Channel 4 recognised as most successful commissioner with multiple finalists in three out of four categories, including two from Katie Arnold in the same category. For the first time, winning entries across all four categories focus on one story, Gaza.
Since the Rory Peck Trust was formed in 1995 it has helped over 3,300 journalists, but 2024 saw its crisis fund all used up by August. Recently appointed Executive Director of the Trust Jon Williams (former Managing Director of RTÉ News and Current Affairs) arose to tell the audience that the 30th year was like none before. “This is the toughest role I have ever had,” he confessed. “There has never been a year like this; more countries are involved in more conflicts today than at any time since the end of WWII.
“A record number of journalists and media workers have been killed in the last 12 months, 137 of them in Gaza alone according to the Committee to Protect Journalists. Some 72 journalists have been killed since January, and it does not stop there with 320 journalists in jail,” he added.
In the event program Williams had named 2024 ‘the year of everything everywhere, all at once’. He continued: “Sometimes it can be hard to find a light amidst what can feel like a diet of despair. We all have to believe that tomorrow will be a brighter day, and tonight is just about that.
“Finding hope comes from the courage of those we honour this evening. All are inspiring individuals who faced down those who wanted their voices silenced,” he added. “And there is a lesson in that for all of us: this is a moment, a call to action for journalism and journalists to fight those who try to de-legitimise us.”
His focus is a fight on two fronts – for the public’s trust, and in defence of the business that news people love.
“This is why we have been thinking hard about how the Trust engages not just the producers of journalism but the consumers too. We all need to understand the world and make decisions about our future, but what we do won’t change. We must just make it relevant to a wider audience,” he said.
“Just by protecting freelance journalists we are protecting both freedom of expression and democracy. And that is how we will position ourselves with the public,” he added.
Keep telling these stories
The News Award category, sponsored by Google News Initiative, was won by the experienced AFP duo Belal al-Sabbagh and Youssef Hassouna, for the powerful story Israel-HAMAS War in Gaza. The runners up were Luckenson Jean for his AFP commission Caught in The Crossfire as Gang Violence Chokes Haiti’s Capital, and Sara Creta with the C4 commissioned Journey to Darfur.
Belal al-Sabbagh made it to the awards night. He said: “For the last 33 years of my life I was stuck in this tiny piece of land I call my country. I cannot describe the distress we’ve been through during the coverage of this war. We did it while we were suffering from a lack of food, water and medicine.
“My biggest pride is that I have been able with my colleagues to convey the sound and sights of all the victims of this war. I hope this award becomes like a message of support of all the brave journalists who are still risking their lives to convey the truth,” he added.
Sara Creta said: “It is really difficult to be here knowing that so many of my colleagues are risking their life every day. Reporting on violence and especially in a place marked by genocide and unspeakable atrocity, is one of the hardest challenges I faced, but I feel it is not a choice. It is an obligation to keep telling these stories.”
Shining a light on two conflicts
The News Features award made event history with Katie Arnold securing two last three spots with Inside Myanmar’s Rebel Advance and another C4 News commission called West Bank Settler Expansion: A Year in the Frontline. But she was beaten to top spot by Ibrahim Al Otla with his (Al Jazeera English) story Witness - Rescue Mission Gaza.
With Otla unable to exit Gaza and sending a short message, it was Arnold who wowed the audience.
“Everyone in this room knows it is a particularly scary time to be a journalist. The goal of both my films was to shine a light on two conflicts that were perhaps overshadowed by the war in Gaza. And to expose the people and institutions who think they can kill or harm others in the name of power, land or religion while the world looks the other way,” she said.
“For the Myanmar film we had security advisers so we were able to get to the front lines and within 200 metres of the Myanmar military. We were very confident in our decision making because we had such a good team around us, and I have very good contacts with the rebels,” she added.
She told the rebel stories without much stress, but the West Bank was different.
“I have a degree of protection because I am a female journalist, and I stand there with my camera. I am not the target in the West Bank, they are after the Palestinian families,” Arnold said.
What did she see as another problem for freelancers? “Across the whole TV industry, 60-80% of freelancers are out of work, so if it is freelancers who are keeping the TV industry alive then it doesn’t give us much hope because freelancers are really struggling to survive.
“The type of stories that I want to see and the type of places I want to go to you have to have finance, and if you need a strong support team it is not cheap to go somewhere like Myanmar, and getting smuggled across that border,” she added. “You need to have the backing of the broadcasters who are willing to support that type of storytelling because they think it is important. Done well, these stories are brilliant.”
Keeping free media alive
The Sony Impact Award went to another C4 commission from Vanessa Bowles and Jaber Jehad Badwan. Titled Kill Zone -Inside Gaza, it beat The Other War from Josh Baker, Sarah Obeidat, and Isobel Yeung, made for the BBC, and the C4 Dispatches production Hunting Russia’s Lost Boys. That was a British/Russian effort involving Melanie Quigley, Vladimir Sevrinovsky, Oksana Serbinova, Anastasia Tenisheva, and Evan Williams.
Vanessa Bowles said: “Our hearts broke over and over again, every single day. I cannot bare looking at another lifeless small body any more. As a commitment to the generations after us we really need to fight for our humanity.”
Evan Williams explained the big team. He said: “What this film was about was us facilitating Russian colleagues working in incredibly difficult circumstances, every day as they try to keep free media alive in their country. It was a window into a world we are not seeing anywhere else.”
Still the best job
The Martin Adler prize for new talent among local freelancers and field producers was won by Aseel Mousa, who splits her time between Palestine and the UK. She had hot competition from Beril Eski who is based in Turkey, and the Ethiopia/Canada based Zecharias Zelalem. This award is supported by The London Embassy of Sweden.
Mousa said: “Winning this prize is both an honour and a responsibility. Israel has killed around 50,000 Palestinians – including 17,000 children and 12,000 women, and as a journalist my own story is deeply tied to this reality.”
Eski said: “Journalism is hard, demanding and has never been more dangerous, but for some of us it is still the best job.”
Zelalem had documented mass slaughter in Ethiopia’s North West region. He said: “The government and rebels are fighting a war that has made that front into something of a testing ground for the distributors and manufacturers of cheap drones. Hundreds, possibly thousands of people have been killed because of drone strikes.
“Although not everyone here covers the East Africa region, I urge journalists, at least those who work in human rights reporting, to look at the war in the Amhara region. It is a model that can be exported,” he added.
The Truth matters
Asked what typified this year’s entries, Williams extended the sentiments evident amongst the audience.
He said: “Never taking no for an answer is the one thing that connected all of those entries. Thanks to the courage of the individuals involved, the world now knows what’s going on. The thing that connects them is that truth matters.
“There is less money around, and you only have to look in terms of TV. People are commissioning fewer stories,” he added. “Journalists have always faced dangers, and they have always defied risk, but the risk and the danger are now of a different order. The dangers have changed, but journalist commitment to telling those stories has not. They have only redoubled their commitment and determination to make sure they get the facts.”
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