The Cameroon Association for Media Professional, CAMP, has set the stage for fourth edition of Victoria International Media Merit Award, VIIMMA.
The event is slated for Friday December 10, 2021 in Limbe under the distinguished patronage of the SDO for Fako Engamba Emmanuel Ledoux.
On Friday December 3, 2021, The Executive Director of CAMP, Tarhyang Enowbikah Tabe explained to the press during a press conference how the activities will unveil on that day.
He said in 2018 when they started the award it was just a recognition of some individuals who had impacted the lives and political landscape of Victoria now Limbe.
Meanwhile In 2019 with the Anglophone crisis in the North West and South West regions, they decided to give the awards a humanitarian touch version of the Victoria International Media Merry Award.
In 2020 due to popular demand the Victoria Media Merit Award added another ‘I’ which made it international
“We took it international because we saw people from Limbe who are doing well outside so we decided to take the award to them. That's why we have other categories like best sports journalist, best banks etc.” Tarhyang said.
“2021 VIIMMA should take a different perspective. We think that the theme of this year which we are announcing officially is social cohesion, tourism, culture and communication.” Tabe Tarhyang explained.
The award is tagged, Social cohesion, culture and tourism and communication. This year, there are ten special awards only for journalists.
Quizzed why such an innovation he said, they think that journalists have the responsibility to report in such a way that social cohesion shall be guaranteed.
It should be noted that, It is only on the day of the award that winners will be known.
The event which is sponsored by Orange Cameroon, Limbe City Council and other partners will have award for Financial institutions of the year, micro institutions, banks.
These shall be for two categories. The victoria category and the national category
“Like we said it's a Victoria award, so we shall be having awards for the Victorians, the national and international and the media award we shall be having a total of 25 awards.” Tabe Tarhyang explained.
He added that there shall be a talk on social cohesion and humanitarian crisis from an expert for the United Nations center for human rights and Democracy in central Africa.
On her part, the National Vice President President of CAMP, Noela Bisong said, the innovation this year, VIIMMA 2021 is the fact the nominees came from journalists themselves. Otherwise other awards which have been organised in the past years they were usually selected from a pool.
" So we decided that journalists themselves should nominate their colleagues themselves and say this person is good at this, this person is good at that." She said.
A five man jury headed by ace journalist and human rights expert, Franklin Kiven, was put in place to evaluate nominees in the media category after submission of their best five articles and report.
CAMP's Littoral Regional Coordinator, Scholar Maloke, said the committee had as Members, Comfort Musa, Ayang Mac Donald, Larry Esong, Ebane Slessor and Nfor Hanson.
This move according to Tarhyang, was to give the award some credibility.
They are also going to be recognising institutions in Limbe and since it has an international touch, they will be having recognition from institutions out of Victoria now Limbe.
Meanwhile, CAMP National President , Solomon Agborem appreciated and to saluted the solidarity that has come from journalists themselves across the board, across the national territory to participate in this year's edition of the Victoria International Media Merit Award.
“We feel that working in a context of the crisis and working within our theme social cohesion, promotion of tourism and communication, we should be able to come to a point where we should acknowledge what journalists do What they sacrifice day in day out to give information to Cameroonians" Says Agborem.
"We feel that journalists should be celebrated and this is just what we want to do come Friday December 10, 2021.” Agborem said.