Africa, out loud.
Community media made in Sheffield. A celebration of African and diaspora life, in its own words, on DAB, TV, YouTube and the app.
Being African isn't a hobby. It's an identity.
Mainstream media tells African stories without the texture it gives everyone else's. We started African Voices in 2018 to change that, on Sheffield Live first, and now on our own 24/7 station. A place to be honest, without stigma and without sympathy. Just people, talking, laughing, arguing, celebrating.
One station, four ways to listen.
The DAB licence is rooted in Sheffield and Rotherham. The app, YouTube and the website reach everyone else. Wherever you are, tune in.
On DAB
African Voices Radio, 24 hours a day, on the Sheffield small-scale DAB multiplex. Launched 1 April 2025.
On the telly
Our weekly show on Sheffield Live TV, Freeview 7 and Virgin 158, with the full archive on YouTube.
On YouTube
Every episode since 2018, fresh each Wednesday at 9.30pm. Watch back anywhere in the world.
In your pocket
The African Voices Radio app for iPhone, with Android on the way. Carry the station with you.
Faces, flags, music, family.
Eight years of community, captured. Theatre and DJs, elders and students, Africa Day and Black History Month, all of it ours.
Talk that sounds like home.
Music across the diaspora, from afrobeat and highlife to reggae and soca, alongside speech that takes the issues seriously. Real debate, real guests, real phone-ins.
Culture & arts
Heritage, music, poetry and the storytelling tradition, with artists like Otis Mensah and Utopia Theatre.
Health & wellbeing
Honest talk on mental health and the things communities don't always get to say out loud.
The next generation
Young people on youth violence, knife crime and the future, hosting shows of their own.
Current affairs
Local Sheffield news next to politics and human rights across Africa and the Caribbean.
The oldest way of telling a story, on the newest way of hearing one.
Africa has carried its history in the voice for centuries, the griot, the elder, the song. African Voices puts that same voice on DAB, on screen and in the app, so an elder and a teenager can share the same microphone and the story keeps moving.
From a Sheffield studio to the wider diaspora.
We reach around 30,000 households a week across South Yorkshire. Online, the audience is already answering back from Kenya, Rwanda, Zambia and South Africa.
Home base: 15 Paternoster Row, Sheffield. Signal: as far as the internet goes.
The people behind the mic.
A not-for-profit community interest company, run by people who came up through this work and stayed for it.
Baillor Jalloh
Sierra Leonean and Guinean, born in Liberia, raised in Sheffield. A journalist for over a decade, from Paris magazine 54 États to Sheffield Live. He built African Voices to tell the stories the mainstream skips.
Tchiyiwe Chihana
"I want this to be intergenerational and purpose-built for the next generation." She keeps the station pointed at the young people who'll one day run it.
Enoch Karimba
The link between the studio and the city. He brings in the partners, the volunteers and the communities the station was built to serve.
This only works if it's yours.
The station belongs to the people who make it. There's a way in whoever you are, and we'll train you.
Pitch a show
Got an idea, a community to speak to, a story that needs airtime? Bring it. We help new presenters get on air, in any language.
Pitch your showTell your story
You don't have to host to take part. Share what's happening where you are, or come on as a guest for a conversation.
Share a storyVolunteer
Production, tech, social media, events. Around 20 people give their time each week and pick up real broadcast skills doing it.
Join the teamBacked by the city, held to a standard.
Regulated by IMPRESS and licensed by Ofcom as a community service. A community interest company, so any surplus goes back into the station and the community, never into private pockets.
Help these voices reach further.
Run a community organisation, want to advertise, or just believe in the work? Talk to us, or chip in to keep the signal going.