Steering Committee
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Vincent Kahiya is Zimbabwean-based vastly experienced Communications Practitioner with over twenty-five years of practice covering Reporting, Editing, Public Relations and Public Information Management. He is an International Trainer in Journalism, Change Management, Media Strategy, Social Media Policy & Governance, and Digital Media Project Development. He holds qualifications in Journalism and Communications, Public Relations, Public Information Management and Business Leadership.
Vincent was Editor of the Zimbabwe Independent (theindependent.co.zw) for six years (2004-2010) before becoming Founding Editor of NewsDay (newsday.co.zw) in 2010. Between 2015 and 2017, he led publishing company Alpha Media Holdings as Managing Director before joining Oxgn PR as Managing Consultant and currently he is the COO of Corporate Communications firm VPCG (vpcg.co.zw). In this role, he advises on Corporate Communications Strategy and Reputation Management to local and international organisations.
Vincent T Kahiya is a Steering Committee Member under WAN-IFRA Women-In-News programme and Lead Trainer in WIN-Advisory.
Barbara Kaija is group Editor-in-chief of New Vision Printing and Publishing Company, a multimedia company in Uganda that publishes various newspapers, including The New Vision, Bukedde, Orumuri, as well as a suite of magazines.
Barbara has been with the newspaper since 1992, when she joined as a trainee sub-editor. She was promoted to Editor-in-chief in April 2010, having steadily moved up through the ranks first as features editor -a position she held for ten years – and then as deputy Editor-in-Chief, a position she held for 4 years.
Under her strategic leadership, New Vision has grown from simply telling stories to aiming to have an impact on the society. Barbara oversees both the development as well as the production of all content, providing guidance to an ever-growing number of journalists and editors.
As the head of New Vision, Barbara led her team to launch the ‘Ugandans making a difference’, a project that recognizes, profiles and awards outstanding individuals in their fields. She also spearheaded the innovation and production of various unique media products in farming, health, education, gender and entrepreneurship that have transformed into large-scale social initiatives. These include Women Achievers, Teachers Making a Difference, Best Farmers, Pakasa Youth Awards and the Top 40 under 40 inspirational Men and Women in Uganda.
In addition to her role at New Vision, Barbara is also an established media trainer and coach and has been providing mentorship to young people in the fields of media and communications in Uganda and across Africa.
Barbara has been a board member of the African Centre for Media Excellence (ACME) since September 2012. She has also served on the board of Media Focus Africa (MFA) since March 2017.
Pamella Sittoni lead the Nation Media Group’s coverage of international, African and regional affairs by staff in Nairobi and three bureaus in the region, as well as Correspondents across Africa. She has held the position for five years.
Sittoni began her career at the Nation Media Group in Kenya as a reporter in 1993,and later worked as a sub- editor, deputy chief sub-editor and chief sub-editor. In 2003 she moved to the Standard Group, as Deputy Managing Editor. In 2005, she was appointed Managing Editor of its flagship daily, The Standard, becoming the first woman Managing Editor of a daily newspaper in Kenya.
From 2006 to 2012, she worked as a Communication Specialist with the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) Kenya, where she, among other tasks, led the agency’s engagement with Members of Parliament and was charged with mobilising the media to keep children’s and women’s issues on the national and global agenda.
Sittoni holds a degree in literature and anthropology and a post-graduate diploma in communication from the University of Nairobi, and a Master’s degree in New Media, Democracy and Governance, from the University of Leicester. She is a Fellow of the Aspen Global Leadership Network through the Africa Leadership Initiative (East Africa).
Ehab El Zelaky is a veteran Egyptian journalist, currently working as the Executive Editor-in-Chief at Al Masry Al Youm newspaper, which is considered one of the most successful daily Egyptian newspapers, both in print, and online. Ehab has worked in several media organizations including Al Arabi, Al Dostor, Rosa Al Yousef, over the past 20 years. In 2001, Ehab established “Online”; one the most pioneering technology magazines in Egypt. He writes about technology development in relation to the media industry, and trains on CAR, Data Journalism, New trends in Media and Social Media.
Jumana Ghunaimat is a leading Jordanian media figure with an extensive career in media policies, journalism, and activism. As a Minister of State for Media Affairs (June 2018 – November 2019), Ghunaimat led government communications, advancing progressive media policies, formulating the government’s socio-economic narrative, and closely managing cross- government media campaigns and operations. As a minister, Ghunaimat advanced several media and communications initiatives, including reforming the appointment process for the senior leadership positions at the Media Commission (media regulatory body), JRTV (national TV and radio broadcaster), and Petra News Agency – rolling out a competitive merit-based appointment process. Fact-checking was a key communications priority for Ghunaimat. Accordingly, she envisioned and supervised the development, launch and activation of the government’s first fact-checking platform as a strategic and tactical response to a media environment characterized by aggressive fake-news dissemination. This effort was part and parcel of a wider approach Ghunaimat strongly supported to deliver a nation-wide and cross-generational Media and Information Literacy framework, which aimed to equip citizens with the necessary tools to discern credible information and quality journalism.
