Wole Soyinka Awards announces entries for journalists

In a statement made available to journalists in Lagos, the Wole Soyinka Centre for Investigative Journalism which coordinates the awards noted that this year award which is the 7th in the series is opened to professional Nigerian journalist or team of journalists, full-time or freelancers, who have produced a news story published between 26 October […]

In a statement made available to journalists in Lagos, the Wole Soyinka Centre for Investigative Journalism which coordinates the awards noted that this year award which is the 7th in the series is opened to professional Nigerian journalist or team of journalists, full-time or freelancers, who have produced a news story published between 26 October 2011 and 3 October 2012 primarily targeted at and received by a Nigerian audience.

“In this edition, the award will reward and honour the works of outstanding Nigerian journalists whose news stories expose corruption, regulatory failures and human rights abuses in public and private spheres of the country in the print, radio, television, photo, online, climate change, local government, sports, health and editorial cartooning categories,” the statement said.

According to the organizers of WSAIJ, the sports and health categories have been included in this year edition basically because of the importance of these sectors to sustainable development, the well being of the country and its future in relation with international realities.

“The addition of the editorial cartooning category on the other hand, is in alignment with global acknowledgements of cartoon as a veritable tool of investigative journalism and in response to agitations from journalists in this genre,” the statement further noted.

It added that the annual awards is a continuous tradition which started in 2008 and re-introduced in 2011, the Centre intends to present a grand prize of the WSCIJ-Nigeria investigative journalist of the year award to any work adjudged as the best among the winning pieces.

The entries are said to be scored by a judges’ board comprising persons of integrity who are in the media and related professions. The deadline for submission of entries has been slated for Thursday, October 25.