TV channels Sierra Leone

Sierra Leone's television began early for the region and today includes a strong religious strand alongside the national services.

How television came to Sierra Leone

Television reached Sierra Leone in 1963, when broadcasts began from Freetown - one of the earlier television starts in West Africa. The service grew out of the Sierra Leone Broadcasting Service, created in 1934 as the earliest English-language radio broadcaster in the region, and television began as a partnership between that public service and commercial interests. Coverage, at first limited to the capital, was extended to all districts in 1978, when the service also switched to colour. The field grew slowly through the decades and today mixes national coverage with faith-based channels.

The national broadcaster today

The Sierra Leone Broadcasting Corporation was formed in April 2010, when the old broadcasting service merged with the United Nations peacekeeping station Radio UNAMSIL, and it was inaugurated that June by the president and the UN secretary-general. From its headquarters in Freetown's New England neighbourhood it produces two television channels - one relayed by satellite toward Bo, Kenema and Makeni - alongside a network of regional FM stations reaching as far as Koidu and Kailahun. Commercial television has proved a hard business here - Star TV serves Freetown, while other ventures have come and gone - and radio remains the most widely used and trusted medium, with most households in reach of a set. Relays of the BBC World Service, Voice of America and RFI have long been part of the Freetown dial. Outside the capital and the main towns, patchy electricity keeps television audiences thin.

Faith broadcasting

Mercy TV is the religious voice of the country, serving the strong church life of the country with worship and gospel programming. Christian broadcasting has deep roots in Sierra Leone, from church-run FM stations such as Believer's Broadcasting Network and Radio Maria to the gospel music that fills the Sunday airwaves.

From national holidays to the Sundays of its churches, Sierra Leone's channels serve a country where the screen remains a shared public space.