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Mr George Charamba

From George Maponga in Masvingo
ZIMBABWEANS have been urged to be rational in their push for Government to issue community radio licences. The call was made by Secretary for Information, Media and Broadcasting Services Mr George Charamba yesterday at the official launch of Masvingo’s Hevoi FM. He said the noise from some quarters for the issuance of community radio licences was unwarranted.

The International Telecommunications Union (ITU) rules governing allocation of frequencies speaks to the need to consider national priorities in issuance of such licences.

“We must not be bigoted. We must be rational.

“Knowledge is how you tether it within a social milieu, lets interrogate the terminology that we use and see whether it has sense in our own circumstances,’’ he said.

“The word ‘community radio’ presupposes that there is a radio that does not serve the community, so if there is a radio that does not serve the community, who is it speaking to? Does a national radio station not serve a community?’’

Mr Charamba urged Zimbabweans to disabuse themselves from blindly borrowing and applying foreign concepts.

He said some developed countries like England do not have community radios but rather regional radios.

Mr Charamba said those leading calls for Government to licence community radios should feel embarrassed as it had licensed several local commercial radio stations throughout the country like Hevoi FM in Masvingo.

“So what does our country say today look we now have Hevoi FM?

“If they cannot serve the Masvingo community, would the community here listen to them? Would the community here listen to them if they start talking about elephants that are non-existent here or Kariba Dam which is not here ignoring, Tokwe-Mukosi Dam and Lake Mutirikwi?.

“We give you local stations so that their messaging and broadcast content encompasses preoccupations of your area. To us we would have tried to satisfy the desires of the community.”

He said the right to issue community radio licences lay with BAZ.

Mr Charamba said Government had ordered BAZ to relook the issue of licences for local commercial radio stations which stipulate that their coverage should not extend beyond a 40km radius.

Government realised that the move did not make both technological and economic sense hence the need to increase the radius and make the radio stations viable.