Award ceremony for small-scale media outlets took place on 6 April 2017 in Sarajevo, granting the winners of “Imaš priču?” contest which was published under the framework of the “Building and Consolidating National Capacities for Conflict Prevention” project, funded by the EU with the amount of 43,000 euros, and implemented by UNDP in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The activity is coordinated by the Office of the UN Resident Coordinator in BiH.

Head of Political and Economic Section of EU Delegation in BiH Jan Snaidauf and UNDP BiH Deputy Resident Representative Sukhrob Khoshmukhamedov congratulated the winners of the contest on their amazing ideas, and thanked all the applicants for their efforts in preparing the applications.

Head of Political and Economic Section of EU Delegation in BiH Jan Snaidauf emphasised that media in BiH are experiencing many challenges in terms of political pressure, intimidation of journalists and no transparency of media ownership. That is why the EU, together with its partners, thinks that it is highly important to try to support the alternative, sometimes critical voices.

„There has been some sort of general opinion in this country that citizen’s voices do not count, that they cannot be herd, because they are not part of the political scene. We certainly think this is not right and should not be the case and that is again a reason why to support you. We wanted to look at the broad range of media activities, from more traditional toward more non-traditional social media that are innovative and creative. It is clear that Social media, and non-traditional media formats have more and more importance and influence as time goes. What we need are narratives bridging the divides in the country: ethnic divides, cultural, religious, gender, educational, social and economics. It is about peace and trust building, respecting the others across the divides, it is fighting against hate speech and radicalization“, said Snaidauf.

„Strengthening independent and free media, as well as bloggers is crucial for promoting positive dialogue, building peace and trust among people. They are the generators of positive changes in society and a crucial factor in democratic development of the country. I am glad that we will support these great 8 ideas, and that with the support of our partners, we will continue the implementation of similar initiatives”, said UNDP BiH Deputy Resident Representative Sukhrob Khoshmukhamedov, and took the opportunity to once again thank all the applicants on the innovative ideas they sent.

„Moja Hercegovina Portal was started by me and my brother, being people with disabilities, five years ago with a team of young Journalism graduates. We started by making a different kind of media, a media that would write about everything that the mainstream media does not write about, i.e. people with disabilities and other marginalized groups, but also the position of women in our region is not very good. I believe that we are the only independent media in Eastern Herzegovina”, said Dragiša Sikimić, one of the grant winners.

„This grant means a lot to us because the position of media in Bosnia and Herzegovina is not satisfactory, it is very difficult to finance them. We would not be able to make these stories come to life without this grant because it all requires resources for technical realization, travelling… Without the support of this project it would be impossible for us to do what we do”, he added.

“I think that every project, every voice, not just my project, extremely important to all of us, to change and to educate ourselves in the first place. I believe that education is the key to all the problems we are facing now. This publication will, as planned, be available in libraries around BiH, so that children will have access to it, which is the initial idea, education.”, said Anesa Abadan, winner of the grant with her “Malo sam drugačiji” book idea, which will be published thanks to this grant.

With the high number of applications, eight stories were chosen that stood out with their originality and creative ideas. Grants worth 5000 USD per grant were awarded to the following winners:

• Cyber Bosanka: “BH Ljudi”;
• BH Studenti:  multimedijalni prijedlog s dvije priče “Problemi studiranja studenata s invaliditetom; Studiranje kroz objektiv moje kolegice/mog kolege”
• Aladin Kavgic: “Sjenke”
• Moja Hercegovina Portal: “Multimedijalno online izvještavanje na temu ljudskih prava i položaja žena i marginalizovanih ciljnih grupa u Istočnoj Hercegovini”
• Global CIR: “Pozitivni Balkan”
• Sayber DOO: The Loft Radio: “Loft Online Radio/Video magazin- start-up povezivanje mladih”
• Anesa Abadan: “Malo sam drugačiji”
• Srđan Puhalo Blogging: (action-oriented blogging/ društveno-odgovorno bloggiranje)