Surround Sound: Senegal - A Letter from Senegal

In June of 2009, Malaria No More Managing Director Kate Campana visited Senegal to experience the impact of the "Surround Sound: Senegal" campaign firsthand. Below is a letter she wrote describing the experience.

Hello Friends,

I wanted to take this opportunity to share with you an update on my recent trip to Senegal for the launch of Malaria No More's exciting new partnership with Youssou Ndour, Surround Sound: Senegal.

Along with my Malaria No More colleagues Scott Case and Jen Cho, I joined Dakar-based Martin Edlund for the launch of the new marketing and awareness project with an all-star concert and to see for myself the remarkable power of so many voices raised in unison against malaria.

Surround Sound: Senegal

MNM has been working hand-in-hand with our valued international partners and Senegal's National Malaria Control Program (PNLP) for months in anticipation of this event, which was timed to coincide with Senegal's nation-wide campaign to distribute more than two million nets to children under five.

Together with Youssou, we are embarking on a two-year effort to apply innovative marketing techniques and engage a broad cross-section of Senegalese society—entertainment, sport, faith, business and government—to create a culture of net usage and fever treatment in Senegal.

Luckily, we've got a big head start: Youssou is the biggest star and the best marketer in Senegal, if not in all of West Africa. His talent, commitment, and innovative thinking, along with that of the entire malaria partnership in Senegal including PNLP chief Dr. Thior, reached people across the country with a message of malaria control.

Cheering the End of Malaria

The festivities began on Saturday, when Youssou led a three-hour caravan through the slums of Dakar—an area frequented by flooding, and, of course, malaria—to herald the kickoff of the mass net distribution the following week.

A cattlecar festooned with posters and loaded with giant speaker stacks played Youssou's new "Xeex Sibburu" ("Fight Malaria") song in three local languages, while live reports were carried throughout the morning on Senegal's top radio station, RFM. I rode on the roof of the press van right in front of Youssou the perfect vantage point from which to watch thousands of fans as they chased Youssou's car, handed him babies, and literally fainted with the excitement of the spectacle.

But that was only a warm-up. The Xeex Sibbiru concert at Stadium Amadou Barry in Guediawaye that night was a six-hour event featuring 20 of Senegal's top acts and drawing an estimated 15,000 fans, with several thousand more listening in a giant crowd outside the stadium grounds. Youssou's brother and chief marketing strategist, Boubacar Ndour, orchestrated the whole thing from behind the scenes and each of the 20 performers spoke in their own language to describe the impact of malaria on their lives and why they wanted to join with Youssou in the fight against the disease.

LLIN campaign partners joined Youssou onstage during his set and his malaria speech was carried live on RFM, which broadcasted from the stadium grounds and interviewed partners all day, spreading the news of Senegal's star-powered fight against malaria.

Songs from the Field

After recovering from the concert launch, we had the privilege of traveling to Kaolack, about three hours southeast of Dakar, to witness the distribution of nets and see how national activities translated to the local level.

4,000 copies of the Youssou malaria songs plus radio PSAs in four languages were distributed to the regions for inclusion in campaign activities and local radio promotion. Special kudos go to Child Fund Consortium, who managed the local integration into Senegal's 1,300 village-level cases de santé or "health huts".

We fielded a 1,800-person baseline survey before the campaign, so we'll be able to track with precision the long-term impact of the campaign and look forward to sharing the results. For now, though, I'll have to content myself with anecdotal results... The highlight was showing the Xeex Sibbiru t-shirt to a group of kids playing soccer in Kaolack and watching them spontaneously begin singing the chorus to the song: "Sanke bun nandal/Moom ngay fanaanoo" which means "you and your children/must sleep under a treated mosquito net" in Wolof.

It was music to my ears.

Best,
Kate Campana
Managing Director for Programs, Malaria No More