Scandal at the German Henri Nannen Prize
The presentation of the prestigious German Henri Nannen Journalism Awards on Friday evening in Hamburg was marred by controversy. The awarding of prizes to staff members of the tabloid *Bild* sparked discontent.
Hans Leyendecker, Klaus Ott and Nicolas Richter from the Süddeutsche Zeitung (SZ) declined the award at the ceremony on Friday evening at the Deutsches Schauspielhaus in Hamburg. They did not want to be honored at the same time as authors from the Bild newspaper in the "Best investigative achievement" category. The jury had decided on two award winners after the jurors were unable to agree on just one award winner in three votes. According to jury member Helmut Markwort (Focus), no meeting of the panel has ever lasted so long.
The nomination of the tabloid Bild was already controversial beforehand. The article "Wirbel um Privatkredit - Hat Wulff das Parlament getäuscht?" was successful in the affair surrounding former Federal President Christian Wulff, who ultimately resigned. The piece was researched by Bild authors Martin Heidemanns and Nikolaus Harbusch. "Satisfaction doesn't play a role," said Harbusch at the award ceremony.
The SZ journalists who uncovered the "Formula 1 affair" at Bayern LB in 2011 took the stage after the two. The jury's decision in favor of Bild was perfectly fine, said Leyendecker. But he and his colleagues did not want to be honored on the same day as Bild.
Prize withdrawn
There had already been a scandal the previous year. The reportage prize awarded to a Spiegel editor was subsequently revoked following criticism. The jury had cited a lack of diligence as the reason, as the journalist René Pfister had only obtained some of the information second-hand, but did not state this. This time, Stefan Willeke from the weekly newspaper Die Zeit was successful in the reportage category. Other prizes went to Der Spiegel, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung, the website Stern.de and the British journalist Nick Davies (The Guardian).
He received the award for his commitment to press freedom. Davies uncovered that reporters from the British tabloid News of the World, owned by media entrepreneur Rupert Murdoch, were using illegal wiretapping and bribery methods to obtain information from celebrities, politicians and private individuals. (SDA/DPA)
