Amid conflicting reports that Maulana Fazlullah a.k.a. Mullah Radio is dead / alive / being chivvied across Swat by security forces, comes this story of good radio and bad. (Well, it is actually about Internally Displaced Persons and polio, but close enough...)
Sajan IDPs: the health aspect By Huma Yusuf, The Dawn, 1 Jun 2009 "Along with Afghanistan, India and Nigeria, Pakistan is one of the four countries where polio continues to thrive. Twelve cases have been confirmed across the country this year. This number is expected to rise as Swatis fleeing the military operation in their valley spill across the country. The trouble began when Swat-based extremist cleric Maulana Fazlullah, better known as Maulana Radio, came on air using an illegal FM transmitter to denounce polio vaccination. He argued that polio drops were part of a western conspiracy to render Muslims infertile. [...] One wishes there were a vaccine to counter ideological brainwashing. Once again, community radio broadcasts (first in IDP camps and subsequently across Fata and the Frontier) featuring correct information about polio vaccination backed by local authorities such as clerics and maliks might be the best way to forever quash Fazlullah’s nonsensical theories." [for the full story, go to http://www.dawn.com/wps/wcm/connect/dawn-content-library/dawn/news/pakistan/provinces/07-idps-the-health-aspect-ha-02 ]
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