Talk show host murdered, station director killed, broadcasters warned

At sunrise Saturday morning Radio HornAfrik talk show host Mahad Ahed Elmi took four bullets to the head as he reached his office door. Hours later station director Ali Iman Sharmarke, returning from Elmi’s funeral, died when his automobile struck a landmine. Friday government troops raided Radio Shabelle, arresting staff members. Both stations – broadcasters known for independent reporting – have continued to operate despite warnings and threats from disparate bands of warring factions

Across Africa radio talk shows are increasingly popular with listeners, allowing a venue for venting complaints and providing up-to-the-minute news tips. Authorities – and warlords – criticize - and threaten - talk show hosts for the comments made by interview subjects and phone-callers. Uganda’s government issued a stern warning to radio stations and their talk show hosts in particular to cease being “irresponsible.” The country’s National Security Committee “directed the Media and Political Squad to move out fast and clamp on such people and charge them in court,” said the minutes of the Committee’s July 27th meeting.

It’s not like Somalia’s Radio Shabelle hasn’t been shut down before. Five times, it seems, this year. A local police commander and his troops entered the station in Mogadishu (Friday August 10), hauled away ten staff members marching them to a police station and shutting down the station.

The police commander was looking for the morning program producer, upset over the stations’ coverage of an attack on the police station. All but one, morning newscaster Bile Abdulahi Ali, were released about three hours later and the station returned to the air. The Ethiopian-backed forces fighting Islamic insurgents complained that Radio Shabelle inaccurately depicted the violence. 

Soldiers of one army or another, “looking for guns,” raided the station four times in two days in early July. No weapons were found. In January the Transitional Somalia government ordered closed all three independent Mogadishu radio stations, HornAfrik and Radio Voice of Holy Quran.

Ali Iman Sharmarke founded HornAfrik in 1999, returning to Somalia from a decade living in Canada. In 2002 the Canadian Journalists For Free Expression honored HornAfrik saying, "Its journalists, from many clans, have faced constant intimidation and threats in a society where there is no one to protest to, and no protection of press freedom.”

The Shabelle Media Network was founded in 2002 and also operates a television station. Radio Shabelle is a Radio France International (RFI) affiliate. The station began offering a daily 15 minute English language newscast earlier this week.

Reporters Without Borders (RSF) characterized life for media workers in Somalia as “precarious” in its statement following the weekend killings. There is no calm in Mogadishu, Somalia’s wrecked capital. Armed gangs loyal to one warlord or another continue fighting Somalia’s Ethiopian-back government troops and all sides are targeting journalists and broadcasters.

– August 11, 2007

Keywords:media in Africa, radio journalists murdered

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