TheCable’s Anu Adelakun selected for 2022 ‘Bertha Challenge’ fellowship

Anu Adelakun, TheCable’s TV director, has been selected as one of the fellows for the Bertha Foundation’s 2022 challenge fellowship programme.

The ‘Bertha Challenge‘ is an opportunity for activists and investigative journalists to spend a year focusing on one pressing social justice issue.

Adelakun is a journalist and development-focused high-impact documentary producer, leading TheCable newspaper’s video team as director and head of production.

Some of her works, many of which have been featured on BBC/CNN, have won several awards, and more importantly, have triggered responses from governments and institutions across Nigeria. 

She is a founding member of the Women’s Economic Imperative, a UNICEF Voices of Youth alumni, Carrington Youth fellow, US consul general award recipient, UN Women/Empower Women Global Champion for Change, Chevening alumni and USGEEA women achievers awardee.

Her most recent documentary on the stories of victims of police brutality during the #EndSARS protests of 2020 contributed to testimony accounts at the Lagos panel, which was followed up with compensation from the government.

For the programme, Adelakun will produce a documentary about the dynamics on Nigerians who lack access to clean water.

Twelve other journalists from across the world were also selected for the fellowship.

They include Mustafah Adbulaziz from Germany, Shinji Yoshimoto from Brazil, Fumba Chama from Zambia, Tommy Greene from Northern Ireland, and Maria May from Guam.

Others are Luisa Izuzquita from Belgium, Aminah Jasho from Kenya, Pascalinah Kabo from Lesotho, Abdikhayr Hussein from Somalia, Fredrick Mugira from Uganda, Musuk Nolte from Peru, and Jelena Prtoric from Croatia.

The Bertha challenge aims to support ground-breaking work by the fellows to investigate social justice issues, by providing time to work exclusively on projects, the spaces in which to connect with a diverse global cohort of Bertha fellows, and the resources to develop tangible products speaking directly to the challenge question.

The fellows will receive a non-residential paid fellowship and a project budget to work independently and together.