Haitian media a part of story
Former IRP Fellow Trenton Daniel just returned from covering Haiti for the Miami Herald. The below is one of a collection of stories from his trip
PETIONVILLE, Haiti -- As she ducked under the canopy of tarps in a tent city here and looked for wounded survivors to interview, journalist Florence Lisene got an urgent call.
It was her uncle. He wanted to speak to Lisene's mother, who was sitting under a blue tarp around the corner in Place St. Pierre -- where Lisene and her family have been camping since their home pancaked.
"This hasn't been easy, " Lisene, 27, a radio reporter who has worked at Signal FM for the past year. "You have to put your personal emotions aside to deal with whatever situation you see."
Lisene is among the hundreds of Haitian journalists struggling to report the news after a 7.0-magnitude earthquake heaped devastation on the Caribbean nation. They must grieve and take care of wounded family members as they gather the news. They must find food and water as they report on where listeners can do the same.
The small society of Haitian journalists has been dealt a tough blow from the earthquake, which destroyed much of the country and claimed an estimated 200,000 lives.
So far, 12 journalists have died in quake-related accidents, 15 were wounded and one is missing, said Joseph Guyler Delva, a local press freedom advocate. Other setbacks, he noted, include at least five destroyed radio stations.
Then there's the journalists' own predicament.
"The profession is in jeopardy, " said Delva, secretary general of SOS Journalistes, a local press freedom group. "The journalists have the same problems as everybody else. They need food, water and tents."
In the aftermath, Delva had to tend to his bruised wife at the SOS Journalistes headquarters; the three-story structure collapsed. Now he's launching a campaign that would help feed, hydrate and shelter reporters.
Press freedom groups say the work of Haiti's journalists is even more vital now.
"It's critical for Haitians at this time to get news about essential issues like, where to get aid, where to get food, where to get medical treatment, where to get water, " said Carlos Lauria, the Americas program coordinator at the Committee to Protect Journalists in New York.
The independent press had made significant strides in recent years after reporters struggled to do their jobs under decades of despotic rule.
Heads-of-state took turns toppling one another and employed private militias to terrorize and hang on to power. Journalists often found themselves the targets of harassment or even victims of assassination.
But in the past few years, the press had come to enjoy a sense of freedom, even if the coverage of the privately owned radio stations sometimes reflected the interests of its business-minded advertisers. Today, an estimated 100 stations operate in Port-au-Prince, along with two daily newspapers.
Amid the ruin, radio stations shut down. All but one kept broadcasting continuously after the quake, the general director and press freedom advocates say. That was Signal FM, a privately owned station in Pétionville, a suburb of Port-au-Prince, and it was the only one to air for the first four days after the disaster.
Perhaps it was sound engineering or sheer fortune, but the towering radio station and its equipment eluded damage wrought upon neighboring buildings.
"Thank God, our radio system wasn't broken, " said Mario Viau, general director of Signal FM, or 90.5 FM, which was founded in 1991. "Our Internet was still working and we already had some gas saved."
But obstacles were elsewhere.
Some of his 23 reporters in Port-au-Prince lost family members or saw terrible injuries. They needed food and water as supermarkets and restaurants were destroyed. And they needed fuel to move around as well as to run generators. And they needed functioning phone lines to conduct interviews.
Friends and station supporters stepped up to help, donating food and gasoline, Viau said.
On its feet again, the station gave survivors the airwaves to make announcements. Banks have also told listeners where they could find open branches. U.S. Ambassador Kenneth Merten visited and relayed a statement on behalf of President Barack Obama, Viau said.
Late Sunday morning, Viau and top announcer Lucien Jura brought a government official to speak about aid distribution.
Announcer Michel Chancy updated listeners on distribution efforts. He also mentioned that they were in close contact with nongovernmental agencies.
"We are trying to give priorities to the areas that were badly hit, " Chancy said, speaking into the microphone.
There are other challenges.
With almost all businesses in Port-au-Prince and in surrounding areas still closed, media owners must wrestle with this question: "How can I send a bill tomorrow to a business that's down as well?" Viau said.
Delva said a dwindling number of advertisers -- on which the privately owned stations depend so much -- threatens to crush the press. The average journalists' salary, he said, was between $100 and $150 a month. Now, it could drop to $40.
Sunday afternoon, Florence Lisene toured Place St. Pierre, the very camp in which she lives with thousands of others. With a press badge dangling from her neck, she approached strangers with bandaged legs and arms and asked for interviews. She wanted to get their thoughts on aid delivery and rescue efforts.
She then held out her recorder. The shoebox-size device uses a cassette tape.
"The government is trying to help people, but we had to dig ourselves out, " July Napolean, 28, said into the recorder. "The rescuers never came to help us."
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