Making Waves

Stories of Participatory Communication

for Social Change

RADIO IZCANAL

1991 El Salvador

BASIC FACTS

TITLE: Radio Izcanal

COUNTRY: El Salvador

MAIN FOCUS: Health, human rights, education

PLACE: Nueva Granada

BENEFICIARIES: Population of Usulután Departmentin El Salvador

FUNDING: Associación de radios y Programas participativos de El Salvador (ARPAS), Community Assistance Foundation, The Netherlands (CAF), Canada, Norway Ayuda Noruega, Cooperación de Canada

MEDIA: Radio

SNAPSHOT

The dirt road to Nueva Granada disappears from time to time under a cloud of fine dust, as small trucks and motorcycles rush towards the village. No one in nearby towns wants to miss the II Festival of Arte, Cultura y Comunicación that Radio Izcanal has organised to celebrate both its eighth anniversary and the inauguration of its new building and digital equipment. The main square of Nueva Granada is full of people, moving from one corner to another to see the exhibition of trained dogs by the local police, or the exhibit of photographs and documents that trace the history of the station since its early days. The Mayor, the priest, guests from other Salvadoran institutions and even from abroad are already seated waiting for the official programme to start. A few speeches follow reminding the audience of the story of Radio Izcanal then fun and free food for everyone. Young musicians and dancers from other provinces have come to pay their tribute to the radio station. The boys sing ancient songs in Nahua and the girls dance dressed in traditional Maya huipiles.

Izcanal or Ixcanal is a word derived from Nahua language, once important among the indigenous population of El Salvador. It names a common plant that grows large thorns as tiger claws. This is maybe why the founders of Radio Izcanal choose it as the symbol of the new community station. "Ix means leopard and also sacred place; and canal is where the energy is rooted into the earth", explains Basilio, one of the founders. "The radio has the force of a leopard, and it is rooted into our ancient traditions and culture", he adds.

A sample of the thorn plant has been placed beside the main door of the new building. Its sharp edges are a reminder that a lot of struggling and hard work were necessary before Radio Izcanal earned indisputable recognition. Even the Mayor, who is from ARENA, the rightist party that supported the military during the civil war, is an advocate for Radio Izcanal He had to fight within his own political party for the existence of Radio Izcanal too easily labelled as a "rebel" station.

Now is the time of reconciliation. People are holding on to democracy, as imperfect at it seems to be. Everybody wants to move beyond the bloody war that divided the country. Radio Izcanal is the expression of hope.

DESCRIPTION

Radio Izcanal was conceived and started in 1991 by a group of Salvadoran exiles, most of them peasants. They had returned home in early 1990. More exiles returned and joined the station when the Peace Accords were signed on January 16, 1992, after more than a decade of internal war. For eight years most of the exiles had been living at the San Antonio refugee camp in Honduras. It was there that they started planning the radio station. Meanwhile, they developed activities of popular theatre, puppets and other interpersonal communication tools. They did it to organise themselves around important topics such as health and education while strengthening their community.

The station started in a small community called Nuevo Guaicho, where the first group of former refugees were given land when they returned from Honduras on March 5, 1990. The influence of the station grew so fast that a few years ago the population of a nearby larger town, Nueva Granada, invited the community leaders of Nuevo Guaicho to move the station to the larger town. For several years they operated out of a small building over the main square of Nueva Granada, with simple non-professional equipment: a six-channel mixer, a couple of cassette players and recorders and a small volunteer staff.

On November 20th 1999, after the move to Nueva Granada, the station started operating in a new building, with a higher antenna, a bigger transmitter, a 24-track mixer, digital audio equipment and most interesting of all, computers that can handle most of the programming and recording.

Funding of Radio Izcanal has gone through a number of attempts. It started with very little means except for the direct support of the community, but as it expanded its influence, the needs of the station grew as well. Now, the station has various sources of funding and one of them is advertising. Being the only station located in that part of the country, Radio Izcanal is sought by small shops to air ads aimed at the local population. Educational messages are also important. The external support for Radio Izcanal has come from The Netherlands, Canada and Norway. CAF/SCO (The Netherlands)contributed the new equipment; Canada donated materials for the construction of the new building (the community had bought the land); and Ayuda Noruego (Norway) financed the training. All this was possible through the support of ARPAS.

Radio Izcanal is part of ARPAS, a leading organisation in El Salvador founded in February 1994. ARPAS is a network of twenty-four community stations, most of them transmitting on a common frequency (92.1 FM) which was purchased to prevent small community stations from disappearing under the heavy legislation imposed in recent years. Ten new stations are soon to be added to the network, either under the 92.1 FM or 90.5 FM frequencies. At least six radio production centres are also associated with ARPAS, producing educational programmes often used by the radio stations of the network.

