Munghana Lonene FM is proud to announce and introduce a new Station Manager, Mr Lawrence Ubisi former Programmes Manager of the station since 1 October 2003 to date; he has served the station in the position of Programmes Manager for 13 years. Mr Ubisi is not new in the broadcasting industry his career in broadcasting dates back in 1996 when he got himself involved in setting up the very first Community Radio Stations in Mpumalanga and Limpopo while serving in the National Community Radio Forum (NCRF) as the first Provincial chairperson of the two provinces. He has serviced the community radio sector in the discipline of Training and Development for the radio sector specializing in Quality Programming production and Radio Innovation. His work history started at the Wits Rural Facility, a research unit of the University of Witwatersrand as a fieldworker, Careers Resource training facilitator and student counselor. He is the founding member of Radio Bushbuckridge and first Programmes Manager of that station. He worked part time at the Institute for Advancement of Journalism – in the training department of servicing community radio called Community Radio Training Project (CRTP) as training and development facilitator specializing on quality programming production. In 2000 he was appointed station manager of Greater Tzaneen Community Radio, while serving Tzaneen Community Radio he was tasked to serve all Love Life Youth Centre with studio with technical training and introduce trainees to basic digital programmes production and in 2003 he moved to Join the SABC as the very first person to be appointed Programmes Manager of Munghana Lonene FM to date. Since inception of Munghana the affairs of broadcasting were handled by Station Manager.   

Lawrence Ubisi will be ascending to the position of Station Manger as from 01 December 2016. He is ascending to this position bringing with him a wealth of radio knowledge, Radio Management experience and radio production background. He has served in a number of radio professional bodies and  has been part of the transformation of the radio industry dating back to early 90s when he was part of the  campaigners and lobby group that lobbied the Government of South Africa to open up the airwaves to allow other role players to access the airwaves resulting in the establishment of the then Independent Broadcasting Authority (IBA) and which was tasked to regulate and license new Community and Private Commercial radio stations and transform the then State broadcaster to public broadcaster in the new democratic South Africa. He participated in the passing of the Broadcasting act having participated in the consultation process from the green paper, white paper until the bill was passed, he was there when community radio stations organized themselves as lobby group and the formation of the National Community Radio Forum, a body that represent Community Radio to date. Over the journey of his career he interacted with key industry stakeholders on professional level from regulatory bodies, local funding agencies of the media sector like the Development Bank of Southern Africa under the chairperson Murius Schoen at that time, The Open Society Foundation of South Africa which is funded by George Soros. Interacted on professional level with Henry J Kaiser Family Foundation, The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, German Technical Agency (GTZ) and other international funding organisation because at that time South Africa was dependent on international funders to facilitate the down of democracy in South Africa.

He served in community media structures in the SADC region, served in Institutions like Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA), I had an opportunity to work with SADC Countries like Zambia, Mozambique, Lesotho, Kenya, Malawi, Zimbabwe and Botswana and Namibia to share knowledge, skills and experiences of the community media sector.

he was instrumental to lobbying the DBSA and South African government to fund community radio stations in South Africa leading to the establishment of MDDA and the school of broadcasting NEMISA, during that process he worked with the then Chairperson of the DBSA and ANC stalwarts Mr Marius Schoen. He regard himself fortunate to have received Media training from various local Institutions of higher learning like Cape Peninsula Technikon and Rhodes University, other training he received from international institutions like Zamcom  Institute of Mass Communication in Zambia, The Knight Fellowship Institute in the USA and Deutsche Welle Radio Training Centre in Germany. He has been trained  and incubated by radio freedom legends like   Mr Thomas Seete, former GE PBS Radio at the SABC comrade Thami Nteteni and former COO of the SABC Mr Solly Mokoetle while they served at the Radio Freedom Institute

He in return introduced and trained radio gurus in the radio sector like Mr. Given Mkhari, Glyson Monyela and others who were studying at University of the North to the concept of setting a campus radio which led to the birth of  Radio Turf and later University Community radio. He worked with Chief Mbangiseni Masia to set up University of Venda. He has been a trainer for young people who aspire to be on radio at Love Life Youth Centre Studios throughout the country and working with young people to craft Love Life radio messages to compliment messages on billboards, magazine and newspapers before the birth of social media in South Africa. He was responsible for all Love Life Studios in all the provinces including Love centres like Mandini, Langa, Acornhoek, Orange Farm, Lenyenye and Thlatlolanang Y centre in June Furse, Sekhukhune.

As part of his career history he has done some work on the technical side of things for example when Radio Bushbuckridge was moved to a new building he was in charge of that relocation processes, setting up the new studio in the new building. He installed the studio equipment of Middleburg Community Radio when they first launched the station and help them switch on transmission on launch date. He was assisting Community Radio stations that owned their transmission sites with transmission maintenance.

He co authored the first Community Radio Hand book manual to set up community radio which was commissioned by IBA, GTZ( German Technical Agency) in conjunction with National Community Radio.