March 30, 2009
Kids News Network ends cooperation with Afghan kids news
The freedom of press is deteriorating in Afghanistan. Critical journalists, especially women, are increasingly threatened. Exemplary is the flight of the editor in chief ofthe Afghan kids news after persistent threats from within the state broadcaster RTA. The editors in chief of the Kids News Network (KNN), a network of six youth journals in developing countries, now officially ends the cooperation with RTA.
Farida Hares (43), the editor in chief of “Ayenda Sazan” (“Future Makers”), had to flee for her life, after years of protecting the female journalists against all threats, mainly because of the conservative view that women are not supposed to be on TV. The Afghan children’s news was the first program on the state broadcaster Radio Television Afghanistan (RTA) with female presenters after the fall of the Taliban.
After Farida’s flight to India, all editors were sent home and the state broadcasting ignored all attempts of contact. To draw attention to the deteriorating media situation in Afghanistan and to call for support for Farida, the editors in chief of the remaining six KNN youth news programs from South Africa, Zambia, Surinam, Peru, Indonesia and Burma, decided to send this clear signal.
Farida Hares was editor in chief since 2004, established by the Dutch media foundation Free Voice. She fled for her life after serious threats, expressed by the ‘security service’ and management of the state broadcaster RTA. Since September 2008 she is with her family in India; due to her security, this has not been published before.
At the request of Free Voice, ‘Reporters Respond’ (an emergency fund for journalists by the Dutch journalist union NVJ) has donated 1,000 euros, for the first needs of the family Hares. The UNHCR, the refugee agency of the United Nations, has given the Afghanfamily a temporary refugee status. They have almost nothing, not even money for her twochildren to school to go.
Ayenda Sazan / Future Makers was initiated by Free Voice’s KNN since 2004. KNN started at the same time youth news programs in Suriname and South Africa. These three youth journals were soon successful, with high ratings and much appreciation shown by children and parents. Two years later, this success made Free Voice decide to expand the network of children’s news programs and now similar youth news is also broadcasted in Zambia, Indonesia, Peru and Burma. The network expands ever further, with the newest being developed in the Dutch Caribbean. KNN now reaches about 20 million viewers collectively each week worldwide.
Due to the extremely difficult conditions in post-Taliban Afghanistan, this youth news program costed most of the time and the most money, but the Afghan kids news also made the biggest difference. Since the retreat of the Taliban, Ayenda Sazan was the first program on TV in which women presented, children were singing songs that were not necessarily about religion and in which a weather forecast for the whole country was shown. On air three times per week, twice 15 minutes in the languages Pastun and Farshi. The editorial team consisted of around 25 young professional journalists, traveling the country to give all Afghan children a voice on TV, sometimes risking their own lives.
Ayenda Sazan was soon popular: the state broadcaster described it for many years as ‘our best viewed program’. Next to compliments the editors also received criticism, especially from religious-conservative forces in Afghanistan, who still believe women belong at home, and if on the street, wrapped in a burka. Over the years, the frequency and severity of criticism and threats grew. Presenters were seriously threatened, so they were forced to come to the studio completely covered, to present the news with only a headscarf. Farida also received increasingly threatening phone calls at night. When the RTA board was replaced last year, the problems started. They also demanded that women could not be presenters, let alone a woman leading the most popular program. After a ‘very serious’ warning by the ‘security’ of RTA, her husband, who was a police officer in Kabul, decided it had become too dangerous in Kabul for the family Hares.
After the flight of Farida, the entire editorial staff was sent home and all equipment and office space was taken over by the news team of RTA. Mr. Nazari, the general director of RTA, refuses to answer any email, post and phone calls by Free Voice. Also, he resolutely send away a team from the public broadcaster NOS, who wanted to make a report on the Afghan kids news.
The Afghan kids news is still being broadcasted since Farida fled, but only once a week, on Saturday afternoons. Free Voice has requested two independent media researchers to watch the program. Both report that the quality is very much decreased. It is poorly assembled and consists of only local news. In a random research on the street in Kabul among a group of children, a majority said to know and regularly see the program. The need for children’s programs among young people remains high.
In the studio of RTA Ayenda Sazan was recorded three times a week, until Farida fled and her editors were sent home.
The team producing Ayenda Sazan is now a group of volunteers (two girls and eighteen boys from 12 to 18 years), with one RTA producer as supervisor. Several RTA employees have anonymously told the researchers that the RTA board gives the program no priority and that the general director preferably takes it off air.
In addition to the unacceptable threat of the editor in chief, this program no longer has anything to do with independent journalism and making an understandable news program for the next generation. Therefore it is no longer part of the Kids News Network. The current RTA management shows not to be serious about the freedom of press, women rights, nor children as viewers.
The partnership is officially closed until the situation in the state broadcasting structurally improves. As soon as another opportunity for Afghan journalists occurs, to produce a quality program in freedom and its editor in chief can return home safe, the door to KNN is wide open for them. The disconnected cooperation means for RTA it can no longer use other kids news reports from the network, it will not participate in the annual KNN, nor the ‘collective projects’ (such as reporting on the World Cup in 2010) and also the website www.knnafghanistan.com will be taken offline. The editors in chief of KNN programs from Peru, Surinam, South Africa, Zambia, Burma and Indonesia call, together with the Dutch kids news and Free Voice to help Farida Hares and call for action against the deteriorating freedom of press in Afghanistan.
Ayenda Sazan was supported from 2004 to 2008 by the National Postcode Lottery, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Oxfam Novib.
Note to editors: For more information, images and interviews: please contact Ole Chavannes, program manager for Kids News Network in the Netherlands:+31 35 625 0123 - ole.chavannes@freevoice.nl