OSCE Office in Tajikistan supports multimedia workshop for journalists covering elections

A six-day multimedia workshop for journalists was held at the OSCE Office in Tajikistan in Dushanbe on 17 January 2015 in preparation for the forthcoming parliamentary elections in Tajikistan on 1 March.

The workshop brought together 21 journalists from different regions of Tajikistan representing all sectors of the mass media: the state, private, print, radio, TV and online media.

The programme was planned and led by the Mohiddin Alempour International Foundation which has previously organized multimedia training courses for Tajik journalists. The Open Society Institute – Assistance Foundation in Tajikistan and Internews Tajikistan also supported the workshop.

National and international experts set out the legal framework governing the parliamentary elections and provided examples of election coverage in other countries.

Guest speakers included Ashurbay Imamov, the former chairman of the Constitutional Court of Tajikistan, Nuriddin Qarshibayev, the new chairman of the Tajik Media Council and Muhiddin Kabiri, member of the Tajik parliament, who discussed various aspects of the political and legal environment in Tajikistan ahead of the parliamentary election.

The workshop placed special emphasis on practical training sessions of journalistic work covering audio, video, online and print media reporting. Most of the trainers were former or still active BBC journalists with many years’ experience. The participants worked in three groups, each of which carried out a journalistic assignment on an election issue for possible publication in their own media outlets. During the last day of the workshop, the completed assignments were presented in an open session and evaluated by participants and trainers.

Ewald Orf, Media Officer at the OSCE Office in Tajikistan, emphasized the special importance of the media during election campaigns. “By improving the multimedia skills of journalists, the OSCE Office in Tajikistan is actively contributing to the transparency of the next parliamentary elections in Tajikistan,” said Orf.

David Morton, a former head of the BBC Russian Service, a member of the Board of trustees of the Alempour International Foundation and one of the trainers, said: “This has been a rewarding week during which journalists have gained practical experience in planning election coverage with imagination and with knowledge of the rules.”

A similar multimedia training workshop will be conducted by the OSCE Office in Tajikistan from 19 to 24 January with the same trainers and new participants in Khujand.