Venezuelan journalists fight censorship by delivering news personally
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Demonstrators display on June 8, 2017 a banner that reads "No More Killings" near the spot where protester Neomar Lander died. (AP)
Journalist Laura Castillo and a group of six writers and artists in Venezuela are fighting censorship here by delivering the news personally to their compatriots.
Last month they started riding public buses around the capital city and reading three-minute news broadcasts from behind a square cardboard frame meant to evoke a television set. El Bus TV updates its viewers on the country’s economic and social crisis in a way other news sources don’t under President Nicolás Maduro —a former bus driver, incidentally.
“We want to hit at that wall of government censorship and we thought the bus is a medium that brings together the diverse population we want to inform,” Ms. Castillo said.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}She and her colleagues launched volunteer-run El Bus TV in part to mark a troubling anniversary. Ten years ago last month, Venezuela’s late strongman Hugo Chávez shut down what was then the country’s most popular private media outlet, Radio Caracas Televisión. RCTV was overtly critical of Mr. Chávez, who blasted the media as an enemy of the people.
Read more at The Wall Street Journal.