Women in News expanded to its 12th market with the launch in September of Somali WIN. The programme will work with 10 journalists and editors from media across Somali regions, and is the result of a collaboration between WAN-IFRA, IMS and Fojo Media Institute.
“I hope to return with many benefits from this training and to help my female colleagues – as well as the male colleagues – learn what I have learned,” said Nasrin Mohamed Ibrahim, head of production at a private radio station in Mogadishu. “As women, we have different problems on the job than men. We’re not allowed to participate as much in the newsroom and decision-makers often ignore women”.
Christine Nguku, coach and trainer for WIN Central-East Africa, addressed the women in her opening remarks saying “WIN Somali programme presents a unique chance for all of you to identify opportunities where you can develop your management skills. WIN is committed to the development of women’s skills in managing news organisations and communication to ensure they are ready for promotion to senior positions. We believe women can do a good job and we know you can do it.”
“Promoting women’s leadership and voices in the news through a collaboration with like-minded organizations such as Fojo and IMS signals a new step for WAN-IFRA” said Melanie Walker, WAN-IFRA’s Director of Media Development said. “We are excited to bring this innovative programme to another group of fine journalists, many of whom operate in extremely challenging conditions.”
The launch event also included training sessions by Paula Fray, WIN’s Lead Trainer and managing director of FrayIntermedia. After a quick briefing on how the media is changing around the world and how that is impacting story telling and sources of news, Fray gave a session on leadership and management skills. “Journalists who excel are often promoted to managerial position without additional training and yet managerial work requires a completely different set of skills. The WIN programme is among the few which seeks to address this mismatch by teaching managerial skills.”
The WIN Somali programme will run through to January 2017, and will also link into WIN Central-East Africa programme activities in Nairobi for peer-to-peer mentoring and job shadowing with WIN Kenya partners.
To date, WAN-IFRA has worked with more than 200 journalists and editors from 75 media through the Women in News programme.
Women in News is made possible through support from the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida) and the Norwegian Minsitry of Foreign Affairs.
Click here for the Somali programme Facebook page.
