NIAMEY, NIGER - (ANS)- From a temporary radio installation in Niger's capital of Niamey, a new partner station is sharing the eternal message that people may find peace with God through Jesus.
According to a story by Ralph
Kurtenbach for HCJB Global (www.hcjb.org), this message of the Good News of
the Gospel was also shared in person as missionary engineer Jeremy Maller and
two of HCJB Global's African partners were setting up the broadcasting
equipment in the West African country.
A young man stopped by the home of a Niamey pastor who directs the partner
ministry that operates the station.
"The man was not a believer, but he'd been seeing the pastor in his dreams and had come because he wanted 'peace,'" Maller recounted. The man had dreamed of seeing the pastor's daughter and a man dressed in white beside her. After the pastor counseled the man that God was using dreams to lead him to Himself, he suggested they pray together.
"The man prayed with all of us there, accepted Christ and then thanked us and left," said Maller. "I noticed how the expression on his face changed after the prayer. He seemed very tense and even afraid before he prayed, but very relaxed and at peac e afterward."
Granted a license in July, the local
partner had just six months to get the community station on the air in Niamey
where most of the residents are Muslim. Nationwide, Muslims represent some 98
percent of Niger's population.
Maller arrived in Niamey on Nov. 28, 2011, with Rocky Wilson, the head technician with Theovision, an HCJB Global partner in Ghana. As the two men and the pastor set to work installing a 300-watt transmitter and a small antenna to put the station on the air, they were besieged by problems including a broken antenna connector, a transmitter circuit board failure, and an electrical failure in the city that cut power to the studio for three days.
"God provided an answer to every problem we faced," said Maller. "Despite the challenges, the station is now broadcasting in Niamey!" The station went on-air Monday, Dec. 12, the day after the three-day power outage. It is not Niamey's only station with Christian content, as Maller knows of at least one other-and possibly two-Christian-run stations. Broadcasts are in French, Fulfuldé and Tamajeq.
"The thing we heard from people is that they were grateful for the Christmas music that the station played when we first went on air. They do not hear much of that in Niger," said Maller.
An earlier endeavor, partner Radio Espoir (Radio Hope), was Niger's first Christian-owned radio station and broadcast from Niamey for five years before ceasing operations in 2009.
Future plans for the new station include boosting its power with a 2,000-watt transmitter and a 300-foot tower, according to Maller. He added that he and Wilson gave some on-air training, but HCJB Global anticipates providing further training sessions with help from yet another African partner, Togo-based Mediafrique..
"After concluding their work, the two men faced challenges in returning to Ghana, home of HCJB Global's Sub-Saharan Africa office. Their initial Dec. 6 departure date was postponed by the transmitter problem, plus one additional day due to a scheduling error by the airline. Then a canceled flight delayed their departure two more days," said Kurtenbach.
"On the morning of Dec. 11 on the way to the airport, the driver's truck broke down so we needed to find a taxi quickly," Maller recounted. "That was also the morning the president of Niger was leaving for the airport so he had blocked all the roads and soldiers with machine guns lined the streets!"
Stalled at a blocked intersection, Maller resigned himself to another trip delay, but then traffic began moving and they made their flight back to Ghana. "I have personally never seen so many problems come up in a single installation trip," he said. "This just confirms to me that God will use this partner station in a great way for His purpose."
