Major General Jameson Losok Lopai made time for his audience. The head of the security forces in the South Sudanese capital, Juba, does not normally give interviews but he made an exception for the journalists from the DW-AKADEMIE training course. They wanted to talk to the major general about a highly sensitive issue: public security.

“We were very pleased about the security forces’ willingness to cooperate and we were surprised by the warm welcome they gave us,” says Maria Frauenrath. She has been running DW-AKADEMIE’s media project in Juba since 2008. The project, which is financed by the GTZ, aims to train journalists and build up the local radio service.

After 23 years of civil war between northern and southern Sudan, the country is one of the poorest and most indebted nations in the world. The South enjoys far-reaching autonomy and the peace negotiated in 2005 is stable. Nevertheless, the region lacks many necessities - including good journalists.

So Maria Frauenrath and the DW-AKADEMIE training team began with the basics of professional journalism. During the past month, the German team and the Sudanese participants planned and produced a pilot program for a political radio magazine. The work involved close cooperation with Southern Sudan Radio and it was all done in an atmosphere of mutual trust, says Maria Frauenrath. This made it possible to produce the first program on a politically controversial topic: public security. “The management,” says the DW-AKADEMIE instructor, “allowed us to tackle even the most burning issues.”

And there is no shortage of these issues in South Sudan, especially in the light of the April elections. The atmosphere was already heated before the polls opened. Observers and some politicians did not expect a free and independent election. In early April, the main opposition party in South Sudan announced it would boycott the election in many parts of the country, saying there had been many irregularities in the run-up.

In these circumstances, getting an interview with senior security officials such as Major General Losok was a huge success for the reporters, say the instructors. And it was a new experience for the listeners as well. “For the first time I understood something about how the security forces work,” said one listener after the program. “I didn’t know they needed to be neutral and to be there for everyone, and not just for one group or party.”