By Our Reporter
PwC Nigeria has announced the winners of its 2022 Media Excellence Awards at a virtual ceremony on Thursday 6 October 2022.
The awards, now in its seventh year, celebrates and rewards excellence in business reporting in the following categories, Tax & Fiscal Policy, Finance & Capital Markets, SMEs and Business & Economy Reporting. The first-place winners in each category receive a cash prize of N500, 000 (Five Hundred Thousand Naira), while second and third-placed winners receive N150,000 and N50,000, respectively.
In his opening remarks, Uyi Akpata, Country Senior Partner, PwC Nigeria, commented:
“For about nine years now, PwC Nigeria has focused attention and resources on enhancing the quality of media reporting in Nigeria as part of our corporate responsibility strategy. We started with the annual Capability Enhancement Workshops for Journalists, which has trained over 500 journalists in the last nine years. We then also introduced the Media Excellence Awards as a platform to reward those who produce exceptional reports across all media channels.
Our efforts, in this regard, is in recognition of the critical role the media plays in society, especially in deepening democracy and developing all facets of our national lives. We hope that these awards continue to motivate journalists working in Nigeria to take a greater interest in business reporting, which is key to the economic development of our country and aim for excellence while at it. When we achieve this, we will have fulfilled our purpose as a firm, which is to build trust in society and solve important problems.”
The winners of the 2022 PwC Media Excellence Awards are as follows: Tunde Ajaja of Punch won the Tax & Fiscal Policy category for ‘Legal battle over VAT collection stirs debates on equity, fiscal federalism I & II’, Isaac Anyaogu of Business Day won the Finance & Capital Markets category, for the entry ‘Nigeria’s green bond is driving a quiet boom’, Odinaka Anudu of ICIR won the SME category for ‘As Nigerian government slumbers, N144bn Aba shoe industry crawls’, and Kunle Adebajo of Humangle Media won the Business & Economy Reporting category for ‘Banking Made Easy … But Not For People With Disabilities In West Africa’.
The judges of the 2022 awards included, Taiwo Oyedele, Fiscal Policy Partner & Africa Tax Leader, PwC Nigeria who was the head judge, Andrew S. Nevin (PhD), Partner & Chief Economist, PwC Nigeria, Amaka Anku, Practice Head, Africa, Eurasia Group and Cyril Stober, Veteran Broadcaster/Journalist, Editor, Television News Anchor & Talk Show Host of more than four decades.
The head judge of the awards, Taiwo Oyedele, while giving an overview of the awards noted that:
“This year, we received 221 valid entries, an increase from 188 in 2021, entries cut across several media, including print, online, TV and radio. The entries submitted were impressive, with instances of journalists going beyond the call of duty, even in dangerous circumstances, to report factual news. It’s hard to be a journalist anywhere in the world, but it is twice as hard in Nigeria. This is why we organise these awards to celebrate and motivate journalists for their work.”
The head judge also indicated that the organisers would consider breaking the Business & Economy Reporting category into two separate categories in future editions such that Investigative and Special Reports will be a different category.