[pima.nius] Nauru makes media network from scratch

Nauru makes media network from scratch

• Sally Jackson
• From: The Australian
• February 15, 2010 

Not long ago the most effective form of mass communication on Nauru was painting messages on walls in public places.

Now, with its TV and radio stations upgraded and a newspaper about to launch, the poor island nation is constructing a genuine media sector thanks to Australian funding and expertise.

Over the past two years overseas aid program AusAID has put almost $450,000 into the project, overseen by former ABC broadcaster Rod Henshaw, now interim media director for the Nauru government.

When he started doing consulting work on Nauru nine years ago the media outlets were little more than government mouthpieces, Henshaw says.

"The radio station was more of a jukebox and you had to be driving past it in order to hear it," he says.

"The TV station didn't have any working cameras. And they didn't have any newspaper at all."

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Now, he says, official announcements are disseminated by a Government Information Office. The TV station carries local content as well as broadcasting the ABC's Australia Network. A new transmitter means the station can be heard all over the island.

The next step, on February 24, will be the launch of a fortnightly newspaper. Called Mwinen Ko, which roughly translates as "let's talk about the issues", it will have a print run of 2000 and cost 50c.

"There have been other papers (in the past) and it was good, but they faded and don't exist any more," says editor Sandra Bill.

"A community paper can voice people's concerns. I think people will find it interesting to hear views from different communities."

Covering just 21 square kilometres, with a population of roughly 12,000, on the world map Nauru is a pencil dot in the Pacific Ocean about five hours' flying time northeast of Brisbane.

Australia and Nauru have had a special relationship since World War I, when the island was placed under the trusteeship of Australia, Britain and New Zealand. It became independent in 1968.

In 2001, Nauru became a key part of the Howard government's controversial "Pacific solution", aimed at keeping asylum-seekers out of Australian territory. The island hosted two processing centres that employed about 1000 locals and represented an estimated 20 per cent of the economy.

The media project is one of the efforts of the Australian government to assist Nauru following the closure of the centres in 2008.

Once the media infrastructure is in place, Henshaw says, his final task will be training locals to run it.

"There are no trained journalists on Nauru and it will be some time before we have one, but we have what we call reporters and program-makers who can do interviews and put news stories together," he says. "It's now a case of capacity building."

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pacific islands media association
pima.nius@gmail.com
aotearoa, new zealand
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