“It seems Ahmadinejad should better be the president of Palestine or Lebanon and not of Iran,” reads an SMS message from Koorosh in the southern Iranian city of Kerman.
A phone message from Ahmad in Teheran counters: “Give Mr. Ahmadinejad a chance. Nobody can change things in just three years and return the country to how it was before. He has the will and resolve.” Students of the University of Shiraz send dozens of emails and photos about their protest action against the “restrictive and ideological policies” of the college management.
But it is not only politics that is reported about and discussed on Radio Farda (Persian for “tomorrow,”) the Persian service of US-funded Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL). “I’m 47 years old with a family of six and all my adult life I’ve been a carpet factory worker,” says Karim from the western Iranian city of Sanandaj who lost his job four months ago. And Omid from Teheran appeals to health authorities and the public: “I am HIV positive and not a criminal.”
Producing a 24/7 program with news, analyses, debate, and Persian as well as Western popular music, Radio Farda receives more than 500 SMS, email, and phone messages daily. Jean Khakzad, a veteran broadcaster at RFE/RL’s headquarters in Prague, Czech Republic, monitors all of them and answers most. “Most of the messages come from Iran,” says Mr. Khakzad. “Some want to hear their favored songs, others comment on social or political issues. I guess the senders of the messages are aged 25-35.”
Most messages make it to broadcasting: SMS and email messages are read at some point during news or music programs and phone messages aired. But presenting all those diverse statements is not where communication ends. Mr. Khakzad and program editors choose the week’s most popular subject based on what has been most commented upon.That subject — recently the Israeli offensive in Gaza — is put both on the forum of Radio Farda’s website and on air, inviting listeners and web users to tune in for a weekly discussion called “Your Views.”
“We broadcast all relevant statements on the week’s subject,” says Mr. Khakzad. He calls a on a few volunteers in Iran who want to take part in the roundtable. “In the selection of participants we care about diversity: differing views, men and women, different locations in Iran — and we as moderators don’t take a position.” “With the hundreds of messages we receive daily, we could produce a full-hour program everyday. But we don’t have enough manpower and resources.”
According to Washington-based research group InterMedia, Radio Farda is the most popular international broadcaster in Iran. Based on Google Analytics, Radio Farda’s website in Persian, blocked in Iran but still available through proxies offered on a daily basis, has 3.9 million pageviews monthly.
After the US presidential election last November, hopes rose among Iranian journalists that a President Obama would invest more in public diplomacy, including broadcasting, in dealing with Iran and pressing its regime back to more acceptable international standards of behavior. With most of brains and resources understandably focused on the financial crisis, however, they are wondering about the priority of attention to public diplomacy when federal budget will be checked “page by page and line by line” as President-elect Obama promised. “This is a great service,” says Rosa Ajiri, 25, who recently joined Radio Farda from Teheran. “You can’t do enough to fill the information gap in Iran.”
