New Narratives is delighted our Co-founder and Executive Director Prue Clarke has been shortlisted for the Advance Global Australian Social Innovation award recognizing her work with us. The Awards celebrate Australians and alumni from Australian universities living overseas who exhibit remarkable talent, exceptional vision and ambition. Prue was born in Australia and started her journalism…
Cestos City – Hannah Toe is in the twelfth grade class at Cestos High School in rural Rivercess County. She looks youthful with cornrows and a red flower headband in her hair matching her ruffled top, but she is 24 years old and already a mother, with a five-year-old son named Tony. Part 3 of…
There is a subculture in Liberia that, though highly visible and active, is almost never discussed – like an unacknowledged elephant in the room. (See original post here.) It consists of Lebanese businessmen and their families who started migrating to West Africa in the 1950s and found a home in Liberia. It consists of thin,…
NN is proud to announce our reporter Mae Azango, of FrontPage Africa, has been awarded a newly created reporting fellowship in honor of Minnie Lee Walker. The fellowship is given by the Alliance for East Africa, an organization that supports grass roots programs in Africa. It was started by Mrs Walker’s daughter Jean Wr. The…
TODEE, LIBERIA It’s late afternoon in Todee, a village in rural Liberia, and the sun is starting to drop. Mae Azango settles into a taxi for the three-hour drive back to Monrovia, the capital. But this long day hasn’t been quite long enough. Ms. Azango, a journalist, needs to come back on Monday to finish reporting a…
Charles Taylor guilty: Liberians have mixed reactions In Monrovia, some Liberians denounce Taylor’s conviction, others welcome it. By Joanna Devane and Tecee Boley April 26, 2012 12:48 In Freetown, Sierra Leone, Mohamed Traore, one of the amputees of the civil war, welcomes the conviction on war crimes of former Liberian President Charles Taylor. Taylor was…
Written by New Narratives Fellow Robtel Neajai Pailey April 12, 1980 is often described as the beginning of Liberia’s end. I think of it as the preface to Liberia’s long, complicated biography, the beginning of our awakening. It was a day when our pomp and circumstance left a deafening echo; when we were all exposed,…
Monrovia – Traditional leaders and government ministers have revealed a secret agreement to shut down the activities of Liberia’s secret women’s society, the Sande, for an indefinite period. The deal will see all Sande land turned over to the leaders of the Poro men’s society. A ceremony handing over the land from the women to…
Robtel Neajai Pailey joins New Narratives as our first Opinion Writing Fellow. Robtel’s opinion pieces appear in FrontPage Africa and her commentaries air on radio stations across Liberia. Robtel was recently named one of the Top 99 Foreign Policy Leaders Under 33. Born in Monrovia, Liberia, Robtel is an activist/writer who spent her formative years…
Chase Walker is New Narratives’ resident photojournalist. He works at FrontPage Africa newspaper and website where he is head of the graphic department and is responsible for the layout and design of the newspaper. He also regularly contributes political and social cartoons. Chase’s photographs for New Narratives have appeared in publications around the world. Chase…
Rose Kebbeh Kaiwuh is a journalist and presenter with Truth FM and RealTV in Monrovia. She hosts three programs FOCUS ON WOMEN, a program that looks at issues affecting women in Africa and the world at large, CONSUMERS WATCH, a program that digs out expired and and contaminated products on the Liberian Market and MOVIE…
It is often said in Liberia: “to spoil it is easy but to build it is hard.” So is the case with water and sanitation here. The 14-year civil war destroyed much of the water supply and sanitation facilities. People escaping brutal battles in the heart of the country relocated to Monrovia—overcrowding the city’s slums…
Wade C.L. Williams is an investigative reporter and chief of the news desk for FrontPageAfrica newspaper and website. Some call her the most powerful newswoman in Liberia where few women have been able to make a career in the media, let alone reach the top ranks. Since joining NN in January 2011 she has interviewed warlords and written…
In Liberia, financial pressures prevent many journalists from properly doing their jobs. Though it’s rarely discussed, it’s widely known that reporters take gifts — bribes — from politicians or others to either bury stories or to write promotional ones. Sonnie Morris, a Liberian radio journalist, earned just $40 a month. As a single mother of…
Fabine Kwiah is a reporter and newscaster at Radio Veritas where she presents the weekly Voices of Women program. She has been a New Narratives fellow since July 2011. In 2012 Fabine’s report on the impact of Liberia’s high rate of teenage pregnancy won her the national women’s reporting award. Fabine became one of a…
Sonnie Morris is a public relations officer with the United Nations in Liberia. Sonnie was recruited from her job as a reporter and presenter at Sky FM in 2011 because of her groundbreaking reporting with New Narratives. During her time in the program Sonnie won widespread acclaim for her expose on teenage prostitutes. The story…
Clara Mallah is a newspaper reporter in Monrovia. During her time with New Narratives she was a reporter with FrontPage Africa newspaper where she did groundbreaking reporting on a range of issues including child prostitution, unsafe abortions and child rape. Clara won the 2011 Women’s Reporter of the Year award becoming one of just 3 women ever…
Lady Mai was chosen by the Liberia Broadcasting System, the country’s state radio, for a new project involving young people reporting on young people in 2008. She coordinated the International Children’s Day of Broadcasters before moving to the Liberia Women Democracy Radio at the start of 2010, the first and only radio station for women…
