Rutherford student on the airwaves

Talkback: John Kingi enjoys hosting a talkback radio show. Photo: BEN WATSON

By LEANNE WARR

New radio talkback host John Kingi loves life on the airwaves.

He's among several Rutherford College students hosting a radio show every Friday night on Planet FM 104.6.

The community radio station was looking for something to fill a gap in the market. John and others in his school's gifted and talented programme has just the answer.

"The premise was a youth radio show that gave youth the opportunity to voice their opinions," he says.

The students are funded to be on air for a year and they're encouraging more young people to tune in to their 6pm show.

John and co-hosts Chen Liu, Aonghas Anderson, David Graham and Craig Robertson hope to get candidates in as guests in the lead-up to the local body elections, so listeners can call in with the hard questions. 

Children's Commissioner Cindy Kiro and Green MP Nandor Tanczos have already been interviewed on the programme.

"Cindy was amazing," John says. "She was really interesting to talk to."