Time is up for sleazy urban radio presenters

Urban-based FM radio stations across Africa are outdoing each other with stories of scandal, peddled in a sensational, ethics-free fashion.

In Kenya, a Nairobi-based FM station that runs a morning show with a segment dedicated to smoking out cheating spouses and significant others last month got tongues wagging when it aired the story of a married woman named Agnes who was supposedly “busted” cheating on her husband with her boss.

The presenter placed a call to Agnes, feigning the voice of her boss’s wife. She claimed that she had just been diagnosed with HIV and had called Agnes, out of concern, to inform – not fight – her because she was supposedly infected with the virus by her cheating husband.

Agnes went into shock, shrieking “Oh My God!” several times after revealing that she and her boss had not been using protection in their illicit sexual encounters. Agnes’s supposed husband, who was in the studio, added to the drama with his angry remarks.

The audio file went viral among Kenyans on social networking sites.

Such emotion-arousing scandals, sometimes uncovered using surreptitious tactics, are becoming the lifeblood of popular morning and evening shows on urban-based national FM radio stations in Kenya and elsewhere in Africa.

Sensational

Aside from scheduled news bulletins that are often followed by shallow analyses, the highest-rated shows on these stations mostly peddle triviality, smutty jokes and sex scandals.

The checks that formerly guarded against broadcasting the trivial and sordid are no longer enforced in a number of radio stations.

Armed with the benefit of wide geographical reach, many urban-based FM stations revel in spreading delicious gossip with gleeful abandon and have precious little time for important public affairs.

In their unrelenting quest for sensational stories, presenters at these stations trivialise national issues in their cocktail of scandal, gossip and commercial promotion by advertisers.

Many shows are distinguishable only by the amount of gossip, fluff, banter and overplayed music that they offer between long commercials. Sadly, tabloid fare has become the gold standard for many stations.

Radio is the medium through which most Africans get their daily fix of news and information on current affairs. It is fast, ubiquitous, and for media companies, very profitable due to low costs and high cash flow.

The tablodisation of many urban-based stations provides an awesome opportunity for local, community-based (or vernacular) radio stations to quench the thirst for thoughtful coverage and discussions on serious public affairs that affect the lot of most Africans.

Sleazy journalism

Community radio stations have been banned across the continent for fuelling ethnic strife and political violence in countries such as Kenya and Rwanda. But these stations can expertly fill the void created by sleaze-chasing urban FM stations.

There are listeners yearning for stations that offer serious reporting, thoughtful analyses that catalyse discussions on the serious issues that face them day in, day out. Tabloid urban FM stations have failed on this.

Sleaze-peddling might have its commercial gains for the media companies that run urban FM stations, but it doesn’t offer listeners the diverse range of economic, political and social programming on public affairs, which they need.

If supported, rather than threatened with closures and government clampdowns, community radio stations, which have historically enhanced participatory communication for social change the world over, can meet this crying need, especially now.

The vulgarisation of urban airwaves calls for more community radio stations across Africa.

Community radio stations now have a greater opportunity to offer diverse programming and limit the debauched commercial influences of advertising. They can expand the range of debate on critical issues facing many African countries – poverty, corruption and unemployment.

In an environment of consolidated media, community-driven stations can offer minority viewpoints and lesser known cultural material.

Community radio stations are accessible to illiterate populations and more effective at sharing, preserving and promoting local traditions and cultures.

The convergence between radio and the Internet also presents a green field and blue sky of opportunities to community radio stations.

The writer is a communications professional