Western Sahara: A new Sahrawi satellite TV station
This will be our first attempt to cover the Sahrawi blogsphere. I, alongside Jillian York and Renata Avila will try to shed light on what the Sahrawi bloggers are saying each week, in Arabic, English and Spanish. The topic of Western Sahara is one of a very complex background, and emotions tend to run high whenever it is under discussion. We will try to cover the Sahrawi side with as much objectivity as it is humanly possible.
This week's pick comes from the Western Sahara blog, writing about the new Sahrawi satellite TV station, R.A.S.D. TV (Democratic Sahrawi Arab Republic Television):
لا أخفيكم سرا كم انتظرت شخصيا كما الكثيرين بالمناطق المحتلة خروج هذا المولود الجديد الى النور بعد طول انتظار، نعم أخيرا لنا تلفزاتنا الفضائية
I have to tell you how much I've personally waited, like many others in the occupied areas, for this newborn baby to see light. And after a long wait, yes, we now have our own satellite television station.
The blogger says that the most important mission for the station should be to advance the Sahrawi case among other Arab countries:
لعل أهم دور لها آن تعرف بالقضية الوطنية لأخوتنا العرب في ظل صمت الجامعة العربية والذي نتمنى أن تتمكن القناة من كسر جدار الصمت هذا وان تجعل منها منتدى للنقاش البناء وللتفاعل مع الأشقاء العرب ، وهو اكبر تحدي للتلفزة نظرا لامتناع المسؤوليين عن الأقمار الصناعية العربية عن إعطاء تردد لها.
The most important role [for the station] is to shed light on our national cause to our Arab brothers. As the Arab League has remained silent over the issue, we hope the station will be able to break this silence barrier and to be a forum for constructive and interactive discussion with our Arab brothers, which will be the biggest challenge facing the channel, considering that the officials at the Arab TV Satellites have refused to host the channel on their frequencies.
He adds:
وأخيرا نتمنى أن تميط القناة اللثام عن واقع المناطق المحتلة من خلال بث أشرطة متلفزة تظهر فيها الصحراء الغربية من الداخل وان تؤرخ هذه الحقبة والمنعطف الهام في مسيرة قضيتنا الوطنية العادلة،
And finally, we hope the channel will also uncover the realities in the occupied areas by airing footage showing the Sahara from the inside, and to document this era and this important juncture in the history of our just national cause.
142 comments
beautiful efforts you guys, and looking forward to reading more of Sahrawi blogsphere.
Good first post. I’m really excited about watching this develop–I was sad that Western Sahara didn’t have its own section.
In response to Lounsbury, I understand his desire to see more reflected than just government propaganda from either side. Since there are so many good Sahrawi blogs written by regular people, though, I know this won’t be a problem in the future.
thank you so much for highlighting our cause in global voices i hope the initiative shall rise awareness throughout the globe about the sahrawi people suffering on both sides of the Moroccan berm,and be a source of reality away from propaganda.
Personally i would like to mention here people and blogers that i admire for making their best either via their blog or on the the ground for our homeland SAHARA let me present Mr Will Sommer’s
http://onehumportwo.blogspot.com/
and Dr. Nick Brooks’s
http://nickbrooks.wordpress.com/
Finally,thank you once again for that initiative.
I am really glad to see that some people here are very moderate and open to people more than to governments or leaders. The western sahraouis, the unionists, the separatists, the diaspora must move forward to end this 32 years old sterile conflict.
The TV of the polisario isn’t on the air. The announcement was made a few months ago but nothing is happenning on satellites.
To make a balance in terms of medias, TV Laayoune (the city and not the camp) has been on the air for a long time as well as Radio Laayoune and Radio Dakhla (the city not the camp). Those are the medias of unionist western sahraouis (= the ones supporting the autonomy initiative under the moroccan sovereignty)
Good job! Will be very interesting to see where this leads. Since Western Sahara blogging tends to be quadrilingual — in Arabic, Spanish, French and (very little) English — and also separated down political lines, this is really valuable if it can help get people from all sides together in the same forums.
Thanks alle, I appreciate your comments.
If you have suggestions for more blogs (particularly French ones, of which we have very few so far), please send me an e-mail!
Best,
Jillian
“Those are the medias of unionist western sahraouis (= the ones supporting the autonomy initiative under the moroccan sovereignty)”.
Sorry but the television station in El Ayoun as well as the radio stations in the same city and the one in Dakhla are run by the Moroccan government. They are state controlled and not media of any Saharawis, independent of whether they support Moroccan occupation and annexation of Western Sahara or not.
thank you Jillian York and others for the initiative and i think i got some useful french blogs on western sahara tobics i may suggest for example,
http://lesaharaoccidental.over-blog.com/
http://saharaoccidental.blogspot.com/
the SADR tv has stopped its broadcasting few days ago on Hispasat satellite we need to know the reasons.
In fact, TV/Radio Laayoune is broadcasting its programmes from Laayoune city as well as Dakhla Radio. As I said before these are the medias of unionist sahraouis. I think we need to take into account their point of view as they represent the majority. They are sahraouis as the ones in Tindouf and may be more.
It’s not a fair to defend one position, one TV, one kind of blog. In Western Sahara, there are unionists living inside the territory of Western Sahara. There are separatists living in Tindouf camps south Algeria claiming independence and there are also diaspora living in Spain and many other countries.