Why women are saving Africa’s ‘tree of life’
The baobab tree is found in many countries in South, West and East Africa, but many take it for granted. In Zimbabwe, where baobab woodlands are often cleared to make space for farmland, increased interest in the baobab fruit has elicited keen interest to conserve the indigenous African tree, writes Tafadzwa Murangwana Ten years ago, […]
How our simple system ended pasture wars
It started as a fight for water and grass and turned into a series of wars that never seemed to end until women said enough and proposed a better system where everyone’s livestock gets to graze. Women from Isiolo, Kenya told Mercy Adhiambo how they brought order and peace to their community through environmental conservation. […]
Why I traded my stethoscope for a microphone
Dr Mercy Korir talks to Sharon Barang’a about why she left clinical practice to become a health journalist Growing up in Kapsoit, in rural Kericho County in Kenya, Mercy Korir always wanted to be a doctor. She always topped her class, and top performers were encouraged to pursue medicine. Her headteacher – Mr Gathii – […]
Why I left the newsroom for politics
Coming face to face with governance issues pushes Ugandan journalists to join politics to push for change. Sarah Biryomumasisho interviews journalists who left the fourth estate for the legislature on their motivations
How pandemic opened new opportunities for journalists
In the midst of the pandemic, women have found new opportunities online, writes Mercy Mangwana The COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated the uptake of digital tools and services and scaled up the global transition towards a digital economy. The Economist reckons that the usage of mobile internet grew faster in the first quarter of 2020, as citizens, governments and […]
We couldn’t find suitable internships, so we created our own media house
Three years ago, three university students were at the cusp of their journalism careers, looking forward to starting their journeys in newsrooms in Zimbabwe. However, they met with unforeseen roadblocks. Nicole Kurebwasweka couldn’t get placement for the industrial attachment unit of her journalism course at the University of Zimbabwe. The production department of the Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation turned her down, saying they […]
In Farah-Salam, migrant women reclaim their stories one photo at a time
On a “normal” day in Farah-Salam, you might find journalists from Europe-based media clicking away at their cameras capturing images of residents in Casablanca’s migrant suburbs documenting the European migrant crisis. 2020 was anything but normal for the residents of Farah-Salam, one such suburb, and the photojournalists who cover them. Six years ago, there were […]
Sexual harassment scourge causing untold pain for women in media
Sexual harassment is media’s open secret, and journalism in Cameroon is losing many promising reporters who leave the newsroom to run away from it.
We defied bias to shine in male-dominated crime beat
“Journalism is not a crime” is often the rallying call against the injustice of the persecution of reporters the world over. But crime journalists can’t ply their trade without getting into the thick of crime, metaphorically speaking. This, however, is often used to perpetuate biases that keep women out of the crime desk. A cursory […]
Invisible scars: Cost of covering traumatic stories
Nelly Ating has been documenting the plight of child victims of Boko Haram, in the norther part of Nigeria. Ating, a photojournalist, focuses on the trauma inflicted on the children by the militia. While telling the stories of children caught up in the crosshairs of conflict is Ating’s driving force, she told AWiM News that […]
