KuJAMbula Studio
Lilongwe, Malawi
In 2007, we broke ground on an exciting project at our Njewa Ministry Center in Malawi—KuJAMbula Studio, a recording studio, complete with radio broadcasting capabilities. KuJAMbula means “recording” in Chichewa, a tribal language of Malawi.
COTN partner BroMan Expeditions conceptualized and raised funds to build KuJAMbula Studio in Malawi. BroMan’s vision (Brothers Reaching Out to Meet a Need) is to raise funds and awareness for well-established children’s charities through mountain climbing by organizing, soliciting sponsors for, and leading charitable mountaineering expeditions.
Through KuJAMbula Studio, our goal is to generate local radio programming that focuses on Christian programming and social issues involving children. Culturally, Africans are storytellers. By creating radio programs that broadcast cultural stories that children can relate to, we hope to empower children and give them hope for a better future. Our initial strategy will be to create 52 weeks of 30-minute programs addressing local issues that our children face, and broadcasting them over the radio. We hope to end a cycle of hopelessness by empowering children with options, providing a coming-alongside style of assistance, and pointing them to local relief agencies.
Initial programming focused on social issues affecting young girls. Malawian girls, sometimes as young as 12 years old, are often forced to marry and leave school. Once they are married, the young girls rarely return to school. “In the past, girls from some tribes in the country were denied certain rights,” former COTN–Malawi Country Director Yobbe Lungu explains. “Most of their rights were violated, as evidenced by arranged marriages, and not being given equal opportunities to education, leadership opportunities, business and other key social economic opportunities. A daughter was seen as a possession of her father. In this poverty-stricken nation, when debts need to be paid, food, possessions, or property need to be purchased, or the family needs money for a son’s education, the daughter(s) often became the payment.” An eleven-year-old girl may be sold to a man three times her age. She becomes a wife, no longer the possession of her father, but of her husband. She has no future, no hope, and no dignity.
Issues similar to this affect all of the children of Malawi, not just the young girls. By setting up this studio and broadcasting discussions on the topics, it is our desire to inspire hope in the children of Malawi, letting them know they are not alone, and enabling them to make powerful transformations in their lives.
Our long-term goal is that KuJAMbula Studio will attract American Christian recording artists to travel to Malawi and work with the children firsthand, sharing their musical gifts and creativity to inspire the youth. Also, by promoting the studio’s recording facilities to the local market our COTN–Malawi staff hope to generate income to benefit our programs in Malawi.
For more information on KuJAMbula Studio or BroMan Expeditions please contact Jeff Sondermeyer at jeff@bromanx.org.