Adelina Diaz-Uriarte: The employers, about 80 percent of the employers are very conservative section of the society. The women who employ, very often they don't do it because they need to, it's not because there's such a huge amount of housework or anything. You know they see it basically as a luxury. And they even also listen to our radio program, they will send out the domestic worker out of the kitchen, to another place, so that they can't listen, while they'll put on the radio and be listening in to the program and commenting or whatever.

Erica Bridgeman: In May of 2000, when Peru was holding presidential elections, producers at the station discovered that their program had caught the attention of individuals who felt that the broadcast represented a direct threat to the status quo.

Adelina Diaz-Uriarte: So the day before the election, we opened up the program for callers to call in and to speak out, and of the many callers there was one call of someone who called in and who accused us of rising up the masses, of encouraging rebellion and that we should take very special care of what we were doing on the program. We got a call from the secret service, the intelligence services of the country. They called up the radio station and they said "Look, we are listening to your program, we're recording what you're saying, and we're very concerned about what you're saying about the fact that, in the situation of domestic workers, that they're in a semi-feudal system. We are very concerned about that. On the 29th of May, on the Monday after the elections, one of the producers of the program was leaving the program and was followed by four men and a woman. And at four blocks distance from the station, they then attacked her and tried to force her into a car. But luckily the passer-by stopped this from happening, and though she was injured, they managed to stop her from being kidnapped. And this is not an isolated incident, because other presenters, and other producers of programs on our radio station have received death threats. And this even though the radio station is a catholic radio station.

Erica Bridgeman: Women from around the world organized a petition campaign denouncing the attacks against the Peruvian radio women. As a result of this collective action, the intimidation stopped. And according to Diaz-Uriarte, the women at the center have continued to agitate for domestic worker rights.

Adelina Diaz-Uriarte: For us, what was important was not only the recognition that we were of value and that we were dignified, but also what were we going to do for others. And that's something that we're aware of on a daily basis is what work are we going to do for others?

Erica Bridgeman: After the attacks stopped, the domestic workers participated in many of the demonstrations against Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori, who later resigned. While they are now reaping the benefits of more democratic space, they still face a problem common to most community radio stations: the challenge of funding. Despite ongoing struggles, however, they continue to broadcast.

For the Women's Desk of the National Radio Project, I'm Erica Bridgeman.

Shereen Marisol Meraji: That's it for this edition of Making Contact. A look at community radio and popular movements. Thanks for listening. And special thanks this week to Paola Zuniga, Susan Celli, Leda Nelson, Arlene Shaupp, Hector Vides, Steven Dunifer, Anna Luisa Delgado, and the Crossroads Women's Center in New York and London.

Phillip Babich is our managing producer, Laura Livoti is our managing director. Peggy Law, executive director. Associate producer, Stephanie Welch. Senior advisor, Norman Solomon. National producer, David Barsamian. Women's desk coordinator, Lisa Rudman. Prison desk coordinator, Eli Rosenblatt. And, I'm your host and associate producer, Shereen Marisol Meraji.If you want more information about the subject of this week's program, call the national radio project at 800-529-5736. Call that same number for tapes and transcripts. That's 800-529-5736. You can also go to our website, at radioproject.org. That's radioproject.org.

Making Contact is an independent production. We're committed to providing a forum for voices and opinions not often heard in the mass media. If you have suggestions for future programs, we'd like to hear from you. Our theme music is by the Charlie Hunter Trio. Bye for now.