Peace University ousts radio
By Suzanna Starcevic
San José, Costa Rica, July 25-- With this week’s
padlocking of its parking lot and a notice to evacuate the building
within two weeks, Radio for Peace International (RFPI) has found itself
bracing for, rather than broadcasting, political struggle.
The radio has promoted international peace, news and information programs,
including many from the United Nations — from the University for
Peace (UPaz) campus in Ciudad Colón, 25 km west of San José
— since 1987, using the land rent-free as an independent, joint
project with the UN-backed university.
Although the station continues to broadcast, the padlock went on around
noon July 21, trapping staffers’ cars inside the parking lot until
the armed UPaz guard who put it there relented and let them out.
“The university is just defending its rights to its property,”
said Luís Alberto Varela, the university’s lawyer. “It
didn’t just give them two weeks to leave; they’ve had a year
and a half.”
As early as Apr. 12, 2002, past RFPI director Debra Latham received
a letter from Rector Martin Lees saying the university would be terminating
the 1992 International Cooperation Agreement with RFPI’s Oregon-based
umbrella organization, World Peace University, Inc.
The notice gave the station until July 10, 2002 to leave, amounting
to a 90-day informal eviction notice -- recourse provided for.
While no one contests the university’s ownership of the land, RFPI
CEO James Latham says a cloud of confusion is still swirling around
the station as to why the university is trying to remove the station
from its two-story building and adjacent transmitter, built through
RFPI fundraising.
“When [University for Peace President] Maurice Strong first came
in 1999, he said he was very happy with Radio for Peace, one of the
only independently funded joint projects,” said Latham. “The
last time I asked them why they were doing this, they said only they
did not want us to be here, weren’t able to give us the land and
wanted us to leave.”
UPAZ has been criticized since its creation in 1980 by the UN General
Assembly as being unproductive, an image the current administration
has worked to revise; it recently graduated 24 students from a ten-month
Master’s program.
The agreement doesn’t require reasons for termination, but Varela
says there should be no confusion. He cites an outstanding $14,000 debt
owed by Radio for Peace to the university for installation of telephone
and internet structure and illegal use of radio frequencies as reasons
that have been communicated. “It has fallen on deaf ears,”
he claims.
Latham says an arrangement was in place to repay the debt, incurred
in 2001, in the form of cash or radio time for UPaz, but that the radio
wasn’t given time to provide the services in kind.
All attempts to contact other University for Peace representatives were
refused and directed to Varela.
Although an inquiry into the Radio for Peace use of frequencies listed
past unauthorized use of FM frequencies, the report lists no complaints
after Strong’s review of the university’s relationship with
RFPI began. Also, UPaz initially arranged the broadcasting frequencies,
some of which did not require permits at the time.
According to Latham, the shortwave bands the radio is using, 7445 and
15040, are international, registered with the High Frequency Coordination
Committee (HFCC), which coordinates frequencies over the world, and
open to broadcasters as long as they test for 90 days to make sure they
are not interfering. The bands are used by several other broadcasters
as well.
The National Radio Control disagrees, maintaining the two bands are
registered for sole use by mobile aeronautic and mobile land communications.
Melvin Murillo, director of National Radio Control, agreed that Radio
for Peace had taken the steps necessary to register its frequencies
with the HFCC, and the mistake was made in the go-ahead.
However, he says that upon receipt of a UPAZ letter “revoking”
the station’s protection (the university holds mission status and
is considered international territory), he considers the radio to be
under Costa Rican jurisdiction. To get “legal,” the station
would have to pay Radio Control ¢2,500 ($6.25) per year to test
and then use a frequency.
He says he has been trying to notify the radio of this for a year and
a half, but that it was impossible to find the phone number (which is
listed on the RFPI web site and also in local directory assistance).
Varela says the university had offered to negotiate compensation for
the buildings, and keep open future joint projects once the radio had
resettled, but that Radio for Peace would negotiate only to stay.
Latham’s response is that the RFPI board, which consists of members
who live around the world, meets only once a year, and it was impossible
to negotiate compensation terms without consultation.
Arcelio Hernández, lawyer for RFPI, says principles are
going to be the radio’s defense in future legal action.
“The radio entered the premises under an agreement,” he says,
noting that former Costa Rican President Rodrigo Carazo was one of the
founding members of the University for Peace who extended the invitation
to the radio in 1985 and is still active on the station’s board,
as well as President Emeritus of UPAZ. “And it remains that its
most recent actions, sending an armed guard to lock the gates so people
can’t get their cars out, are hostile acts, and don’t coincide
with the ideas of peace.”
He says there are legal eviction procedures, and that the university
has not used them. Also, RFPI has invested roughly up to $725,000
in the infrastructure, far less than half of which would be transferable
to another location, he says.
He plans to meet with board members July 26 to plan the defense carefully,
and accompany it with a campaign for policy change in the university.
Ex-President Carazo will also be at this meeting, and says he couldn’t
make detailed comments until speaking with the Board. He did forcefully
say he was in “utter disagreement” with the university’s
actions. “They haven’t given real reasons for eviction,”
says Hernández. “We could be looking at repression of freedom
of the press.”
Varela says that’s nonsense, and that a letter from the university
to Foreign Minister Roberto Tovar stating that the “current activities
of RFPI are inconsistent with the international emphasis currently being
developed by the university” wasn’t a reference to programming,
but to the irregularities in frequency operation.
“These things came up in other administrations,” he said.
“They just decided to focus attention elsewhere.”
Robert Muller, a UPAZ co-founder and the university’s Chancellor
Emeritus, said he was saddened by the actions. “My ideal was that
the University for Peace, Earth Council and Radio for Peace would be
the beginning of a new Athens on the hills there, and together be able
to give hope to new generations,” he said.
At 80, Muller is still active in promoting peace, but acknowledges he
no longer has influence in decisions made at the university. “I
have heard that people at the university have said radio doesn’t
have a place,” he said. “I think it’s very important
for a developing country.”
A tired Latham emphasized on the night of July 22 that the radio bears
no ill will towards the university. “We would just like to see
this resolved in a win-win situation,” he said. “We’re
all supposed to be working for peace; there’s more than enough
to do, and enough room for all of us to do it.”
RFPI members and volunteers are urging people to write to Kofi Annan,
Secretary General of the United Nations (annan@un.org) or contribute
with checks marked for Legal Defense Fund, sent to Radio For Peace International,
P.O. Box 3165, Newberg, Oregon, 97132.
Source: Tico Times
