“These awards are now in their fifth year and each year our editorial board is pleasantly surprised at the number and calibre of nominees. The Women in The Media Award recognises remarkable individuals who have made measurable and meaningful strides in furthering media within the economic, social or political environment in which we operate.” says Sandra Gordon, founder of the award concept and publisher of The Media magazine.

“The standard has been set by past winners such as Ferial Haffajee (2006) editor of the Mail & Guardian and Libby Lloyd (2005), then CEO of the Media Development and Diversity Agency.”

In addition to the main award, the Rising Star is presented to women under the age of 30 who have made an early impression in the media field, and the Lifetime Achiever recognises consistent contributions over many years. Previous recipients of the latter award are Jane Raphaely of Associated Magazines and Barbara Cooke of Target Group International.

The awards will be presented at a function at the end of July 2007.

Finalist summary biographies

Patricia Scholtemeyer, CEO Media24 Magazines

Accomplishments in 2006 that impacted on overall print market in SA.

• Acquired a motoring magazine business from Kemsley Schoeman which included the brands Topcar, Topbike and Topdeals. Incorporated this business in to Media24 Magazines, and added Topmotor and Maxpower to the portfolio.
  
• Launched an English version of the Weg! called Go! Acquired Drive Out from New Media and added this to the travel portfolio.
  
• Turned the fortnightly tvplus into a weekly.
  
• Launched a comic magazine business called Beat Comics.
  
• Grew the women's magazine portfolio with additional titles, namely InStyle, True Love Babe, Psychologies. Acquired Femina from Associated Magazines and incorporated this title into the women's portfolio.
  
• Closed Shop magazine.
  
• Started the integration of Finweek and Fin24 into a single business entity.
  
• Rebranded Woman's Value and dit into Ideas and Idees.
  
• Saw Touchline diversifying into online library sales through the Gallo Images/Touchline Photo merger. This business now has offices in South Africa and Dubai.
  
• Saw Uppercase Media launch Zoo Weekly/Weekliks into the South African market, the only [surviving] men's weekly in our market.
  
• Created approximately 300 new jobs in the magazine industry by doing all of the above.

Colleen Lowe Morna, executive director, GenderLinks

Lowe Morna is the executive director of Gender Links, a southern African organisation committed to ensuring that the Southern African Development Community's declaration on gender and development is implemented through working closely with the mainstream media in promoting gender equality in the region. She also served as the founding CEO of the South African Commission on Gender Equality in 1998.

A former journalist, Lowe Morna worked for the Women's Feature Service, The Economist, South magazine and Inter Press service in the 1970s and 1980s. She is also the former editor of Reconstruct, an award-winning supplement to the Mail & Guardian.

She is a regular contributor to newspapers such the Sunday Times, Mail & Guardian and Sowetan.

For the past two years her organisation Gender Links has been running media and gender literacy courses which focus on how the media can report on gender in a balanced and not sensational manner. Every two years, the organisation hosts Gender and Media (GEM) summits in which media performance is put under the spotlight and good practice affirmed through Gender and Media Awards.

Gender Links also has a monitoring project, “Mirror on the Media”, which it runs with the Media Institute of Southern Africa. The projects monitors programmes such as 16 Days of Activism.

Lowe Morna is a multiple award-winning gender and media activist. She has received the Newswomen's Club of New York (1981) award for her efforts, the Wilson and David Lawrence scholarships (in 1980 and 1981), the Phoenix Proze Prize (1978) and holds two degrees, one in communications from the Columbia School of Journalism in New York and the other in international relations from Princeton University in New Jersey.

For more:

• Media24: now the PR really starts [article]
  
• [No Comment] ‘Mayhem at Media Park' [blog]
  
• Is Media24 the only culprit? [article]
  
• Media24: profit and performance pressure cooker [article]
  
• ABC routine audit checks on all publishers [article]
  
• Zoopy interviews Hein Brand, Steven Powell and Di Paice [blog]
  
• Thursday's Media24 press conf in CT [Zoopy videos] [blog]
  
• Potential criminal charges in Media24 scandal [article]
  
• How did it all go wrong at Media24? [article]
  
• Touchline MD faces disciplinary action [article]
  
• "My heart bleeds for the editors" [article]
  
• Touchline Media lied about circulation figures [article]
  
• Notes on a scandal [article]
  
• Wednesday is D-Day for Media24 [blog]
  
• Media24: media agencies take up the fight [article]
  
• Are the Picas at risk? [blog]
  
• Touchline under scrutiny [snippet]
  
• Media24 staff responsible for circulation irregularities [article]
  
• Media24 restates certain ABC figures [article]
  
• Patricia Scholtemeyer honoured for job creation [article]
  
• Scholtemeyer, Lowe Morna: Vodacom Women in The Media finalists [article]

• Video coverage on the Thursday, 4 October 2007, Media24 press conference in Cape Town:

  • Zoopy interviews Hein Brand, Steven Powell and Di Paice [blog]

  • Thursday's Media24 press conf in CT [Zoopy videos] [blog]

• Breaking news blog for coverage of the Wednesday, 3 October 2007, Media24 press conference in Johannesburg: http://blog.bizcommunity.com [blog]