In praise of the BBC

When it comes to a British national election, we’re usually up until 2am or so waiting for a ‘Portillo moment’ or other such excitement before going to bed. This time it promised to be at least as exciting as 1997. But here we are in Northern Uganda, three hours ahead of GMT and in the heart of rural Africa – any chance of following the momentous events?

‘You can listen to the BBC World Service in so many ways...’ the announcer is fond of saying ....’from a satellite receiver to the internet, or even on a radio.....’ Well, yes, we can do all these things, but it depends on the weather, power supplies, speed of downloading, and countless random factors that are a bit like the proverbial butterfly flapping its wings in chaos theory.

First we have a standard battery operated radio, with short wave capability and a very long antenna. It was Anne’s leaving present from her job at Sheffield University, and an excellent little machine. That gives us the BBC World Service, even on FM, very clearly at certain times of day. It is battery operated so no need for electricity. But without warning it can suddenly produce white sound with no hope of recovery for a few hours at least. Even more annoying, it can lurch into Swahili just as the chimes of Big Ben were signalling a news roundup. Our Swahili is not up to it. Then of course the batteries can run down.......

But we also have a satellite radio, generously donated by a friend who works for the BBC. The hospital electrician, who had never seen such a thing before, patiently attached the aerial to the outside wall of our house in the early weeks after we arrived, and to our amazement there was a good signal. When it works it’s fantastic quality, and always in English. But sometimes, when there is heavy cloud, it develops a serious stutter, so that we miss every third word or so. It’s difficult to make sense of things when such a high proportion of the components never make it from the stratosphere. And the radio needs plugging into the mains, so when Kuluva’s ageing hydroelectricity scheme fails it’s useless.

Lastly we can get the UK radio stations on the internet. The BBC website is a delight, but things are slow here and it often takes 10 minutes or so to start getting the live feed, after the 20 minutes or so it takes to log onto the website. So it pays to plan ahead, and sometimes it doesn’t work at all. But it’s nice, when it works, to hear the dulcet tones of familiar voices like Jonathan Dimbleby on Any Questions, or Sandy Toksvig on The News Quiz. And because our laptop has a battery, we can survive for a while even when the power goes.

So did we follow the election? Well actually we went one better than radio and watched it on TV! A South African company, DSTV, provides satellite broadcasting here, for a price, and we can get BBC World News which carried nothing but the election for days. So 4am here on May 7th (2am UK time) saw us up early, sharing a breakfast of tea and toast with a fellow English expat working nearby in the Congo, enjoying the exhausted newscasters’ commentary on the evolving hung parliament. Even the hydro power didn’t let us down this time.

Who says the electronic age has bypassed Africa? And all power to the BBC.