It is a wonderful moment to be able to say a few words on this historic night, which is in effect a significant pause on a never ending journey in the pursuit of journalistic excellence.

What we are gathered here tonight for, is not just to honor those who have reach a particular standard in their work in the year under the review, but beginning the setting of a higher bar on excellence.

If we are serious about achieving and maintaining excellence in this demand profession of ours, tonight is not the end of anything. It is the start of everything.

This award ceremony comes at a time when our organization – MWAG – is pushing forward on a number of fronts.

At the end of last year, MWAG threw out a challenge to the local media to prepare to meet the challenges ahead.

Collectively, we can say we have made strides, but there is always room for improvement.

The Media Awards is just one of the things we set out to achieve this time a year ago.

The initial arrangements for the Training programme with TAMCC have been completed and soon the First Vice President Rawle Titus would be updating the general membership.

Once again I call on media managers to understand the importance of training initiative, and work closely with MWAG to improve the standard of the profession.

While we demand of our members to put more time and effort to their own personal development, we also call on managers to put their own money where their mouth is, and budget more for the training of their staff.

It is only through such initiatives, that the respective media houses will maintain and improve on their relevancy and competitiveness.

It is an investment that would improve on the bottom line in the long run.

We want to congratulate everyone who has been nominated, and who would win awards here tonight.

This award is also a commitment on behalf of MWAG to encourage this new drive for excellence we are seeing in many quarters.

The awards, plus the new training initiatives that will come on stream in the New Year, are all aimed at the same thing.

While we can boast of the collective strides we have made in the last year, we would appreciate that starting with a serious deficit on quality; we have a long way to go.

We celebrate every new milestone. But we also use the opportunity to re-energize ourselves, knowing that these are just few important beginning steps on a journey that has no end.

I also want to say thanks to all those directly responsible in making such a night as this possible. The MWAG team led by Mr Rae Roberts, who has become an internet wiz overnight and the ACM team who deliberated over the judging process. MWAG appreciates the assistance from you - Canute James, Dale Enoch, Peter Richards and
Wesley Gibbings.

I am so pleased, sisters and brothers, to see us all shining tonight.

Thank you very much.

Michael Bascombe

President