Susan Mujjawa Ananda is on a mission to see an inclusive media where the deaf have equal access to information. The professional sign language interpreter and journalist working with Spark TV and NTV founded Uganda’s premier online TV station for the deaf.
“I want to see deaf people live a dignified life. We want to tell their stories.”
In 2020, a story broke out in the news that a man had been shot in the leg by the Local Defense Unit (LDUs) in Lira District due to a violation of the COVID-19 pandemic curfew restrictions. Prior to the shooting, the LDUs had tried engaging with him, asking where he was going during curfew hours but he continued moving. It would later emerge he was deaf, not aware of any curfew enforcement and in fact did not understand what the LDUs were telling him.
“When I heard this story, a lot came to my mind,” Says Ananda. The incident inspired her to team up with a friend, Simon Eroku, and start Sign TV.
“Also being a sign interpreter on TV, I usually get a lot of feedback from viewers, they come to my inbox and inquire if I can be included in all programs which are not possible.”
Sign language interpretation is a far cry from the engineering career Ananda envisioned pursuing while growing up.
She had a change of heart in 2007 after attending an event at Kyambogo University that was graced by former FDC president and presidential candidate Dr Kizza Besigye. At the event, she saw an interpreter seated and signing beside Besigye. She was entranced, especially as back at home she had witnessed the communication challenges her sister and her deaf friend went though. This inspired her to pursue professional training and a career as a Sign Language Interpreter.
Deaf people make up close to 3.4% of Uganda’s population and are one of the most excluded minority groups in the country. A recent survey by UNAD estimates that 87% of Deaf people have no access to social services and this has been as a result of communication barriers that limit them from accessing education, health, legal and public services among others.
In 2021, Ananda and her co-founder Simon applied for the Agha Khan Media Futures project that called for media-related innovations. Fortunately, they were selected for the program that provided them with training, a grant as well as a working space at the Media Challenge Initiative hub in Kampala. Ananda says, they leveraged this opportunity to kickstart their innovation.
Launched in April 2022, Sign TV is an online TV platform that produces information from mainstream media to sign language. It employs deaf news anchors who deliver the news to the deaf.
“Right now we are only doing a weekly news wrap. We get the news that has been happening in the week and make sure the deaf anchors go through it before shooting. We edit the work and include captions and voice-overs from sign language interpreters. We then upload it on our YouTube channel”.
The game-changing platform has proven to be a hit, with over 800 online viewers and glowing reviews from the deaf community. Ananda says this is only just the beginning.
“We want to have all programs because we realized deaf people only access one hour of primetime news so we thought if we can make it to the 23 hours, we can produce information in sign language that can be able to bridge the gap between the hearing and the deaf”.
As such, Ananda and her team have developed a program lineup that will see them produce content covering health, children, as well as education programs to enhance learning. “We realized that secondary school students are underperforming because the information that they use in schools is not visual enough so as a Tv and with technology, this will be a solution to see that their performance is improved.”
However, funding remains a stumbling block to their success. Currently, Sign TV is being funded by a one-year grant from the Agha Khan Foundation. “We are looking for more funders to see that we can operationalize this venture because it’s a good idea and people are interested in it. We need to buy equipment and pay staff.”
Additionally, they have had issues with copyright. However, Ananda says they are working on getting into partnerships with different mainstream media houses to permit them usage of their content to produce the news.
Ananda says her dream is to grow Sign TV beyond a YouTube channel, into a fully-fledged media house, with an on-air TV.
“I have lived with these people, I know their capabilities and what they can do. For example when you give a deaf person an assignment using a computer, they get done within a short period compared to a hearing person because they have no distractions. I want to see them live a dignified life and have access to the right information, so they can make informed decisions.”
