Nine fellows of the Report Women! Female Reporters Leadership Programme (FRLP) have been selected by the Wole Soyinka Centre for Investigative Journalism (WSCIJ) to carry out story and leadership projects. This support, exclusive to the Report Women! Fellows, is under the Champion Building activity of the Report Women! News and Newsroom Engagement project with the support of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. WSCIJ will provide funding support to fellows executing stories related to women and girls’ issues.
The leadership project seeks to enhance the coverage and reportage of women and girls in the news. It involves training female reporters in gender mainstreaming, engaging more female experts as sources, and empowering female reporters to assume leadership roles in newsrooms. Additionally, leadership projects may involve advocacy for increased representation of women in newsroom and executive management, as well as the development or implementation of gender policies within organisations.
The shortlisted fellows include Nkechi Macaulay, Radio One 103.5 FM; Elfredah Kevin-Alerechi, The Colonist Report Africa; Ann Godwin, South-South Bureau Chief, Guardian Newspaper; Blessing Oladunjoye, publisher, BONews Service and Blessing Tunoh Asso chosen from a competitive pool of entries submitted by fellows across the five FRLP sets. Others are Goodness Adaoyiche-Chibunna, Politics Nigeria; Sarah Ayeku, TVCNews; Kimberly Blessing Nwachukwu, Nigeria Info FM and Ijeoma Okereke-Adagba, Centre for Journalism Innovation and Development. All stories and leadership projects will be published and submitted on or before June 18.
Report Women! News and Newsroom Engagement seeks to strategically engage the management and staff of news media organisations within Nigeria, to increase the representation of women in their coverage and newsroom leadership, design a source guide of women experts and raise champions for the cause of equality.
