World Press Freedom Day 2016

Gwen Lister was a founder member of the Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA) and a co-chair of the UNESCO-sponsored conference in 1991 which authored the Windhoek Declaration on an Independent and Pluralistic Media in Africa. Lister has received a number of international and regional awards, including being named a world press freedom hero by the International Press Institute (IPI) in 2000. For 26 years she worked as an editor for The Namibian, the independent newspaper which she steered through difficult times under apartheid, and even the post-independence when the new government placed a ban on advertising in The Namibian. In 2011 Lister handed over the reins to her successor, and currently, she is the Chairperson of the Namibia Media Trust, which owns the newspaper, and which is set up to promote media freedom as well as excellence in journalism.

• Keynote address