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CEMEX-FNPI New Journalism Prize

Nobel laureate Gabriel García Márquez and Lorenzo H. Zambrano, Chairman and CEO of CEMEX.

MONTERREY, Mexico. In a ceremony presided over by Colombian Nobel laureate Gabriel García Márquez, President of the Iberian-American New Journalism Foundation (FNPI), and Lorenzo H. Zambrano, Chairman and CEO of CEMEX, four individuals were awarded the CEMEX-FNPI New Journalism Prize for their commitment to excellence in journalism: Claudio Cerri and Ernesto de Souza for journalistic copy; Diego Levy for photography; and Julio Scherer, for his lifetime achievements.

Prior to awarding the prizes, the Governing Board of the Award issued a statement that was read by Argentinean author Tomás Eloy Martínez. The 447 texts and 154 photographic works that competed for the award, he said, reflect Latin America's "social drama," particularly corruption, "which is unmasked with increasingly more freedom and, of course, with higher risk."

The winners during the ceremony.

Claudio Cerri, 49, born in Rio Claro, Brazil, began his career as a journalist in 1973. He has worked since 1989 as a special reporter for Globo Rural magazine in Brazil. His winning work, "A River in Search of a Nation" chronicled his journey through the San Francisco River in Brazil in collaboration with Ernesto de Souza, Globo Rural's photographic editor.

Diego Levy, 27, a photojournalist since 1991, is now a freelancer for several Argentinean publications. He previously worked for five years, starting in 1996, for the Clarin daily in Buenos Aires, covering events in Chile, Cuba, Brazil, and Uruguay. The jury selected his photographic essay on urban violence in Argentina, published in the Revista Dominical, a supplement to Buenos Aires' daily La Nacion.

Julio Scherer, 75, was born in Mexico City and has devoted more than 50 years of his life to journalism. He worked as a reporter for the Mexican daily Excelsior for 20 years and headed the newspaper for several years, until 1976 when he was removed from his post by President Echeverria's administration. After he left Excelsior, he founded Proceso, a weekly magazine of politics and analysis, with several fellow reporters. He spent the next 20 years as Proceso's editor-in-chief.

Julio Scherer

"If we understand 'attitude' as each person's must, as loyalty to those values that rule a career, then Scherer's attitude focuses on attachment to the profession," said Carlos Monsiváis, the Mexican writer who presented a summary of Scherer's career. "His guiding principle is clear: the only conceivable privileged information is the reader's."

In his acceptance speech, Scherer recalled the first years of Proceso, after the "Echeverrian" blow to Excelsior; the paradoxical situation in which he found himself during those days; and the spirit in which his friends and colleagues had to see "what I did not see."

Scherer further expounded on how absolute power corrupts. "Corruption destroys principles, degrades habits and jeopardizes desire, the immaterial grace of life. The refuge that shelters and isolates power is built with abominable materials; impunity provides an arsenal for whatever is needed: confidential information, invasion of privacy, threats, torture."

The author of Máxima Seguridad and Los Presidentes also talked about the "other powers": the spectacle of pain and violence as a colorful ritual. "Manipulation commands the world," he said, making reference to excesses by mass media and governments.

The CEMEX-FNPI New Journalism Prize was created to promote excellence in journalism and to reward those individuals committed to its integrity in Latin America and in the Caribbean. The Prize is the result of a strategic alliance for social development between the Iberian-American New Journalism Foundation (Fundación Nuevo Periodismo Iberoamericano, or FNPI), headquartered in Cartagena de Indias, Colombia, and CEMEX, a leading global cement company, based in Monterrey, Mexico.