Despite bridging the information gaps of communal issues marginalized from the commercial media, community media continues to crumble with a lot of capacity needs which underscores the platforms to the diverse sects within society.
With support from UNESCO, Uganda Media Women’s Association (UMWA) undertook a two-day session documenting impact of Covid-19 on community media and therein, a capacity needs assessment.
Margaret Sentamu, the Executive Director UMWA urged out that community media is strongly relevant but needs a boost up to best serve communities.
“We have least political talk, ours is developmental content that serves the immediate needs of communities without a profit orientation. Our importance is unarguably relevant but how best can we serve in lack?” said Margaret Sentamu
Under the Community Media Network of Uganda (COMNETU), it is considered that there are eight community media broadcasters, specifically radio stations. Among which is: Kagadi Kibale Community Radio (KKCR), Buwama FM, Nabweru Tiger FM, Nakaseke CMC FM, Radio Apac FM, Mama FM, Oyam FM and Ngora CMC FM.
The two-day engagement had six radio stations with a 25 totality representation. Stations were Mama FM, Buwama FM, Nakaseke, Radio Apac, Speak FM and Tiger FM Nabweru. In group submissions, the different community media outlets highlighted the key challenges faced in their operations and needs for further development.
Challenges and needs for action
Media practitioners engaged in this assessment observed that whereas so much is needed, there are common challenges that manifest within the media space operation.
High license and maintenance fees. Different media managers highlighted that even when the broadcasting spectrum is limited to 100watts by Uganda Communications Commission, community media are still levied on high license fees which inconsiderably unmatched their revenue generations.
Most of the managers said that they are monthly charged above two million shillings, a figure that during the covid-19 upsurge would even not be generated altogether from the affected sources of revenue. Therefore, a call is made to UCC for amicable license fees towards community media.
The aforementioned adds to numerous requirements demanded of by the regulator from all broadcasters among which is: timers, biometric doors, scanners.
Due to the high licenses, maintenance expenditures on operational utilities did not serve any sparingly. The community media reflected that the demand to pay for power, water and equipment update only can raise need for tax holidays/incentives from government unto them.
“Government should provide tax holidays to community radios especially on the licensing; we don’t make profits yet we have to pay for all these high demands” Catherine Apalat, Station manager, Mama FM
All participants agreed that there is a digital gap within community media. They addressed that they still largely use analogue equipment for transmission and worse still, have no online presence on all the various digital platforms available. This was attributed to lack of modern equipment, limited human and finance resources to sustain online presence.
Regulators do not appreciate the kind of media community broadcasters are no wonder the non-inclusivity in UCC media engagement and irrational authorizations.
For example, Nakaseke and Buwama FM share frequency of 90.2 FM. Peter Balaba, a station manager of Nakaseke observed that, “This is a challenge because it insinuates a fresh start in terms of audience re-sensitization, re-planning and programming and at the expense of this, we lose listenership.”
Recommendations
Among the recommendations suggested was strengthening of COMNETU to have a formidable collective voice of community media.
John Wasswa Mandevu, a journalist with Nakaseke FM emphasized that strengthening the community media network would help support each other in times of disasters like the covid-19 pandemic.
Similarly Lawrence Kalanzi, a presenter with Mama FM urged that the strengthening of COMNETU would create a collective advocacy voice for the issues that underscore the competence and efficiency of community media.
Sustainability and Crisis management plans for continued operation; socially, technically and financially. Winnie Alishaba, a journalist from Tiger FM reflected that the covid-19 lockdowns taught all but especially journalists to have alternative means of income. This was no exception to the community broadcasters themselves in terms of resource continuity.
It is learnt that most community media strongly rely on donor funds without much local generation revenue. As consequence, the lockdown saw to many struggling with discontinuation of workers, disruption of broadcast hours, among other challenges due to failure in financial meet. Therefore having in place risk plans would help mitigate some of these challenges.
Many community media have strategic plans but lack resources to operationalize them. Therefore, as the fraternity hopes to re-strategize on local revenue generation, they also urge government and UN agencies to finance their activities.
In all due aspiration, community media envision best quality content to the communities they serve, to be strongly sustainable, interest government into supporting community platforms for the benefit of grassroots.
