Radio Offers New Voice on Darfur Border

A Sudanese girl rides a donkey on her way to collect water supplies in the West Darfur town of Mukjar, Sudan, April 22, 2007. Mukjar offers a sobering look at the results of a government victory: Impoverished and frightened ethnic Africans huddle in refugee camps where they survive on humanitarian aid, while Arab nomads control the hinterland, threatening any farmer who tries to return. (AP Photo/Nasser Nasser) (Nasser Nasser - AP)

But when Radio Sila's studio light switched to red, she broke into a fast-paced diction and read the news headlines in Massalit's rolling, high-pitched guttural sounds.

A schoolmistress by training, Oussma said she fled western Darfur three years ago when janjaweed attackers destroyed her village.

Now living in a refugee camp next to Goz Beida with her husband and two children, she was hired and trained by Internews to become a radio journalist.

Camp elders first wanted Oussma to remain a teacher, said Ahmed Zene, the station's editor in chief.

"But then they realized it was better she switched to radio so that she could teach the whole community," Zene said.

Internews' three stations operate on a $1 million budget for this year, with most of the funding provided by the U.S. State Department and the U.S. Agency for International Development.

Along with news and music, the stations feature six weekly shows addressing topics such as health and safety in the camps. The star program, "She Speaks, She Listens," addresses women's issues.

"We consider there's no taboo, as long as you're careful about how to address things," Grange said. "The only topic we carefully avoid is politics."

Music outplays news, and men glued to their radio in the Koubigou refugee camp said they preferred it that way.

"Life is so, so boring in the camps," said refugee Abakar Hamid. "At least listening gives us something to do."