Hours before the official opening of the Baucau Media House on Wednesday, August 19, two reporters were huddled in front of Mac editing a story. ICFJ’s Marcelino Pereira was assisting student Alexandrina de Sa with her story about local produce.

They were sitting in the production room of the new Media House – where journalists can edit their stories and then feed them back to Dili via internet for the online news agency, www.timortoday.com.

The media house is brand new – and spacious –  free computers and free internet for journalists, a training room, a small lounge and an internet café. There’s even a kitchen in the back!

ICFJ and the five journalism associations opened a Media House in Baucau in January 2008; however, in the 20 months since, the program had outgrown those digs and needed more space. A building just up the street was perfect and a local newspaper, the Timor Post, was already there. It needed just one room, so the Media House moved into the rest of the facility.

Around 100 people – including donors, journalists, government officials and members of the community attended the grand opening. Among the speakers was Otelio Ote, who urged government officials, to make information available to journalists when they come knocking. “Journalists are the link between the people and the government,” he said.

The regional media house serves the entire eastern region of Timor-Leste including the towns of Los Palos and Viqueque. 

Since January 2008, the Baucau Media House has conducted dozens of trainings and trained dozens of journalists from the eastern region – including community radio reporters and managers and nearly two dozen high school students.

The Baucau Media House is just one of five regional media houses in Timor-Leste. The others are operating in Dili, Ermera, Suai and Oecussi.

With the local elections just around the country, the Media Houses will be invaluable to journalists who are filing stories back to Dili. The high-speed internet connections at each media house will make it easier for journalists to get timely stories in the newspapers and on the radio – as well as – on www.timortoday.com.