The second prize went to journalist Maksim Risteski for the series of articles about the affair “Tarbs” published in the daily newspaper “Kapital”. The series investigates the reasons and the circumstances in which Republic of Macedonia is facing the danger to be damaged for over 70 million euros because the Government, Ministry of Transport and Communications, the public service Macedonian Radio Television and the Broadcasting Council didn’t fulfill the conditions from the agreement signed with the company Tarbs. The author initiates an investigation, in which, despite the complete closure of the institutions, he succeeds in presenting most of the facts, evidence and statements from many sources who confirmed that all previous Governments from 2002 till now, are involved in this scandal, for which there is still an ongoing legal battle in the London Court.
The third prize was shared between Aleksandar Dinev, journalist from TV Sitel, for the stories on “Adoption”, and the journalist from the daily newspaper “Dnevnik”, Milena Atanasoska Manasieva for a series of articles “Dossier - sales of doctorates and masters”. The stories on “Adoption” reveal exclusive findings of the journalist for violations and abuses of the legal procedure for adoption of children. The pieces reveal systemic flaws and reveal a scandalous practice of longstanding abuses, inhumanity and misconduct of competent institutions in this area. The story caused a great public attention, while competent institutions reacted and began an investigation regarding cases detected in these stories. The texts “Dossier- sales of doctorates and masters “reveal a scandal of selling scientific titles and plagiarism of academic papers in higher education. The author provides lots of information, testimonies and statements from institutions, universities and university professors, whose academic papers have been abused or sold, and the research points to legal inconsistencies and confirms that in the country there is no effective system for detecting plagiarism. Engagement of the author caused reactions and engagements of the prosecution, the Ministry of Education, the academic and the general public, and after publication of this scandal the Ministry of Education issued a call for tender for procurement of computer software that will hunt academic criminals.
The jury decided to award three honorable acknowledgments for outstanding journalistic efforts to the journalists Zaklina Hadzi-Zafirova for series of articles on Bulgarian citizenship syndrome that were published in “Utrinski vesnik”, to Ivana Koleva for the series of articles that cover the public revealing of shareholders that own under 5% in companies listed on the Stoke Exchange market, published in the daily newspaper “Kapital”, and to Laura Papraniku for the articles about the mysterious robberies from the Macedonian Post’s vehicles, published in the daily newspaper “Koha”.
The full report of the independent jury, which selected the best investigative stories in 2011, is attached in addition.
