Africa-Press – Eswatini. It was an exciting four hours at the Eswatini Observer for a quartet of pupils who were attached to the organisation in commemoration of the international World Children’s Day 2023.
According to United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) Deputy Representative, Afshin Parsi, the aim of the visit was for the pupils to have a feel of working in an organisation and take a moment to make their voices heard as they took over the media for the day in their different departments.
The children were Asime Kunene, a Grade V pupil from Mater Dolorosa Primary, Wenkosi Mcetjwa, a Grade VII pupil from Hermann Gmeiner (SOS Primary) and Makabongwe Dlamini, a Grade VI pupil from Ezulwini Community Primary.
Making up the rest of the team was Emmaculate Phiri, an IB I pupil from Waterford KaMhlaba.
The pupils were attached to various departments of Eswatini Observer, which included the Entertainment, News and Sports desks, while Phiri was attached to the Sales and Marketing department.
Parsi said this year’s global theme was Education and Violence against Children. A third theme, though not global was the impact of Climate Change on children, which he said had also globally affected children and caused poverty.
“A lot of children missed out on the chance to have a proper education during the COVID-19 pandemic, which is why we had to remind them of its importance,” said Parsi.
He said during this day, the children’s voices should be heard and the media was one of the outlets where they could have the opportunity to be vocal. On a lighter note, he encouraged the pupils to concentrate and take over the duties of editors so that they would be in charge should the managers go on leave.
welcome
The pupils were welcome by Eswatini Observer Managing Editor Mbongeni Mbingo who made the children take over the desks.
The World Children’s Day was first established in 1954 as Universal Children’s Day and is celebrated on November 20 each year to promote international togetherness, awareness among children worldwide, and improving children’s welfare.
November 20th is an important date, as it is the date in 1959 when the UN General Assembly adopted the Declaration of the Rights of the Child.
It is also the date in 1989 when the UN General Assembly adopted the Convention on the Rights of the Child. Since 1990, World Children’s Day also marks the anniversary of the date that the UN General Assembly adopted both the Declaration and the Convention on children’s rights.
WHAT THE
PUPILS SAID
Makabongwe Dlamini –I benefited a lot from the Eswatini Observer because the employees taught me a lot.
Some of the things I learnt are sub editing which deals with structuring of the newspaper and further details of adding pictures on the newspaper in order to illustrate what happened at the event. I also learnt how reporters get stories and that they all have to be balanced instead of one sided.
Wenkhosi Mcetjwa – I benefited a lot from Eswatini Observer because one of the employees taught me how they work like, if the sub editor prints newspaper they double- check the pages and correct mistakes. They compare the pages of the Times of Eswatini with their newspaper Eswatini Observer so that they check which stories they don`t have
Emmaculate Phiri – I had a very nice and insightful experience on how the sales department works and all the procedures that take place. From how one has to use communication skills with different companies and to be creative with different marketing strategies so as to gain many clients.
The clients request what they want to be advertised on the Eswatini Observer newspaper and a fee is paid depending on the size of the advert and the ink used depending on whether it is in black and white or colour form.
In addition to this, some skills that I have acquired are to be an inquisitive learner, to keep up to date with technology and uprising businesses in the market and have good marketing skills, which are convincing and speaking well with the clients.
Asime Kunene – I learned that when editing a text, you need to write Hollywood when a storyline is from international countries and when a storyline is from South Africa, you write South Africa. The Eswatini Observer helped me to know more about how they do their work, I learned from them that when creating an Observer newspaper, you need to write what is right and then print the page and check for corrections before it is sent to the printers.
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