Keynote speaker President Jose Ramos-Horta pledged to make the Presidential Palace available each year for the awards dinner – and reminded the audience that he, too, had once been a journalist. Mr. Horta said he never won any media awards because his journalism career was very brief due, as he put it, to “accidental history”. He was probably referring to the 1975 invasion of Timor-Leste by Indonesia.

Later in the evening, President Horta presented the Journalist of the Year award to TVTL reporter Elizio Pinto Guteres Soares. In addition to winning the highest honor of the evening, the ‘Balibo Five’ trophy, Soares also won the Greg Shackleton Prize for best Radio and TV Journalist.

The four other award winners were: Zesorot Dela Serna of Los Palos Community Radio - best Community Radio Journalist; Mario Johny dos Santos of Timor Post - best Photo Journalist; Betti Pinto of Radio Timor-Leste - best Female Journalist; and Mario Zevonia Fernandes Viera of the journal Klaak - best Print and Online Journalist.

The Organizing Committee raised all the funds to present the Awards Dinner. The International Center for Journalists assisted with organizing the event – which was hosted by the five journalist organizations: Timor-Leste Journalists Syndicate (SJTL), Timor-Leste Journalists Association (AJTL), Association of Timor-Leste Community Radio (ARKTL), Timor-Leste Photographers’ Association (TiLPA), and the Center for Timor-Leste Investigative Journalists (CJITL). ICFJ established the Media Trust Fund two years ago continue its programs after its departure. The fund currently has nearly $30,000. The Fund will be managed by the five Timor-Leste journalism organizations.