Punch Nigeria Restricted, publishers of The PUNCH, Saturday PUNCH and Sunday PUNCH, on Sunday reaffirmed their management within the media trade as they had been named Newspaper of the 12 months on the thirtieth version of the Nigeria Media Benefit Awards 2022.
The PUNCH, which gained the award in 2021 and several other earlier editions, beat The Guardian and Day by day Belief to win the distinguished award.
Editor of the Weekend title, Olusola Fabiyi, accepted the award on behalf of the corporate.
Chairman of the Committee of Assessors, Mr. Dele Adetiba, enumerating the factors for the Newspaper of the 12 months award, stated: “A number of the standards are the extent of compliance with the foundations of regulatory our bodies, proportion of native content material, response to monetary obligations internally and in direction of regulatory our bodies, public acceptance and notion of the media firm, high quality of manufacturing, degree of professionalism in content material, objectivity, equity and steadiness, and industrial concord throughout the group.”
Within the Editor of the 12 months class, former journal editor The PUNCHMr. Ademola Oni, who’s now the Managing Director of Publications and Digital, narrowly misplaced the award to Hamza Idris of Day by day Beliefwhereas the editor of The nation he was additionally the runner-up.
In the meantime, a number of journalists along with your beloved newspaper additionally gained in eight different classes, whereas others got here out as runners-up.
Head of Investigations Tessy Igomu gained the Setting Reporter of the 12 months award, whereas Afeez Hanafi, former The PUNCHand Harmless Duru from The nation got here out as runners-up.
Igomu was additionally runner-up within the reporter class, which was gained by Francis Juliana from New Telegraphwhereas she additionally got here out as runner-up within the newspaper author of the 12 months, which was gained by Ani Percy, ex The PUNCH.
Weekend headlines interview boss Oladimeji Ramon gained within the Telecommunications and Actual Property Reporter classes.
Within the telecommunications class, he beat Adepetun Adeyemi from The Guardian and Lucas Ajanaku from The nationwhereas within the Actual Property class he beat Hanafi and Gbenga Aderanti from The nation to win a prize.
Hanefi was one of many high winners at this occasion. He’s the winner of the Tourism Reporter of the 12 months, CSR Reporter of the 12 months and Insurance coverage Reporter of the 12 months awards.
Within the insurance coverage class, he and assistant enterprise editor The PUNCHNike Popoola, had been runners-up.
Hanafi, who had six nominations, additionally got here out as runner-up within the oil and gasoline class, which was gained by Lucas Ajanaku of The nationwhereas the runner-up within the Actual Property and Setting class was gained by others PUNCH journalists.
Additionally, Olatunji Obasa, ex PUNCH, gained the Information Photographer of the 12 months award. One other photojournalist from The PUNCHKayode Jaiyeola, was runner-up within the class.
Chief Correspondent, Tunde Ajaja, got here second within the Enterprise and Political Reporter of the 12 months classes.
Dauda Oluwakemi of The nation gained the Enterprise class, whereas Dare Adekanmbi from Sunday Tribune gained the Political Reporter of the 12 months class.
One other senior correspondent, Tope Omogbolagun, got here as runner-up within the Agriculture, Cash Market and CSR classes. Within the agriculture class, Gbenga Akinfenwa of The Guardian; whereas the Cash Market award went to Collins Nweze from The nation.
Correspondent, Janet Ogundepo, misplaced the Agricultural Reporter of the 12 months award to Gbenga Akinfenwa of The Guardian. Ogundepo additionally emerged as runner-up within the Leisure class, which was gained by Harmless Duru of The nation.
Correspondent, Godfrey George, emerged as runner-up within the protection and company social accountability classes. Gboyega Alaka of The nation gained the protection class.
Grace Edema, Senior Correspondent with The PUNCHhe misplaced the Training class to Iyabo Lawal of The Guardian. Francis Juliana Ebere of New Telegraph he was additionally second within the class.
Within the columnist of the 12 months class, Abimbola Adelakun and Tunde Odesola from The PUNCH he misplaced the prize to Azu Ishiekwene of Vanguard.
Adetiba stated entries had been judged on accuracy, originality, initiative, proof, freshness of thought, depth, perspective, language, temper, steadiness and objectivity, human curiosity and social relevance. He famous that the passing grade for every entry is 70 %.
On this particular thirtieth anniversary version of the award, he stated there have been 837 entries out of 588 entries in 50 classes, an exceptional enhance from the 11 classes in 1992 when the award debuted. He attributed the rise within the variety of candidates to the award’s repute.
The occasion was attended by the Governor of Lagos State, Babajide Sanwo-Olu; Minister of Info and Tradition, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, who represented the President, Main Common Muhammadu Buhari (retd); Senior Particular Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Mallam Garba Shehu; Lagos State Commissioner for Info and Technique, Mr. Gbenga Omotosho; former Minister of Well being, Prince Julius Adelusi-Adeluyi; Director Common of the Nationwide Broadcasting Fee, Shehu Ilelah; chairman of DAAR Communications, Chief Raymond Dokpesi, amongst others.
Sanwo-Olu inspired journalists to carry highly effective establishments to account, struggle for the oppressed and use their voices to carry to the fore points in society that should be addressed.
He added: “Your requirements mustn’t ever be lowered for something, and positively not on this age the place social media and the web have made it straightforward to unfold pretend information, malicious reviews and hate speech geared toward giving undue political benefit or divide our society and even derail this democracy of ours.”