Winners have emerged for the maiden edition of the Centre for Journalism Innovation and Development’s Excellence in Journalism Awards in West Africa. The winning journalists selected from those shortlisted from the entries were announced on November 27 at the closing dinner of the CJID’s Media and Development Conference in Abuja.
Winners and runners-up were selected for all categories; Best Health Reporting, Best Factcheck, Best Solutions Journalism Reporting, Best Community Reporting, Best Reporting on Sexual and Gender-Based Violence (SGBV), and Best Reporting on Social Accountability except Best Climate Change Reporting category which only had a runner up.
Mr Jamiu Folarin, a Nigerian journalism lecturer and practicing journalist won the Best Reporting on Social Accountability category as Ghanian Kwetey Nartey emerged as the runner-up.
The Best Community Reporting category was won by Godwin Asediba of Media General Ghana as Nigerian Kabir Yusuf of Premium Times came runner-up.
Jemilat Nasiru and Mansur Ibrahim of TheCable Newspaper jointly won the Best Health Reporting award while Manasseh Mbachi emerged as runner-up for the category.
Prosper Ishaya of Social Voices won the Best Solutions Journalism Award as Olayide Soaga of Prime Progress clinched the runner up reward.
The Best Fact-Checking in West Africa was jointly won by three journalists, Manasseh-Azure-Awuni, Adowa Adobes Owusu and Evans Aziamor-Mensah of Ghana’s The Fourth Estate. HumAngle’s Kunle Adebajo emerged as the runner-up for the category.
While Yero Bah of Nigeria Health Watch emerged as the winner of the Best Reporting on Sexual and Gender-Based Violence, and Juliet Buna came runner-up, the Best Climate Change Reporting Category only had a runner-up, Bettina Nwelih of News Central Nigeria.
The Chairperson of the panel of judges for the award, Mr Ajibola Amzat, Editor of the Centre for Collaborative Investigative Journalism (CCIJ) judged that there was no winner for the category as many of the entries submitted were merely environmental or agricultural stories rather than climate change.
According to the Programmes Director of CJID, Akintunde Babatunde, the entries received over 388 entries from seven countries for the maiden edition of its journalism awards.
Winners of the categories of the awards will go home with $1000 and the runners-up get $500 to recognise their exceptional reporting.
The award presentation marked the end of the CJID’s 2024 Media and Development Conference themed “Navigating Global Shifts: Media and Technology for Inclusive and Sustainable Development in Africa, as well as the 10th anniversary celebration of the centre.
The conference began on Monday 25th of November and had over 250 delegates from different West African countries. With speakers from the media, civil society organisations, academia and the government it featured several themed discussions as it concerns media and development.