The mission of ARPAS is to "associate, coordinate and support participative radio stations allowing the expression of civil society, and especially the great majorities, thus contributing to the democratisation of speech and the construction of democracy in the country".The objective is to "have a presence all over the national territory with stations and participatory programmes of quality, which support the active participation in the development of the communities and the nation" ARPAS is member of the primary international networks, such as ALER, WACC and AMARC.

BACKGROUND & CONTEXT

During several decades the state of El Salvador existed in a similar political situation as Guatemala: civil war. The military in power violated human rights in their attempt to annihilate the popular guerrilla movement.

The community radio initiatives started during the war. One early attempt was Monseñor Romero's La Voz Panamericana the AM station that the Bishop-martyr opened to the voices of the people in the late 1970s. That station was the only one to denounce publicly the murders, disappearances and torture by the military. At some point it was violently shut down, and Monseñor Oscar Arnulfo Romero was killed in his own parish.

During the 12 years of war, clandestine Radio Venceremos and Radio Farabundo Martí both communication instruments of the guerrilla movement, fulfilled the role of alternative information tools, allowing the population in El Salvador and worldwide to learn about the war and human rights violations. They contributed in building international awareness and solidarity with the Salvadoran people.

The peace accords of Chapultepec did not take into consideration the topic of democratisation of media. The only reference to communication is the legalisation of the two guerrilla radio stations that were given frequencies and legal status. Ironically, Radio Venceremos turned its back on participatory communication and became a commercially driven station.

ASPECTS OF SOCIAL CHANGE

In the new democratic context of the 1990s, Radio Izcanal is a very good example of participatory communication and media that is totally "owned" by the community. One of the most interesting aspects of Radio Izcanal is that it grew from a very poor community station, owned by former refugees that were given only a piece of land to survive, to the main radio station in the Usulután department.

Radio Izcanal managed to represent not only the voices of those that had been victims of the war, those that had to flee and left everything behind, and those that lost their land and belongings because of their political beliefs. Radio Izcanal had the will, since its inception, to represent the voices of all rural people in Usulután, including small towns and urban areas such as Nueva Granada. People from the whole region quickly understood that Radio Izcanal was also their radio station.

Another interesting aspect is how Radio Izcanal constantly refers to the "ancient", to the Nahua and Mayan cultures. The language used by the station is permeated with references to the indigenous cultures, even though El Salvador, contrary to Guatemala and Honduras, has not been a country with a large Mayan population.

The fact is that by doing so, Radio Izcanal is contributing to restructure a cultural identity that was largely destroyed both by war and the modernisation of the country. One of the morning sections of programming is called El Guiz in reference to a local bird known to be a symbol of good news. This section brings in a special guest from the community for an in-depth interview.

An outstanding thing that happened in the history of Radio Izcanal is that the Mayor of Nueva Granada, who belongs to the right-wing political party ARENA, has been a strong ally to the project since the beginning. He even fought inside his own party to preserve the right of Radio Izcanal to air. As a result the Mayor is well-respected among the population of Nueva Granada.

MEDIA & METHODS

Young people from the community are being constantly incorporated in Radio Izcanal as staff, which gives the station a very refreshing sound and look. At least five founders, from the first generation, are still there, but they interact very easily with the youngest reporters and disc jockeys, such as Alexander Quinteros, who joined in 1994 when he was in his early twenties.

Communities in the Usulután department of El Salvador, have plenty of access to the radio station. Anyone can step in and request a message be sent through the station. Special slots are scheduled to take care of music dedications, anniversary congratulations, and any other community event.

By creating its audience not only among the former refugees but the general population of nearby villages, Radio Izcanal has ensured both that it is widely accepted by everyone and that the former refugees have been fully integrated within the community.

The most innovative aspect is no doubt the use of the same frequency to allow all the stations to air in their areas of influence. The topography prevents signal interference.

CONSTRAINTS

Community radio stations in El Salvador exist with similar restrictions and menaces as other stations in Central America and most of the world. Access to frequencies is becoming increasingly difficult due to the privatisation process and government legislation that puts frequencies in the hands of those who can pay for it.

Even after the Peace Accords were signed, the landscape of media in El Salvador remains as before in the hands of the very few. Civil society does not participate in the public debate about development or policies. Legislation concerning the media is unfair, undemocratic and incoherent; it only guarantees the arbitrary means of conceding the benefits of official favouritism to private sectors.

If there were no institution such as ARPAS in El Salvador, it is clear that community and participatory radio stations would have had a hard time surviving in that context.

REFERENCES

The information for this chapter was based on direct observation and interviews with Radio Izcanal staff, during a field visit to El Salvador in November 1999.

Further details were obtained through ARPAS; in particular through Oscar Perez, its Executive Director.

ARPAS brochures provide a good insight into the network of community radio stations.

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