If there is one thing that unites all small businesses it's cash flow. Yesterday as I was driving in my car and listening to the Satellite Sisters I heard them mention the campaign to save radio Al-Mahaba--the only first all independent women radio network in Iraq.
They are having some serious cash flow problems and need to raise $100,000. It seems that a roadside bomb blew up their transmitter. A new one costs $100,000.
The fund raising is being managed by OKIINC.org—Opportunity for Kids International, a nonprofit American relief organization that helps the street children of Iraq. OKIINCwas instrumental in starting the station with a grant from the United Nations Development Fund for Women.According to the Satellite Sisters, "100% of the donations will go directly to the radio station for a new transmitter and other operation expenses.
The fund raising campaign started last October. At the time the radio station did receive a great deal of media attention including The Wall Street Journal, New York Times and USA Today
Mona Mahmoud wrote an article in USA Today...
A woman called to say she had been beaten by her husband so much she feels like killing him. Another woman said she was afraid of her husband at the outset of her marriage, but she has learned to assert herself. Now he is the one who is afraid.
Other women said they never wore a hijab but are now being forced to wear the head covering because of pressures or threats from newly powerful religious groups in their neighborhoods.
Launched earlier this year, al-Mahaba, which means "love" in Arabic, is the first independent women's radio station in Iraq. The format is a mixture of news, music and talk.
Ruwaida Kamal, 30, who hosts a program, said callers address a slew of personal and political issues that affect them as women, including family relationships and the wearing of head scarves.The station receives between 70 and 100 calls a day, says station executive director Ali Abbass Hamoudi, 42.
And as Donn Esmonde wrote in the Buffalo News
"The station is the 21st century version of Radio Free Europe, which broadcast the sweet breeze of freedom across the Iron Curtain's stale air. The same message falls now on ears of Iraqi women still in shackles who fear that the new constitution will turn extremism into law."
Your support will be appreciated.
My StumbleUpon Page
