Commission Awards Journalists

The Electoral Commission of Zambia (ECZ) sponsored Election Reporting Awards at the 16th edition of the 2018 MISA Awards held on 28th April, 2018 under the theme “Celebrating Media Excellence”. The Election Award was funded under the 2017-2018 United Nations Development Program (UNDP) Support Project to Elections in Zambia.

The Awards which the Commission was sponsoring for the first time, had seven (7) categories which included Print, Television, Radio, Online, Community Radio, Electronic image and Photo Journalism.

Ms. Naomi Mweemba from Muvi TV scooped two awards in the Television and Electronic Image category. Ms. Munambeza Muwanei from Times of Zambia was awarded for being the best in the Print category while Ms. Prudence Siabana from Radio Phoenix received an award in the Radio category. The other Radio Award was received by Ms. Prisca Lumingu Banda from Millenium Radio. The Community Radio category was awarded to Oblate Radio Liseli. There were no entries in the Online and Photo Journalism award.

Speaking at the 16th edition of the 2018 MISA Awards which hosted the Best Election Reporting Awards, Minister of Information and Broadcasting Ms Dora Siliya who was guest of honour, said journalists were expected to interpret the current happenings in the country in a professional manner.

The Commission introduced the Elections Reporting Award among other initiatives, to encourage, promote and recognise excellence in Journalism through Elections Reporting.

Following the post- election review of the 11th August 2016, General Elections and Referendum, it was recognized that there was need to address challenges in the media which included limited understanding of the electoral process, polarisation among media institutions which affected objectivity of their content and other challenges which reduced capacity of the media to function effectively.