THERE has been a growing concern in some circles over the drying up of funds for community radio stations and other media institutions that once thrived on donor support. But we must ask ourselves: Is this really a loss? Should we, as a people, lose sleep over it?
The answer is ‘No”. In fact, the end of donor dependency in the media is an opportunity for true community ownership, for authentic narratives and for the decolonisation of information. Community radio stations should be just that: owned, operated and controlled by the community they serve. A radio station that relies on external funding, with its editorial line dictated by donors sitting in Western capitals, is not a community radio station, it is a foreign outpost, an extension of external interests disguised as local empowerment.
This shift away from donor dependency should be seen for what it is: a necessary correction. Because, while radio is a powerful tool for development, education and democracy, in the wrong hands, it can become a weapon of mass destruction.
If anyone doubts the power of radio to shape minds and incite action, one need only look at what happened in Rwanda in 1994. During the genocide, radio was not just a medium of communication; it was a tool of war. The infamous Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines (RTLM) did not merely report on events; it dictated them. It called for the extermination of an entire group of people. It dehumanised the Tutsi population, referring to them as inyenzi (cockroaches). It broadcast names, locations and encouraged neighbours to kill each other.
The impact was devastating. The airwaves carried instructions that led to the slaughter of over 800 000 people in just 100 days. Men, women and children were butchered, not by foreign armies, but by their own countrymen, many of whom had been influenced and radicalised by a radio station that served as the voice of hatred.
This tragic episode serves as a reminder that media, when controlled by external forces or dangerous actors, can be manipulated for destructive ends. It is not enough to celebrate the presence of community radio stations; we must ask, who controls the microphone?
If we are to move forward as a continent, we must reject media institutions that are controlled from afar. The very definition of ‘community media’ means that it should be owned and managed by those who understand the realities on the ground —local farmers, teachers and young people whose lives are shaped by the very issues being discussed on air.
A community radio station in rural Zimbabwe should not be receiving instructions from an NGO in London or Washington, DC. A media house in Chiweshe should not be running programming dictated by funding conditions set in Paris, Brussels or Berlin. When media relies on foreign donors, it becomes difficult — if not impossible— to represent the true interests of the community. Instead, it prioritises the agendas of those holding the purse strings.
If losing donor funding means that community media will now be forced to find local sources of funding, so be it. Sustainability should never come from the goodwill of outsiders, but from the strength of the communities being served. We must build models where community radio is funded by local businesses, listener contributions and innovative revenue-generating activities.
Imagine a community radio station that is supported by farmers who see its value in providing agricultural information. Imagine a local media house whose funding comes from cooperatives, churches and schools that rely on its reporting. Imagine a media landscape where journalists are accountable, not to foreign donors, but to the very people they claim to serve.
This is the future we should be working towards, one where media reflects local realities, tells African stories without distortion and serves as a tool for progress.
Radio is power. It can educate, mobilise and empower. But in the wrong hands, it can also divide, destroy and incite violence. If history has taught us anything, it is that control of the airwaves is control of the narrative — and control of the narrative is control of the people.
Let us see this as a rebirth, not a loss. Let us build strong, self-reliant community media that speaks with the voice of the people, not the voice of the funders. The microphone must belong to those who live the reality, not to those who observe it from afar.
