BBC launches 2022 Komla Dumor Award for African journalists

The international news broadcaster is now inviting journalists across Africa to apply for the award, which aims to uncover and celebrate magnificent talent from the continent.

The award, now in its seventh year, was established to honour veteran journalist Komla Dumor, a Ghanaian broadcaster and presenter for BBC World News, who died in 2014 at 41.

The prestigious award allows the winner to spend three months at the BBC headquarters in London, to receive training, gain skills and experience.

The lucky candidate will also have the opportunity to travel to a preferred country in Africa to report on a story that they have researched, with the report broadcasted to the BBC's global audiences.

The last winner for the award was Citizen TV's anchor Vicotria Rubadiri who was awarded the prize in 2020 but her training was postponed to 2021 due to COVID-19 constraints.

During her placement, she travelled to the Democratic Republic of Congo's capital Kinshasa where she reported a story on an app developed to improve transport safety.

"Beyond the huge honour of elevating the memory of the late Komla Dumor, and the weight of the BBC recognizing my work as a journalist, I have seen the growth in myself just in the last three months I spent in London," she said while receiving the award.

"The training and exposure took my skills to the next level. This opportunity gave me a continental perspective of the news market and opened my mind to new ways of telling the African story."

Similarly, Citizen TV's seasoned news anchor/journalist Waihiga Mwaura won the award in 2018:

"For me to be identified with him just a bit, if I can only achieve 10% or 20% of what he did, I feel that I would have made my contribution to journalism to tell the African story in a different way," said Waihiga.

Dumor was the presenter of Focus on Africa, the BBC's first-ever dedicated daily TV news program in English for African audiences, broadcast on BBC World News. He was also one of the lead presenters for BBC World News' European morning segment.

Applications for the award are set to close on 16 February 2022.