On 10 August, 2011 The Gambian authorities ordered the management of Taranga FM, a community radio station in the southwest of Banjul, the capital, to cease broadcasting of all newspaper review programmes of privately-owned newspapers. Taranga FM is the only private radio station with newspaper review programmes which are broadcast in two popular Gambian languages, Wollof and Mandika, to the majority of the uneducated Gambians. It also broadcasts in English.
Media Foundation for West Africa’s (MFWA) sources reported that Ismaila Ceesay, managing director of the station, was summoned to the headquarters of the National Intelligence Agency (NIA) on 10 August and ordered to stop the newspaper review programmes. This is the second time that the authorities have censored the station this year. On 13 January, 2011, Taranga FM was reopened after the Gambian authorities issued a warning to the station’s management to stop reviewing what they described as “opposition” newspapers. The station resumed without its popular “Xibari besbi”, a news and current affairs programme that reviewed newspapers in the two languages for most uneducated Gambians.
In a letter, the management was ordered to desist from reviewing opposition linked newspapers “which were alleged to be sponsored by foreign donors.” The letter said President Yahya Jammeh had given the station a second chance.
Responding to a question about the closure, Alagie Cham, the Minister of Information and Communication Infrastructure, told the members of the National Assembly in April that the radio station was temporarily closed down over “some administrative procedures”.
MFWA says it’s not surprised about this development, which it says is another phase of the attempt to clampdown on the media to scuttle the November presidential election in the country.
(Source: Media Foundation for West Africa via Media Network Weblog)
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