Case studies


Central African Republic, another Fondation
Hirondelle station, Radio Ndeke Luka, speaks
Sango. In the Democratic Republic of the
Congo (DRC), the 20 or so million listeners
to Radio Okapi are used to listening to its
programmes in Swahili, Kikongo, Tshiluba
and Lingala, and also obviously in French.
Radio Okapi is a nationwide radio network
jointly managed with the UN Peace-Keeping
Department, like Radio Miraya, in Sudan, a
station that is also popular and has the largest
audience.
Fondation Hirondelle set up public Radio
Television East Timor, it also managed jointly
with the UN Blue Sky Radio in Kosovo and
helped ensure media coverage of the national
elections in Nepal. Funded by governments,
and in particular by the European Union for
many of its projects such as the one in Sierra
Leone, Fondation Hirondelle is an organisa-
tion of journalists which has been running
radio stations, setting up media outlets, as well
as producing and broadcasting programmes
since 1995.
Its staff come overwhelmingly from the coun-
tries where it is active. It is on a daily basis,
through reports, the choice of topics, the
editing of news, difficult interviews, constant
questioning that a culture of independent and
meticulous journalism is being forged in each
and every one of these radio stations. It is a
continuous school, a permanent training for a








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job that gives both men and women the oppor-
tunity to take on and assume responsibilities.
Could that be unfair competition for local
media? Experience shows this is just the oppo-
site. There' s often concern that the Fondation' s
radio station will close, thus removing the pro-
tection and model it represents and that allows
other media to operate genuinely as they wish.
Fondation Hirondelle radios have some 50
partner stations.
The Fondation Hirondelle media may be
owned by the donors or by the Fondation itself
when it manages them alone, or by the United
Nations when they are jointly managed with
the UN. However, ultimately they are owned
by those for whom they were set up: the listen-
ers. In Isiro, a town in the DRC, a rumour that
Radio Okapi would close down its local trans-
mitter started spreading in 2005. The town's
students gathered and the slogan that could be
heard during a large protest demonstration was
the one we could only dream of: "Radio Okapi
belongs to us, not to you!" M

* Swiss joumalist based in Geneva.
For info: www.hirondelle.org


 Keywords
 Radio; Press agency; Fondation Hirondelle;
 NGO; Sierra Leone; Fourah Bay College;
 Liberia; Timor Leste; DRC; Kosovo;
 United Nations.


Promoting
a
justice through

the Press


Foundation Hirondelle is managing the
Hirondelle news agency in Arusha,
Tanzania. The agency covers the
judicial proceedings concerning the
Rwandan genocide, in particular the
trials at the International Criminal
Tribunal for Rwanda, but also those at
the gacaca (traditional) courts and at
Rwanda's tribunals. Thanks to support
from the European Union, Norway and
Belgium, it is the only news agency
that bas been covering these proceed-
ings in four languages on a daily basis
and without any interruption from day
one. It is thus contributing to uphold
justice and fight against impunity.
www.hirondellenews.org


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