In addition to her core responsibilities in the media and communications fields, Ghunaimat continued her passion for women activism during her ministerial post, chairing the Inter-Ministerial Committee (IMC) for Women’s Empowerment – which leads the Jordanian National Action Plan (JONAP) for the Implementation of UN Security Council resolution 1325 on Women, Peace and Security.
Ghunaimat had an extensive media career working in several leading local publications. Between 2012 and 2018, she led the independent daily newspaper Al Ghad as editor-in-chief with a focus on enhancing the digital presence of the newspaper. These efforts positioned Al Ghad among the top online news sources. While leading the newspaper, Ghunaimat continued writing a semi-daily column focusing on socio- economic issues, such as poverty, budget, energy, and countering corruption.
Dalal is a journalist based in Beirut who worked for United Press International (UPI) for 21 years as Lebanon Correspondent, Beirut Bureau Chief, Middle East Bureau Chief and Editor-in-Chief of the Arabic desk. She has travelled extensively in the Arab region, securing in-depth interviews and covering major summits. In 2003, she was entrusted with developing the UPI Arabic News Service and expanding its news coverage, leading a 30-member team, including editors, translators and correspondents in Beirut and the region.
Dalal was Media Director at the American University of Beirut and later focused on developing media projects and training for a number of news outlets. In June 2015, she helped set up The Arab Weekly, a London-based English-language weekly newspaper, where she served as Deputy Editor-in-Chief.
She is currently a media consultant and trainer who focuses on in-depth political analysis of Lebanon and the region. She has a BA in Political Science and Public Administration from the American University of Beirut and is fluent in Arabic, English and French.
Maria Lourdes (Nini) Cabaero is a pioneer of new media in Philippine community journalism.
She was director for content for the integrated newsroom and editor-in-chief of SunStar Cebu, the flagship newspaper of the Cebu-based SunStar Publishing Inc. She retired on March 1, 2021. She continues with SunStar as a columnist and consultant on digital. SunStar is the only network of community newspapers in the Philippines.
Cabaero holds a bachelor’s degree in journalism from the University of the Philippines in Diliman, Quezon City, and a master’s degree in journalism from the Asian Center for Journalism at the Ateneo de Manila University. She currently teaches at the Ateneo master’s program for journalism.
Cabaero was a Sandra Burton–Nieman Fellow where she spent an academic year at Harvard University from 2013 to 2014. She took courses at the Harvard Business School, Harvard Kennedy School, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
She won as “Newsmaker of the Year” in November 2020 in the Globe Media Excellence Awards of Globe Telecom for her “impactful body of work” that year and her role in the digital transformation of the community press in the Philippines.
Sonny is co-founder and CEO of Frontier Myanmar, a Yangon-based independent
media organisation that reports on current affairs, business and culture in English and
Burmese. He entered the industry in 1996 as a printer and four years later co-founded The Myanmar Times – the country’s first non-government, English-language newspaper in four decades – together with an Australian partner. While groundbreaking, the paper was still forced to operate under strict military censorship and in 2005 Sonny Swe was sentenced to 14 years in prison for breaching censorship laws. Released under a government amnesty in 2013, he briefly rejoined the Myanmar Times but moved on to become CEO of Mizzima Media Group and eventually launched Black Knight Media Group, the publisher of Frontier Myanmar, in 2015. Starting out with an English magazine, Frontier began publishing online in Burmese language the following year and has since won numerous awards for its investigative reporting, feature writing and commentaries. It is also leading the way in Myanmar in developing new business models for media. In February 2020 Frontier launched a membership programme to deepen its relationship with readers and build a community of people who care about independent media.
Vincent Peyrègne took up duties as Chief Executive Officer of the World Association of Newspapers and News Publishers (WAN-IFRA) on 1st October 2012. Prior to joining WAN-IFRA, since the end of 2008 he worked in the office of the French minister of Culture and Communication where he was responsible for newspapers and new media as well as the Dzétats généraux de la presse écritedz, the French government’s response to the economic difficulties facing the newspaper industry. From 2004 to 2008 he was head of development at Edipresse Publications SA in Lausanne, with responsibility for reader studies and marketing research. In 1997, as Regional Manager of IFRA (INCA FIEJ Research Association), he established IFRA South West Europe, the IFRA subsidiary with responsibility for the French-speaking regions and the Iberian Peninsula, which he headed for seven years. He then established IFRA Ibérica in 2000, coinciding with the launch of the Spanish-language edition of IFRA’s international magazine, técnicas de prensa. Before joining IFRA for the first time, he worked for three years for the business daily publication La Tribune Desfossés in Paris, initially as head of advertising, then customerrelationship manager. A graduate of the European Institute of Business Administration (IEA) in Paris, he began his professional career working as a consultant for several French newspaper companies, such as Libération and Groupe Sud-Ouest as well as for professional organisations such as Syndicat de la Presse Quotidienne Régionale, Syndicat de la Presse Parisienne, Syndicat des Quotidiens Départementaux and Nouvelles Messageries de la Presse Parisienne. Vincent Peyrègne is a founding board member of the French-language chapter of SND (Society forNews Design) and since several years a member of ESOMAR and INMA, and a former member of the REMP-WEMF Research Committee (advertising media research) in Zurich.
