By ABDULKADIR KHALIF

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East African journalists have won slots into the continental welfare lobby, following elections held this week, joining a panel of press welfare campaigners.

The Federation of African Journalists (FAJ), which brings together African press unions, will now be headed by Mr Omar Faruk Osman. He is the current secretary-general of the National Union of Somali Journalists (Nusoj).

Kenya’s Erick Oduor, secretary-general of the Kenya Union of Journalists (KUJ), will sit on the executive committee of FAJ as a member.

The election results announced on Friday, mean that FAJ now has a new leadership comprised of president, vice-president, honorary treasurer and six members of the executive committee. The election was conducted on Wednesday at the end of the 5^th Congress of FAJ, done virtually.

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Mr Osman will be deputised by Mr Zied Dabbar of Tunisia who became the new Vice-President while Ms Maria Luisa Rogiero of Angola will be the Honorary Treasurer.

The other five members of the FAJ’s Executive Committee include Jean-Cloude Coulibaly of Ivory Coast, Albert Kwabena Dwumfour of Ghana, Sadiq Ibrahim Ahmed Ibrahim of Sudan, Mohammed Et-Talibi of Morocco and Oban Medjo Marion of Cameroon.

For East African region, the new officials say the elevation will help them place a spotlight on the plight of journalists in the region.

“The new FAJ leadership comes at a time media in Africa is facing very many challenges, and I believe men and women who have been given leadership responsibilities will deliver,” Oduor said after the new team was announced.

Mr Osman said he has a living memory of past injustices, which he wants to ensure they don’t repeat.

“I have graphic memories of injustices that were happening in my country, at first, inflicted by a dictatorial government that reigned for 21 long years, and later, during the civil war that proceeded its collapse,” he said, referring to the Siad Barre regime that fell in 1991 before a civil war ensued and later violent extremism took over.

“It was during this time that I began my career in journalism. I wanted to humanise the suffering that was going on by telling the stories of the victims, and of the efforts to restore peace in our country,” he added.

The Congress, FAJ’s highest decision-making organ, adopted proposals to work on improving precarious working conditions for journalists and media workers in Africa, safeguarding journalists' safety and combating impunity for crimes against journalists, advancing gender equality in the media, strengthening legal defence for journalists to safeguard media freedom, forging trade union solidarity.

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Osman said the new agenda suits his experience. He was born in 1976 while the country was in the firm grip of the dictatorial rule led by the late General Mohamed Siad Barre. He has campaign for worker’s welfare just as much as the press freedom in the Horn of Africa country and was once awarded the Human Rights Defender prize by the East and Horn of Africa Human Rights Defenders (EHAHRD) Project for his dedication to press freedom advocacy.

Osman covered the works of peacekeepers in Somalia including United Nations Operation in Somalia (Unisom) and later the Amisom– the African Union Mission in Somalia that began operating in 2007 with a Ugandan contingency.

“The election of leadership is a milestone for journalism in Africa,” the International; Federation of Journalists (IFJ) to which FAJ is an affiliate said in a congratulatory message on Friday.

Indeed, IFJ is the global voice of journalists and represents 600,000 journalists (in 190 affiliates) in 146 countries.