The following article is based on a project carried out by Internews for International Women’s Day on 8 March.

The most influential newsroom figures behind what headlines get printed and in what approach are still in many countries men. This implicitly means that what many read in a newspaper is heavily shaped by the perspectives of only one sex-important topics to particularly women, such as forced marriage, girls’ education, and rape are thus sometimes deemed trivial, one-sided, or even absent.

For International Women’s Day on 8 March Internews compiled a global profile of women journalists at the frontline in ten very different countries. Specifically, in Africa, Internews highlighted women journalists in Uganda, Chad, and Kenya.

In Uganda, Rachel Jones, a reporter currently on leave from National Public Radio, has been training journalists on how to report on gender-based violence. Speaking about the challenges women face, Jones said, “For women here, it is automatic subservience, and your rights and opinions are of less value than men’s. That’s the foundation for gender-based violence-when women are devalued, it’s a breeding ground for violence.”

Other efforts focus on exposing the ordeals women are forced to undergo. In Chad a radio program, She Speaks, She Listens with reporters Houda Malloum and Halima Nassir on the radio station La Voix du Quaddai in Abéché discusses the indiscussed, with special attention recently paid to forced marriage. The stories highlighted on the programme, which has been running for the past two years, resonate with women, refugee and Chadian, all over the eastern region and give them a new voice and hope for change.

In Kenya, Internews hosted a roundtable discussion to assist Kenyan journalists report on rape. Twenty-four journalists attended the session to gain insight on how to appropriately address rape victims, including children, in the country. Exposing stories of rape victims, Internews said is vital, as it is a “tool of terror.”