8 April 2008
New Zealand soldiers in Timor Leste as part of the NZDF commitment to the Australian led International Stabilisation Force (ISF) based in Dili, have been utilising an ADSF resource, the Force Information Support Team (FIST) in assisting them to communicate with the local population.
The FIST is an ADF asset deployed to Timor to provide material to ISF personnel to create awareness amongst the local population of the activities of the ISF and to create awareness of the role of the ISF and the work they are undertaking.
The main product produced by the FIST are simple, colour handbills designed to be handed out to Timorese by ISF personnel in the course of their duties. The handbills are printed in English, Tetum and Bahasa depending on the main language spoken in the area in which they are being used.
Images of ISF troops are also tailored to be appropriate to the situation. Recent FIST product to be used in local newspaper advertising featured images of ISF staff undertaking urban patrolling, but if an operation is occurring in more rural areas, the imagery used will reflect that to make the material more relevant to the audience.
Kiwi Company soldiers on a recent deployment to the Suai area took a large quantity of FIST material with them to distribute on patrol and at VCPs. Platoon Sergeant Dion Beker says the locals were very interested in the material.
“We want to get pamphlets out to everyone and have been going door to door and covering all the areas shops and houses. We had a number of different varieties of pamphlets all containing essentially the same information relating to specific activities by the rebels.
“Reaction by the locals to the material has been very positive. They are all happy to receive it and they read it and talk amongst themselves about what it says. It's really good to see that they are so receptive to the messages and that they are prepared to engage with us and it"s a great way to start a conversation with strangers.
“Mass media communication does not extend much beyond Dili and the people in the more rural areas welcomed these pamphlets because they provided a concise update of the situation which many of the people were unaware of, so the material has real communication value and reinforces the role of the ISF as a trusted force that keeps the people informed.
“In Dili we have distributed these sort of pamphlets on patrols but they tend to be very generic in the images they use and the messages they convey. This is the first time we have done a targeted campaign with information developed specifically for us with a focus on the operation we are conducting and the reaction to them from the population is pleasing,” said Sgt Beker.