Dates: 16-20 December 2012
Country: Egypt, Cairo
Media Diversity Institute has organised a workshop for Egyptian journalists on how to report on Parliament and the issues debated in Parliament. The participants in MDI workshop were 14 journalists from Egypt who also had an opportunity to compare and exchange the experience in political reporting in the UK and Egypt. One of the objectives of the workshop held in Cairo in December 2012 was to understand the importance of inclusive political debates.
The trainers, Mike Jempson and Ramy Mohsen, have organised sessions on a new way of Parliament reporting, writing skills, profiling politicians and political parties, as well as covering elections and compering the experience of political reporting in the UK with the situation in Egypt.
The participants have valued the comparison between two political systems and the way of reporting on Parliament and political issues in the UK and Egypt, although most of them agreed that the things are not so very different even in different cultural contexts.
During the four-days long workshop the number of politicians, Egyptian MPs and experts were invited to take a part in various sessions of MDI training. One of the most vibrant sessions was the panel discussion between the trainees and the three elected politicians during which the MDI trainees was asking questions from which they could get stories.
They were also encouraged to observe the behaviour and attitudes of the MPs as well as practising parliamentary sketch.
One of the MPs, Basel Adel from the Constitution party, said during the panel that Egyptians “should not be exclusive because not all the politicians who were affiliated to ex regime are bad. “Instead we have to be inclusive and include all people without restrictions to be able to develop this country”, said Adel at the panel discussion within the MDI workshop in Cairo.
In the feedback MDI received after the workshop one of the participants wrote that she was “impressed by the theoretical and practical part of the training as well as by the methods for Parliament reporting in British and other international media. The other participants said that they would benefit from the workshop organised by MDI.
The workshop is part of the project “Inclusive Parliament: Building citizens’ participation in the political process in Egypt through better media, parliamentary and civil society interaction”, funded by the UK Embassy in Cairo.
There were several newspapers articles and broadcasting reports on MDI workshop in Cairo.
To read Mike Jempson’s blog on Egypt, click here.
