GMA Network's News and Public Affairs won three awards in the 2009 US International Film and Video Festival (USIFVF).
Reporter's Notebook's "Lunok-Droga (Filipino Drug Mules)" won the Silver
Screen Award in the Social Issues Production-Documentary
Category. To film the documentary, host Jiggy Manicad traveled
to Kuala Lumpur to witness the sting operation jointly conducted by
Philippine and Malaysian police to arrest members of a Nigerian drug
syndicate. Manicad also had the opportunity to interview the Filipino
drug courier used to bring the syndicate down. Co-host Maki Pulido,
on the other hand, tackled the worsening problem of drug abuse in the
Philippines.
Another Reporter's Notebook documentary, "Pinays for Export (Filipinas
for Export): The Southeast Asian Sex Trafficking Trail" received a Certificate
for Creative Excellence in the same category. The
episode featured the world's third most profitable organized crime: human
trafficking, with victims falling mostly into sexual slavery. For the
first time on Philippine television, the trail of trafficked Filipinas from the
Philippines, to Malaysia, Hong Kong and Macau was traced.
Jay Taruc's documentary "Batang Langoy (Child Swimmers)" won for
I-Witness a Certificate for Creative Excellence also in the
Social Issues category. It documented the struggle of the Magalumbi island
children, who swim a two-kilometer stretch everyday just to be able to go
to school. Being unable to bring home their books, the children
bury these under the sand and in the morning rush to do their
homework before going to school.
The USIFVF was founded in 1967 and is one of the world's leading
international events devoted exclusively to recognition of outstanding
Business, Television, Documentary, Educational, Entertainment, Industrial and
Informational productions.