During the reign of Liberian dictator Charles Taylor, radio journalist John Kollie says he was threatened repeatedly.

THE PROVIDENCE JOURNAL/ Andrew Dickerman

PROVIDENCE — In his Liberian homeland, radio journalist John Kollie produces programs on people who try to find common ground after the civil war that divided them. His topics range from politics and corruption, to child soldiers and wartime rapes, and truth and reconciliation in Liberia.

Kollie now hopes to share his broadcasts with Liberian exiles in Rhode Island and the Rhode Island community at large, through WRNI radio (1290 AM), Rhode Island’s National Public Radio station.

WRNI plans to produce a pilot program of Kollie’s later this month, said general manager H. Joseph O’Connor Jr. If it is well received, the next step will be a monthly broadcast.

“If it works, I hope to bring Liberia a little bit closer to the Liberians here in the diaspora,” said Kollie, referring to the estimated 10,000 Liberians who live here and account for the largest Liberian population per capita in the country. Kollie spoke last week while visiting Rhode Island from Washington, D.C., where he is on a fellowship.

Kollie, senior producer with Search for Common Ground in Liberia (an institute that “works to transform the way the world deals with conflict”) and a Liberian correspondent for the English-language service of Radio France, met with O’Connor and other WRNI staff to finalize plans for a broadcast of his issues program One Step Beyond, which he produces weekly through Talking Drum Studio in Monrovia, the Liberian capital.

“My anticipation is it’s going to go pretty well,” said O’Connor, and that a monthly broadcast could be “a great service to the local Liberian community in Providence,” as well as for a larger Rhode Island audience.

O’Connor was approached last July by Topher Hamblett, president and founder of The Foundation for West Africa, based in Barrington.

Hamblett, former director of advocacy for the environmental group Save the Bay, created the foundation two years after visiting Sierra Leone, where he formerly served in the Peace Corps. When Hamblett saw how the civil war that post-dated his Peace Corps term had devastated the country, he decided to try and make a difference.

The Foundation for West Africa has been working as a fundraising partner with Search for Common Ground for at least three or four years, said Hamblett. “We’ve always talked about trying to connect [Liberian] communities here with the Liberian community back home.” So after meeting O’Connor, Hamblett said he told him his idea for airing Kollie’s programs.

O’Connor considered Hamblett’s proposal, listened to several programs online that Kollie had produced, and decided, “ ‘Let’s figure out what’s do-able here,’ ” he said last week.

Kollie “is already packaging his program for the BBC and Radio France; he’s very amenable to working with us on how to service the local Liberian community in Providence, so I thought, let’s give this a shot,” said O’Connor.

The possibility that WRNI may regularly air Kollie’s programs is already creating buzz among Liberians in Rhode Island.

“I think it is an excellent, excellent opportunity not only for the Liberian community here, but the people of Rhode Island to learn more about this group of people who have come here to settle and who have interacted with them at all levels,” said Saah Charles N’Tow, a well-known figure in the Liberian community.

N’Tow called Kollie “very well thought of, very respected,” and a journalist “who doesn’t hold back irrespective of who he’s talking to. … He makes sure to get at the issues that his audience would want him to really get at.”

Last week, Kollie and WRNI staff discussed technical nuts and bolts of producing a program from Monrovia for broadcast in Providence, as well as the practical issue of what day and time would garner the largest audience.

Financing could be an issue for WRNI, which is still financially strapped and running a deficit of about $200,000 a year, said O’Connor, who became general manager last July.

Just two years before O’Connor took over, owner Boston University had announced it would put the station up for sale, but outraged public radio supporters in Rhode Island protested, and eventually, Boston University decided not to sell.

“We’ve only had one reporter since the end of September,” said O’Connor. “We’re really trying to get the station moving in terms of signal expansion and in terms of underwriting. … We really want to grow the newsroom, but it has to be affordable.”

During the meeting with Kollie and WRNI staff, Hamblett said his foundation is committed to helping the One Step Beyond program go forward in Rhode Island, “and if there are funding needs, we will do our best.”

Kollie, 37, apparently does not shy from tough questions. During the reign of Liberian dictator Charles Taylor, “I was threatened” repeatedly. He added, “That’s part of our business.”

As a producer and host, Kollie tries to get former enemies to sit down at the table and work out their conflicts, an effort he describes as “blending journalism with solution-seeking.” Though that is not a reporter’s traditional role, “over time, I’ve bought into this kind of journalism,” said Kollie. “Our whole content is transformation of conflicts into peace-building. We look at the conflicting parties, and we use this to settle the differences.”

For more information on Search for Common Ground and Kollie’s programming through Talking Drum Studios, visit the Web site, www.sfcg.org, or www.talkingdrumstidio.org.

kziner@projo.com