Islands Business magazine publisher Robert Keith-Reid was declared Journalist of the Year at the Fiji Media Awards night on July 6, 1996.

An article published by The Fiji Times two days after the event stated that Mr Keith-Reid got an attachment with a news organisation in Australia as part of his prize.

He also received the Newspaper Magazine Design Award on behalf of Islands Business.

Review magazine publisher Yashwant Gaunder and his senior reporter, Josefa Nata, received commendations as Journalists of the Year.

Shailendra Singh, of the Review won the Sports Journalist of the Year Award.

The Fiji Times scooped six awards, the most for any organisation, out of 25 awards that were up for grabs.

The awards that were given to The Fiji Times were listed as follows;
– The Fiji Times deputy chief of staff Yunus Rashid won the Magazine Journalist of the Year award, and
– Business writer Mark Crocker won the Business/Finance Award;
– Ifereimi Nadore won the Newspaper Journalist of the Year Award;
– Sophie Foster won an award for her coverage of women’s issues;
– James Ranuku received the Best Cartoonist Award and Yad Singh was presented with the Photographer of the Year Award.

TV One’s Riyaz Khaiyum won the Television Journalist Award and his colleague Richard Broadbridge secured himself an attachment in either New Zealand or Australia for his coverage of regional affairs.

The company’s Fernando Vavaitaman won a prize for best video editing and cameraman Jacob Chute won a prize for television camera work.

Radio Fiji’s Katolina Lewatu was declared the Radio Journalist of the Year and Ofa Kaukimoce received the Radio Documentary prize.

Columnist of the Year in newspaper/magazine was given to Mongoose from the Review.

FM96 employee Reno Miller won the Radio Commercial Award and Amelia Simmons won the Health/Medical Award.

Sitiveni Raturala received the Fijian Media Award while all entries for Hindi media awards were disqualified.

Islands Business employee Dick Lee won the advertisement award. Setaita Natai won the prize for best television documentary.

Other prizes were won by South Pacific Recordings and Monsoon Films.

Meanwhile, Director of Public Prosecutions, Nazhat Shameem who was the chief guest, expressed concern about media reports on court proceedings.

She said some of these had been unfair and unbalanced.

Ms Shameem said some reporters who had covered matters discussed in the High Courts in the absence of assessors, published previous records of people on trial, taken pictures of the accused people before trial and given unfair coverage to court proceedings.

She said in some instances, journalists had reported their opinions about cases before the courts had time to deliberate and deliver rulings.

Ms Shameem said if the media did not respect the courts and the right of any person to a fair hearing, then the courts would have to exercise their powers to lay down restrictions.

She called on media organisations to train their journalists saying there was an urgent need to understand the workings of the criminal justice system.