MANILA, Philippines - Documentarist and GMA News TV anchor Howie Severino has been named one of the winners of the 2015 Search for Journalists of the Year (JOY) organized by the Metrobank Foundation, Inc., which is awarded only every two years.
The award honors Filipino journalists whose excellence throughout their careers has contributed to nation-building and sets an example for the profession.
Severino has worked in television since 1997, but was also an award-winning newspaper reporter prior to TV and was editor-in-chief of GMA News Online from 2009 to 2014.
He is well-known for a series of documentaries on Jose Rizal, widely shown in schools and which inspired Ilustrado, GMA Network’s teleserye on the life and times of Rizal.
“I am so honored by this award because it recognizes my entire 27-year career in journalism. But I am also very humbled because I know that TV journalism more than any other kind of journalism is a team enterprise,” says Severino. “Anything I have ever achieved in TV is also the product of the talented and committed professionals I am lucky enough to work with.”
The other winners are Nancy Carvajal, senior reporter of the Philippine Daily Inquirer who broke the PDAF pork barrel scam story, and Marites Vitug, author of book-length investigations of the Supreme Court and editor-at-large of Rappler.
In the formal award ceremony on Oct. 22, the three winners will each receive a cash prize and the Pamukaw medallion designed by Jun Vicaldo, a winner of the Metrobank Foundation Prize for Achievement in Sculpture (MPAS).
They will also be conferred the title Metrobank Foundation Fellows in Journalism and will be given the opportunity to share their expertise and experience through lectures in Metro Manila and other regions of the country.
The winners were chosen through a process conducted by the Probe Media Foundation. The final board of judges was chaired by Ombudsman Conchita Carpio-Morales and composed of members Commission on Elections chairperson Andres Bautista; Commission on Higher Education (CHEd) chairperson Dr. Patricia Licuanan; Ateneo de Manila University president Fr. Jose Ramon Villarin; and Ramon Magsaysay Award Foundation president Carmencita Abella.
Severino also serves as GMA Network’s VP for Professional Development, one of those responsible for developing journalism standards and policies for the network.
Fellow GMA Network journalists Jiggy Manicad and Malou Mangahas were awarded in the first edition of the Search for Journalists of the Year in 2013. Mangahas also heads the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism.