Equinoxe television’s North West reporter, Mbuh Stella, has bagged another award for her impactful journalistic work.
She won the 2024 CJTU Eric Motomu Memorial Award for Critical Writing after her work titled “Words Matter: Lessons from Rwanda 1994 to Cameroon”, garnered praise from the Jury.
The article focuses on mitigating the dangers of hate speech.
Mbuh Stella received the accolade on Saturday, May 4, 2024, in a ceremony organized by the Cameroon Journalist Trade Union (CJTU) as part of activities to commemorate the 2024 World Press Freedom Day.
The award honours the memory of the late Eric Motumo, whose pen often addressed critical issues such as corruption.
The late Publisher of The Chronicle newspaper used to shed light on topics many journalists refrained from reporting on.
Five other journalists were also knighted in different categories in honour of fallen colleagues in the North West Region.
Talking to MMI shortly after receiving the award, Mbuh Stella said, “I submitted a writeup titled ‘Words Matter: Lessons from Rwanda 1994 to Cameroon’. The report highlighted the role words can play in our instability or stability as a nation.”
“We are told that at least 800,000 people were killed in 100 days just because people created class gaps in their minds and human beings were labelled ‘cockroaches’ by humans and then they were killed,” Mbuh Stella said.
Relating it to the Cameroonian context, she said the Anglophone Crisis and the upcoming elections have made the country vulnerable to hate speech and violence.
“Fast forwarding to our context in the Anglophone Regions, and upcoming elections, there is an urgent need for everyone to guard against hate speech and incitement to violence,” she said.
The recognition, she added, is a motivation to her for contributing to her own quota to nation-building.
“I am happy the jury found my article worthy of that category,” said a visibly happy Mbuh Stella.
“It’s a reminder that operating from an environment where the little contributions made are seen and recognised though we operate from a hostile area that sees journalists as a thread rather than nation builders.”
Stella, who corresponds for Equinox TV and many other outlets, has invested several years into journalism practice.
She told MMI it hasn’t been a smooth sail all along due to numerous challenges faced on the field.
“I faced heightened insecurity. News sources are drying up as more and more people are getting displaced.
“Disinformation and fake news are on the increase as parties in the conflict use propaganda to show their supremacy.”
Gender discrimination, she said, has also been playing a negative role in the discharge of her profession.
“Also I face gender-based discrimination, situations where people see me as female before seeing me as a journalist,” she said.
Aside from the CJTU Eric Motomu Memorial Award for Critical writing, Mbuh Stella had won several other recognitions in the past.
Among them is The Herald Tribune Award of Excellence where she was awarded for her bravery in journalism practice.
As a communication student, she produced a documentary on gender-based violence, which won the first prize from Doctors of the World.
She is also the winner of the CAMACA awards.
