CJID Announces 2022 Alfred Opubor Next-Gen Campus Reporter Award Finalists

The Center for Journalism Innovation and Development, CJID, is pleased to announce the finalists for the Alfred Opubor Next-Gen Campus Reporter Awards 2022. The awards ceremony, scheduled for Friday, December 2, aims to celebrate and inspire outstanding campus journalists who shine a light on social issues and contribute to solutions through storytelling.

After six weeks of rigorous selection and review of entries by a five-person jury spread across academic development, newsroom and media sectors, 25 outstanding entries were selected as the best in nine categories of competitive rewards.

This year's edition of the awards generated 164 applications from campus journalists across 53 tertiary institutions in Nigeria. The southwest region generated the most entries with 74, followed by the northwest with 38, the north-central with 21, the south-south with eight, and the southeast and northeast with six. starters each.

The Next-Gen Campus Reporter Awards are named after the late Alfred Opubor in honor of his pioneering contributions to journalism. Professor Opubor was Nigeria's first professor of mass communication. The first edition of the Awards took place in 2018.

The first place winners and Best Campus Journalist of the Year will be revealed on December 2 at Treasure Suites Hotel, Central Business District, Abuja.

Here are the award categories:

Best Budget Tracking/Procurement Story Best Campus Investigative Reporter of the Year Best Conflict Story Best Election Observation Report Best Environment/Climate Change Report Better fact checking Best Genre Story Best Health Report Sportswriter of the Year

The top three finalists in each category and their entries are:

Best Budget Tracking/Procurement Story: i) Abdulwasiu Mujeeb Idowu (inside Sokoto Multi-Million Naira Works School left to rot for years)

ii) Rabiu Musa (Investigation: Tales of Anguish, Death Trail on the Abandoned Garko-Kibiya Road)

iii) Sunday Awosoro (Without consulting residents, legislator facilitates N115m 'health centres'. Now used by termites, bushes)

READ ALSO: Best Conflict Story:

i) Abiodun Jamiu (With ₦3,500, Sokoto residents buy locally made weapons amid growing insecurity in northwestern Nigeria)

ii) Adebayo Abdulrahman (Beyond the Numbers (I): Distraught Family, Planned Marriage… Victims of the Owo Massacre)

iii) Muhammed Auwal Ibrahim (Special Report: Kaduna Residents Lament Telecom Shutdown)

Best Election Observation Report:

i) Omoniyi Jeremiah Oluwaferanmi (#EkitiDecides: Daniel in the lion's den)

ii) Taiwo Fatola (#OsunDecides: I was a witness while Osun was deciding)

iii) Vindication Alawode (An election masked by fear and my experience as an unpleasant observer)

Best Environment/Climate Change Report:

i) Abdulrasheed Hammad (How Charcoal and Indiscriminate Logging Contribute to Deforestation in Kwara State)

ii) Abdulwasiu Olokooba (How miners put community in environmental degradation, violate child rights law in Ekiti State)

iii) Mariam Hamzat (Fleeing Trespassers: Despite Strict Laws, Herders and Poachers Contaminate Old Oyo National Park)

Better fact checking:

i) Adebayo Abdulrahman (fact check: no, Buhari did not lift 10.5 million Nigerians out of poverty in two years)

ii) Muhammed Bello Buhari (Fact-Check: To what extent certain claims made by Peter Obi on Channels TV's Politics Today?)

iii) Muktar Balogun (Is Lagos Africa's Largest Economy? Fact Check on Tinubu's Governorship Claims)

Best Genre Story:

i) Abdulganiyu Abdulrahman (How the Hijab Crisis Halted Education in Kwara State)

ii) Mariam Hamzat (Daily risks, low financial support and self-medication: plight of women in the production community of Oyo Garri)

iii) Zainab Yetunde Adam (How Borno women struggle to overcome the efforts of the insurgency)

Best Health Report:

i) Abdulwaheed Sofiullahi (Inside Kano...