Manooré FM

Located in a central neighbourhood of Dakar, Manooré FM's broadcasting area covers the entire city and surrounding regions. According to the organisers, Manooré FM is dedicated to women, marginalised people, and civil society. Although no reliable figures are available, organisers say that it enjoys a wide audience, as is apparent from the participation of listeners, both women and men, in its interactive broadcasts.

According to Oumy Cantome Sarr, the radio station's coordinator, the aim of the station is to "address women directly and to offer a more realistic picture of women - all women, including those from disadvantaged backgrounds, for it is they who are usually most excluded from the mainstream media. We wanted to speak of their everyday lives, their experiences, their successes and failures. We wanted to show women's activities on the ground". Manooré FM works closely with women's organisations in order to achieve this and to be close to what is happening on the ground.

Although Manooré FM staff is made up mainly of women, its programmes are not solely for female audiences, and the station does not deal only with women's issues. Rather, its strategy is to include men and to examine all kinds of issues from a gender perspective.

The station does more than just broadcasting; it is also actively involved in advocacy and capacity-building activities. For example, in November 2007, when the Constitution of Senegal was amended to amplify women's access to elected positions and voting rights, Manooré FM contributed by synergising the advocacy activities of women's organisations.

With regard to capacity-building, the radio station organises training for women and/or communicators on issues such as leadership and communication, violence against women, information and communication technologies (ICTs), and journalistic ethics. Manooré FM also provides capacity-building activities for its own staff. Further training opportunities are available through in-house
opportunities, which include training programmes on journalistic techniques, as well as small-group educational sessions on a variety of thematic issues.

Women, Gender

The nucleus of the radio station was set up in 1997 by Altercom - an organisation for women and alternative communication, made up of women leaders and intellectuals - but it was only in 2002 that Manooré FM was allocated a frequency.