"Re: Thanks, I have received the winning prize"

Sometimes, I'm just too damned cynical for my own good. I'm frequently guilty of leaping before I look. But let's not get into my relationship history at the moment.

For today's purposes, I'm talking about the fact that I almost deleted an
email with the subject line, "Re: Thanks, I have received the winning prize."

On the one hand, I have some justification for being so rashly dismissive. First, the email had been sitting in my Spam box for the past few days. Second, the sender had an African name. Okay, who among you has NOT received a fervent cyber plea from the orphaned only child of a recently-deceased African cocoa merchant who has left her 30 million USD in a Nigerian bank account, and who needs your urgent assistance to retrieve the funding?

(And who OF COURSE would be eager to break you off a little sumthin' sumthin' if you help by wiring her the 5,000 USD she needs to travel to Nigeria to take care of this matter?)

So when I saw the name "Gloria Aciro," I instantly pictured a strapping young hustler named Njoki Mtumba sitting in a Lagos cyber cafe trolling for suckas. Still, every once in a while, I read one of those emails just for a laugh, or even to admire the poignancy of the prose. Mostly I just delete 'em.

Well, for some reason, today I decided to take a minute and read this one. And then it hit me: Gloria Aciro is Gloria Laker, one of the Ugandan freelancers I had worked with during my Gulu days! Aciro is her married name. Gloria was so talented and committed and serious about her work, and yet so disarmingly, genuinely humble about it. I kept trying to interact with her as a peer, because we're about the same age, but she just wasn't having it. Because I was the "teacher," she always treated me like a respected elder.

Since starting this blog, I've tried a couple of times to explain why
I do this work, when there are plenty of times when I just plain don't know myself. And then something like this happens.

Read it and you'll see what I mean. Gloria did in fact receive the winning prize, from the BBC World Service Trust Program "Communicating Justice," for her news and feature reporting on the peace and reconciliation process in Northern Uganda. That was the theme of the trainings I helped lead in Gulu. I am so honored to even be mentioned in this note.

"On second thought, Gloria, I have ALSO received the winning prize!"

--- On Mon, 9/3/09, Gloria Aciro wrote:

From: Gloria Aciro
Subject: Re: Thanks, I have received the winning prize
To: Julia.Crawford@bbc.co.uk, jrbakody@hotmail.com, coemmanuel.chicon@radiofonies.eu
Cc: nesryn.bouziane@bbc.co.uk
Date: Monday, 9 March, 2009, 9:20 AM

Dear BBC WST team,

And TJ journalists in Uganda ,

I am glad to inform you all with great pleasure that I have received the winning prize for the just concluded Communicating Justice competition in which i emerged the winner following my radio feature on child-mothers.

i have been given a laptop with adobe sound editing and a digital marantz recorder

Nesryn and Julia thanks for selecting me to be part of the 20 Ugandan Journalists in the communicating Justice project. I promise to work even harder now that I have a good recorder and an editing facility. As a journalist I will remain neutral and independent in pursuing transitional Justice process in Uganda .

Winning this award therefore is one-step ahead in my career as a journalist communicating Justice in Uganda particularly in Northern Uganda where many injustices have taken place and are still taking place. I hope that my stories will sensitize and engage Ugandans into identifying proper justice mechanisms in solving the two-decade conflict in the North of the country, and with this therefore my focus will remain on Northern Uganda .

I would like to appreciate the cooperation of the child-mothers of Koro Abili Internally Displaced camp in Gulu who were very patient with me for the two days I spent in the camp interviewing and recording their activities and stories which resulted into my winning the competition.

Sincerely I would like to thank Ms Clare Ziwa whose training I was able to put into practice in line with location reporting, sound effects and presentation tips which she gave us during the Gulu training late 2008.

Clare, without your guidance, I would not have made it. Thanks Clare and a big hug

Paul Kavuma thanks for encouraging me. I still recall when you said to me that ‘work hard Gloria and win the computer to ease your work’ I have made it Paul.

My friends; Pius Sawa of Radio Sapiencia and Romeo Akiiki of Internews Gulu, thanks a lot for the studio support you gave me during the production of my stories. I cannot also forget to thank Ms Karen Williams and Rachel Jones formerly of internews who guided me many times with my story ideas, and how to produce a good feature story.

Then finally, I would like to encourage my TJ colleagues in Uganda that we maintain the spirit of teamwork and togetherness, by this we shall be able to learn and share ideas from each other on how best we can communicate about Transitional Justice Process in Uganda .

Colleagues, sharing story ideas is one good lesson. I must say Pius Sawa, Sam Lawino and Bill Okech are good at this and many times we put our heads together and it has worked well for us, personally I have learnt a lot from them.

We should be creative and also be able to read the books we were given at the Kampala training. There is a lot of information that can enable one to learn more about TJ. I must say that the first TJ/ communicating Justice training I received in Kampala transformed me from a war reporter into more of a peace and Justice Journalist. I am glad for this.

For sure we should not be waiting for BBC WST to come and give us training all the time on TJ. Lets also prove to them that from the books they gave us and the experience we have we can make good coverage on TJ issues in our country

As I conclude, I would like to congratulate my TJ friends who won the award starting with David Okurut, Wambi and Julian. Ms Julian well done lady, we have balanced the gender quite well lets keep the fire burning

I wish you success in your career

Thanks Aciro Gloria Laker