By Jose Gutierrez
Every day, in the cities or in the countryside, at places of work, factories, farm cooperatives, schools and marginal communities, Salvadorans gather in small circles for a daily ritual — to tune in to Radio Farabundo Martí of the FMLN, the country's national liberation movement.
They tune in for news, cultural and educational programs that reflect their day to day struggle for social change. They tune in for empowerment against the government's propaganda war.
Because more than half the population is illiterate and TV is unavailable for the majority of Salvadorans, radio is the country's most important means of mass communications. It has also become the people's most important asset against the government's propaganda war.
Radio Farabundo Martí started on January 22, 1982, in the northern province of Chalatenango and, like its sister station Radio Venceremos, has been crucial to overcoming the government's disinformation strategy. For the past 10 years, these stations operated under continuous military attack, constantly moving their location to avoid being detected by troops, who made its destruction a top priority.
Today, RFM is operating as a legal radio station and has a new press bureau in San Salvador, but the radio is still threatened by the death squads.
RFM relies on a network of "popular correspondents", who feed it daily information on events in all parts of the country. "Our correspondents are the radio's link to our people", says founding member Luis. "Through them the people relate to the radio, participate in the gathering of information and provide it with the material for its survival."
"We are a community radio in struggle", says Ignacio, the radio's technician, better known as "the witch" because of his legendary ability to repair the radio equipment with virtually no spare parts.
"Everything from the news to the cultural and educational programming is done with the people's direct participation and input. It is the people themselves making radio, learning to use the power of information to advance their struggle for a better and more just society."
The Radio Farabundo Martí collective in Australia is working to raise US$29,000 for new transmission equipment for the main station and repeater.
RFM has a reasonable amount of equipment, the fruit of 10 years of work in the mountains. However, this equipment will be insufficient of national coverage, increase of staff and infrastructure, and amplification of the broadcasting time and variation of programs. The equipment is not of sufficient power, and much of it has deteriorated because of war conditions and storage or transport in less than good conditions.
The collective is also raising money to fund two RFM correspondents to join the network of 28 "war correspondents" distributed throughout the country and coordinated by a team of three who work in Chalatenango.
For more details or to assist in the project, contact Jose Gutierrez, Radio Farabundo Martí representative in Australia, on (03) 349 1290 or write to PO Box 4339, Melbourne University, Victoria 3052. E-mail: peg:jgutierrez.