Radio Free Sarawak
Radio Free Sarawak is a pirate radio station established by environmental and anti-corruption activist Clare Rewcastle Brown and helmed by former Cats FM presenter Peter John Jaban, Christina Suntai, who graduated from Florida Technical College in computer science and computer programming, and Michael Ngau. On the first broadcast on 16 November 2010, the station can be received on shortwave on 15420 kHz. It also produced podcasts for its programmes daily from 1100–1300 UTC or 7:00–9:00 pm at Sarawak local time. The station received wide publicity in Malaysia after the brief disappearance of Jaban. It was later discovered that he had gone into hiding voluntarily. On 15 November 2014, the radio suspended its shortwave transmission services, claiming the Sarawak state government had jammed its service.
Purpose
In its own words, "Radio Free Sarawak is the independent radio station that brings you the news you want to hear, not what others want you to hear." In a report by the London Evening Standard, it was stated that the station aims to "expose the alleged corruption of Taib Mahmud, Chief Minister of... Sarawak... and bring an end to his 30-year rule."The station can be seen as an attempt to bypass the control of mass media outlets in Sarawak managed by Taib's government and logging companies.
The operators
Clare Rewcastle Brown
Born in colonial Sarawak to British parents, Brown is best known as an environmental and anti-corruption activist who started her career as a journalist with the BBC in 1983. In 2008, she returned to Sarawak to report on a by-election and secretly filmed companies clearing rainforests for oil palm plantations. In 2010, she anonymously founded the Malaysia-focused blog Sarawak Report to advocate for environmental causes, indigenous rights and anti-corruption.Incidentally, Brown is the sister-in-law of former British Prime Minister, Gordon Brown.
Peter John Jaban
Better known by his on-air pseudonym, Papa Orang Utan, Jaban is an Iban from Sarawak and a former civil servant with the Land and Survey Office of Kuching. He was also a former DJ of the state-owned Cats FM radio station. Jaban worked the airwaves for that station from 1996-1999.Jaban also served as the Deputy Chairperson of the Sarawak Dayak Iban Association and was active as a human rights activist in Sarawak. He is now actively involved with the Malaysian Civil Liberties Movement, a non-profit organisation based in London, United Kingdom.
In June 2012, Jaban returned to Sarawak purportedly for a medical check up in Parti Keadilan Rakyat's Miri Branch Chairman Dr.Michael Teo's clinic, when he was accosted by three men from Dr.Michael's car. A press statement released by Jaban's Democratic Action Party lawyer Alan Ling Sie Kiong indicated that prior to that, Jaban was stopped at Immigration upon his entry and was told that he would be questioned by the Malaysian Special Branch.