BLOJAY, Yarpah Town – A three-day women’s media empowerment workshop has ended in Yarpah Town, River Cess County, aiming to prepare female journalists for leadership roles within Liberia’s male-dominated community radio sector.
The training, organized by the Liberia Media Center (LMC) in collaboration with the Multi-Stakeholders Forest Governance & Accountability Project (MFGAP), brought together twelve female reporters and presenters from Sinoe, Grand Bassa, and River Cess counties.
Francis Brewer, Program Manager of MFGAP, told Verity News that the initiative responds to a persistent gender gap in community broadcasting. “Community radio across Liberia is still heavily dominated by men, with women too often relegated to supportive tasks,” Brewer said. “We want to equip them with the skills and confidence to compete for on-air and management positions.”
According to Brewer, the workshop combined practical reporting exercises with sessions on newsroom management, editorial decision-making, and public speaking. The goal was to build technical competence while encouraging participants to speak out and take charge.
“Many of the women were shy on the first day,” he noted, “but by the end of the training, they were presenting programs, debating editorial choices, and showing real leadership potential.”
Participants also discussed the broader challenges facing females in the media, including limited mentorship opportunities, cultural barriers, and unequal access to professional development.
Facilitators emphasized strategies for overcoming these hurdles, such as forming peer support networks and advocating for gender-sensitive hiring policies in community stations.
Brewer stressed that while the workshop is only a starting point, it is part of a wider effort to increase female representation in Liberia’s community radio sector. “We may not reach a fifty–fifty balance right away,” he said, “but we can certainly move from almost no women in leadership to a meaningful share.”
Organizers hope participants will return to their respective counties as change agents, inspiring other young women to pursue careers not only behind the microphone but also in management offices where key broadcasting decisions are made.
Community radio remains a vital source of information in rural Liberia, and advocates believe that having more female in leadership will ensure programming reflects the perspectives and needs of the entire population.
