The "Award for Successful Journalism in Turkey" for the year 2009 was given by the Turkish Journalists Association (TGC) in a ceremony in the Sheraton Hotel in Istanbul on 17 June. TGC President Orhan Erinç said in the opening speech, "There has been a measureable development of freedom of expression throughout the past 50 years. Nevertheless, the working conditions for journalists have worsened".
Erinç continued, "I send my regards to Mustafa Balbay and Tuncay Özkan who are detained because of following their profession. The delays in realizing the commitment to a future Turkey as a 'country without journalists in detention' will leave us facing negative results related to our international reputation".
The prizes were awarded by a committee joined by Necdet Doğan, Cengiz Kahraman, Doğan Satmış, Mehmet Tezkan, İbrahim Yıldız, Prof. Şükran Esen, Zafer Arapkirli, Mehmet Ayan, Orhan Ayhan, Sibel Güneş, Prof. Nurdoğan Rigel, Ercüment İşleyen, Hakan Kara and Celal Toprak.
The following journalists were awarded: Ayşe Arman for her interview entitled "Homosexual Referee", Nagehan Alçı for the research "Evening Karabagh" and Belma Akçura for the research "Kurdish movies of the state", İlhan Taşçı "The congregation could not be touched", Bahadır Özgün and Şebnem Turhan for "The textile surprise of TÜİK", Enis Yıldırım for "They killed the heroes" and Ali Dağlar for the news item entitled "He erased one sentence and came to the poisoned city". Serkan Akkoç was awarded for the news item "The winged angel began to shine after 160 years", Murat Ağca for "He gained TL 700,000 but could not take it because it was said to be illicit" and Bağış Erten for "Do Armstrong, Pelps and Bolt play in Real Madrid?"
Award for story from Dersim
In the branch of "column writers", Yavuz Şemerci was awarded for his article entitled "Let me tell you a story from Dersim" published in the Habetürk newspaper.
In the "non-written" category, caricaturist Latif Demirci received a prize. Fikret Ercan, Ersoy Diyar, Naci Koç and İbrahim Sarıdağ were awarded in the categroy "Page organization - front page". İbrahim Usta from Associated Press and Berin Alpaslan received rewards for their photographs on "SOS Istanbul" and "Again Religious Holiday" respectively. Sena Kiper and Oktay Uçar were awarded for their NTV news item "Horizon - 1 vessel". Further laureates were Erol Candabakoğlu for the FOX TV news item "We found Turhan Çömez", Ramazan Öztürk for the TRT 2 program "Breaking point - Afghanistan", Tülay Akça for her TRT 2 documentation "Courteous clerk", Yasemin Küçükkaya for "The canons of Fatih Sultan Mehmet" on TRT 2, Ali Birerdinç for "The regatta of the Naval Forces Commanders" on Yaban TV, Çağtay Kenarlı from DHA for "They held on to life in the flood" and Filiz Yentürk for "Sea economics" on TRT radio.
The Nezih Demirkent Special Award went to Ali Ekber Yıldırım form Dünya newspaper. www.NTVmsnbc.com and www.ODAtvcom were awarded in the "internet" category.
The prize giving ceremony was attended by many guests, among them the Istanbul Governor, Hüseyin Avni Mutlu and Selami Öztürk, Mayor of Kadıköy (district on Istanbul's Asian side). (BT/EÖ/VK)
