MEDIA-LATIN AMERICA:
Bringing Millennium
Goals to Life
By Diana Cariboni
MONTEVIDEO, (IPS) -
"Daniel San Juan
Tolentino dug his own
grave. A pile of earth
fell on him and buried
him." So begins the
article on child
labourers in Mexico that
won first prize in the
"Latin America and the
Millennium Development
Goals" Journalism
Awards, organised by IPS
and UNDP.
Daniel, 12 years old,
was told to dig a ditch
to prevent heavy rains
from flooding the crops
in the field where he
was working. But an
avalanche of mud ended
his short life.
His story was one of
several told with
clarity and compassion
in the series "Niños
Jornaleros" by a team
led by reporter Marcela
Turati, published in the
Mexican newspaper
Excélsior from Jun. 27
to 29, which won the
competition organised by
the Inter Press Service
(IPS) news agency and
the United Nations
Development Programme (UNDP).
"This Latin American
journalism competition,
conceived to reward work
that best portrays the
region’s struggles to
achieve the elusive and
often distant Millennium
Goals, has been like
rubbing salt in a
wound," said Cuban
author Leonardo Padura,
one of the members of
the jury.
A total of 466 articles
were entered from 19
Latin American and
Caribbean countries,
written in Spanish,
Portuguese or English
and published in print
media in the region
between Oct. 1, 2006 and
Jun. 30, 2007.
"This kind of
journalism, often
consigned to the
sidelines and neglected
for obvious reasons, has
shown its credentials
and demonstrated that in
Latin America, hidden
behind more sensational
reporting, there is this
other kind, with a
vocation for
participating and a
sense of its own
usefulness," said Padura.
Six other articles by
reporters from Brazil,
Mexico, Uruguay and
Honduras were singled
out for praise by a
panel made up of Padura,
Mexican writer Carlos
Monsiváis, the president
of the Press Freedom
Foundation of Colombia,
María Teresa Ronderos,
IPS director general
Mario Lubetkin, and UNDP
regional director for
Latin America and the
Caribbean, Rebeca
Grynspan.
The second prize was
awarded to "Faces da
maternidade" by Bruna
Cabral and Mona Lisa
Dourado, published in
the Jornal do Commercio
in Recife, Brazil. "By
telling the experiences
of numerous women, these
articles take a rich,
and at the same time
harsh look at motherhood
in Brazil," said the
panel.
"None of the daily
rituals carried out by
26-year-old biology
student Flávia Santiago,
who is seven months
pregnant and anxiously
awaiting the birth of
her first child, was
ever experienced by
Nadja Batista Borges,
29, who dropped out of
primary school in the
third grade. She, too,
is pregnant. But with
her seventh child," the
reporters wrote.
"They probably love
their babies equally.
The difference lies in
their addresses. Nadja
lives in a ‘favela’
(shantytown) of Santo
Amaro. Flávia lives with
her husband in a
comfortable apartment"
in a well-off
neighbourhood, their
article said.
Ronderos said that the
competition was "a
wonderful opportunity to
discover what is
happening among us, how
we Latin Americans see
ourselves, how we are
thinking about our
serious social problems
and how we are seeking
solutions."
Pollution and other
environmental problems,
violence against
children and among young
people, poverty,
exploitation, and gender
inequality were some of
the aspects addressed by
the journalists, all
related to the
Millennium Development
Goals (MDGs) which the
governments of the world
promised in 2000 to meet
within 15 years.
An extensive feature, "Morir
en la pobreza" published
in the Mexican magazine
Contralínea by Zósimo
Camacho and his team,
and "Mata Atlántica, a
floresta esquecida" by
Paulo Aurélio Martinelli
and Raquel Lima for the
Brazilian newspaper
Correio Popular, shared
third place.
Fourth place went to
César Bianchi for "El
pequeño Comcar",
published in the
Uruguayan newspaper El
País about a school for
children "so badly
behaved that they can’t
attend a normal school."
Writer Monsiváis said,
"Reading these articles
has been a fruitful and
harrowing experience.
The quality of the
information and the
authors’ critical gaze
are truly exceptional."
Acording to Lubetkin,
they are "a vivid
portrait of the dramas
and hopes of our
continent. Many of them
successfully communicate
the gravity of the
problems and the urgency
of finding solutions."
"Tolupanes, paraíso de
los abandonados" by
César Rivera, published
in the Honduran
newspaper El Heraldo,
and "Violencia extrema
en las escuelas," by
Humberto Padgett for the
Mexican weekly magazine
Emeequis, shared fifth
place.
UNDP regional director
Grynspan said she was
glad to share the moving
experience of reading
these articles about
Latin American reality,
and highlighted the
importance of the awards
to honour the efforts of
journalists and media to
bring that reality to
public attention.
First, second and third
prize winners will
receive 5,000, 2,500 and
1,000 dollars,
respectively. The awards
ceremony will take place
in Mexico City in
October. IPS will
publish a book
containing the articles
selected in first to
fifth places. |
