Bushmen catch the airwaves

2003-09-01 22:15

Windhoek - Namibia's Broadcasting Corporation (NBC) will start a new radio channel for its ancient Bushman community, Information and Broadcasting Minister Nangolo Mbumba said on Monday.

Mbumba said the channel for the 30 000 strong Bushman community would be launched as part of the government broadcaster's restructuring process.

"The San radio service will start as soon as a transmitter tower is erected at Tsumkwe", 650km north-east of Windhoek, programme director Claudia Ikela said.

In July the British-based Minority Rights Group International had released a report saying that Namibia's Bushmen, also known as San, have experienced a deterioration in their economic and political rights since independence 12 years ago.

The report criticised the Namibian government for not formally recognising the existence of the the southwest African country's 30 000 San outside the former "Bushmanland" in northern Namibia.

Bushmen are hunter-gatherers, hunting with bows and arrows and eating edible roots and berries. They were the original inhabitants of southern Africa, appearing as a separate and identifiable group more than 20 000 years ago.

- AFP