By Stephen Ouma Bwire in Muscat, Oman.
Dominique Pradalié is the newly elected elected President of the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ). He has worked throughout her career in French public broadcasting, from ORTF to France Télévisions, and has been Editor-in-Chief of the nightly news on France 2.
At the same time as she was pursuing her career as a journalist, Dominique Pradalié was also involved in trade union activities on a voluntary basis. In particular, she has held various mandates to represent journalists within France Télévisions – staff delegate, member of the works council and union representative in the company.
Within the union, she was elected at regional (Ile de France section) and national levels as General Secretary and spokesperson of the SNJ until 2021, in charge of legal and international issues.
She currently sits on the SNJ National Committee, the union’s parliament, and has been a member of the IFJ Executive Committee since the Angers Congress (2016) after being re-elected at the Tunis Congress (2019).
She is a member of the Higher Commission of the Professional Journalists’ Identity Card (CCIJP) until 2021, and is currently deputy treasurer of the Council of Journalistic Ethics and Mediation (CDJM) and administrator of the Maison des lanceurs d’alerte in Paris, organisations of which the SNJ is a co-founder, and of several journalists’ defence associations. She is also an adviser to the Commission d’arbitrage des journalistes, a specific jurisdiction for the profession in France.
Since 1926, when the IFJ was founded in Paris, Dominique Pradalié is the second woman president of the IFJ, after the Belgian journalist Mia Doornaert (1986-1990).
She succeeds Moroccan journalist Younes Mjahed, who was IFJ President from 2019 to 2022. Her term runs until 2026, when the IFJ will celebrate its Centenary.
Ms Pradalié said: “My election to the IFJ Presidency gives me great pride in the honour done to France. Press freedom is under attack all over the world and journalists are the first victims. But it is the citizens who are the most penalised, because democracies are judged by the quality of their media and information, which must be honest, complete, independent and pluralist”.
Ms Pradalié also pointed out that the IFJ Convention against Impunity for Journalist Killers should be adopted by the UN General Assembly: “Solidarity and collective action must be multiplied everywhere to promote and remember the mission and role of journalists in society”.
Anthony Bellanger, IFJ General Secretary, said: “I have known Dominique for many years – we were activists together in the SNJ – and her commitment to the cause of journalists in France and around the world is well known. She has never counted her hours in defending the most precarious (but also others) and she is one of those seasoned and experienced volunteer activists, in touch with social reality, that the IFJ needs”.
President: Dominique Pradalié SNJ – France
Senior Vice President: Zuliana Lainez Otero ANP – Peru
Vice-President: Nasser Abu Baker PJS – Palestine
Vice-President: Sabina Inderjit Indian Journalists Union
Honorary;
Treasurer
Jim Boumelha National Union of Journalists (NUJ)
2. Advisers
Mohamed Al Araimi OJA Oman
Dhairan Almutairi KJA Kuwait
Maria José Braga FENAJ – Brazil
Larry Goldbetter NWU – USA
Adriana Hurtado FECOLPER Colombia
Mohamed Yassine Jelassi SNJT – Tunisia
Joachim Kreibich dju in verdi Germany
Raffaele Lorusso FNSI – Italy
Filemón Medina Sindicato de Periodistas de Panama
Marion Medjo Obam SNJC – Cameroon
Luis Menendez FAPE – Spain
Jennifer Moreau UNIFOR – Canada
Omar Faruk Osman NUSOJ – Somalia
Adam Portelli MEAA Australia
Maria Luisa Rogério SJA Angola
Ali Youssef ORLB – Lebanon
3. Reserve Advisers
Africa
1st Eduardo Constantino SNJ – Mozambique
2nd Stephen Ouma Bwire UJU – Uganda
Asia
Rashid Al Hamer BJA – Bahrain
Mohammed Al Hammadi JA – UAE
Europe
1st Serhiy Shturkhetskyy IMTUU – Ukraine
Latin America
1st Jose Altagracia Guzman Beato SNTP – Dominican Republic
2nd Domingo Vargas FENATRAMCO – Chile
Oceania
1st Karen Percy MEAA – Australia
2nd Leigh Tonkin MEAA – Australia
General Reserve Advisers
1st Indira Priyadarshini Nawagamuwa FMETU – Sri Lanka
2nd Wanchi You ATJ – Taiwan
The IFJ represents more than 600,000 journalists in 146 countriesin the world ■