New Telegraph’s Shadare Wins Aviation Writer Of The Year

Aviation Editor of New Telegraph Newspapers, Wole Shadare, has been named Aviation Writer of the Year at the 10th edition of Nigeria Media Nite-Out Awards (NMNA) 2016. 

At the award ceremony held on Sunday at Time Square Event Centre in Ikeja, Lagos, Shadare was announced Aviation Writer of the Year, ahead of Comfort Oseghale (Punch), Olusegun Koiki (National Mirror), Loius Ibah (Sun) and Kelvin Osa Okunbor of The Nation.

Speaking at the event, founder of NMNA, Sola Olagbemiro, described the NMNA as a child of necessity to recognise excellence, distinction and achievements by media practitioners in virtually all the major categories and sub-sectors.

He further stated that if members of the Fourth Estate of the Realm could go out of their way to fish out and recognise individuals in other sectors of the economy, “why then can’t we, the veritable source of gauging achievement and excellence in the society, do same to ourselves?”

Olagbemiro said it was for this sole reason the NMNA launched out 10 years ago to fill this yawning gap. He advised the awardees not to rest on their oars because henceforth, light would beam on them to assess whether they truly and meritoriously deserve the awards or not, adding that it was left for them to prove the organisers right for selecting them out of a handful of their colleagues.

A member of the jury revealed that the criteria for selecting the rewarded journalists were originality, accuracy, fairness in reporting, objectivity, depth of writing, conformity with ethics of the profession, currency of the report and social responsibility.

Also in the category is Best Television Station of the Year that went to Television Continental (TVC), while Best Radio Programme of the Year was won by Radio Continental with its programme, Kubanji Direct.

The On Air Personality of the Year Award went to Joshua Morakinyo of Silverbird Television, while that of radio was won by Olayemi Ogunwole of Radio Continental. Other awardees were Maureen Ihua Maduenyi of Punch Newspapers who won in the Business Writer of the Year category.

Oladesu Emmanuel of The Nation came top in the Writer of the Year (Politics) category, while Photo Journalist of the Year award went to Akeem Salau of Vanguard newspapers.

Ikem Okuhu of Brandish won Brand Writer of the Year award; Society  Writer of The Year award went to Juliet Ebirim of Vanguard, Kunle Akinrinade of The Nation won Crime Writer of the Year award, while Tade Asfat won Editor of the Year (Soft Sell).

Receiving his award, Shadare dedicated it to his family, New Telegraph for providing him the platform to win the award and to the families of ‘Chibok girls.’ The event was attended by corporate industry players, state governors, who were represented by their aides, journalists, the award-winners and their colleagues.