16 August 2003

Idi Amin and international broadcasting The death in exile of former Ugandan dictator Idi Amin brought back memories of how it was 30 years ago. A young Ugandan journalist who was recently on a course at the Radio Netherlands training centre told me he didn't know that Uganda had ever had an external service. In 1972, President Idi Amin changed the name to Uganda Broadcasting Corporation (UBC) to compare with the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC). He purchased some high power shortwave transmitters and started a foreign service, which was inaugurated in time for a conference of the Organisation of African Unity which he hosted in Kampala. He boasted at the time that Radio Uganda was stronger than the BBC - hardly surprising, as the transmitter site was just down the road from the conference centre. It wasn't long before the expensive transmitters fell into disrepair due to lack of proper maintenance. By the time Amin was deposed in 1979, the only similarity with the BBC was the name, and that was duly changed back to Radio Uganda. 4:49:49 PM     comment on this entry []

The Seagull has landed! Radio Seagull has started streaming as announced. I'm listening to the 80k stereo stream and it sounds fantastic. The only criticism I have is that they're inserting some US drop-ins with phrases like "CD hits in stereo" which are quite inappropriate and unnecessary, especially as the station name is not mentioned. I was hoping the format would be true to the original Radio Seagull, which to the best of my recollection never used jingles. No complaints about the music, though. It's less "familiar" than the music played on Arrow Classic Rock, which is exactly what I was expecting. Or to put it another way, I recognise most of the songs on Arrow, but not the ones on Seagull. Real diehard rock music fans no doubt will. 1:05:20 PM     comment on this entry []

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