Eurasia Review
Friday, September 24, 2010
The staff at Global Broadcast Co-operation refused to follow orders from Hizbul Islam militias which now control the station.
Hizbul Islam militants ordered radio journalists to refer to the government as "apostate".
Journalists at the station told AfricaNews defied the order not to lose their impartiality.
“We are not soldiers; so we have to work as in impartial or to leave”, said a reporter at GBC in anonymous.
The GBC was raided by another insurgent group of Hizbul Islam on Saturday.
The group had already banned music and songs which they regard as unIslamic.
The station which located in the Heliwa district of northeast Mogadishu was popular for its broadcasts of international football matches.
Another Islamist rebel group of Al-Shabaab had seized the first independent radio station in Mogadishu last week.
Less than a month ago, Al-Qaeda linked group of Al-Shabaab seized another privately-owned Mogadishu station, Radio Holy Quran (IQK). The stations have been used to broadcast their propaganda.
The main rebel group of Al-shabaab has already banned broadcasting BBC and looted stations in five towns in southern Somalia, including Mogadishu and also ordered local media to end contracts with the VOA. Mogadishu-based radios stopped airing music in April after Hizbul Islam militias ordered them to take them off the airwaves because they claim the songs were un-Islamic.
Al-Qaeda inspired Al-shabaab group and Hizbul Islam run most of Mogadishu, where Uganda and Burundi sent 5,000- strong peacekeepers.
Source: Eurasia Review