BIG WIN: Olive Press awarded as Best English newspaper in Spain at key awards ceremony

THE Olive Press has been described as the ‘best English newspaper in Spain ‘for its honest, incisive reporting and professionality’.

It came as the newspaper won a key communication award at the prestigious Joan Hunt Diputacion de Malaga Ceremony.

The President of Malaga Province, Francisco Salado, told a 500-strong gala that we deserved the gong for our ‘truthful’ and original reporting.

Before accepting the Joan Hunt for Communication Prize, he said: “Jon Clarke and his team integrate expatriates into our society through current and truthful information, making the Olive Press the most widely read English newspaper in Spain.”

A two-minute film went on to explain that we were frequently quoted by global media giants, including the BBC, New York Times and the Guardian.

It added it was written entirely by ‘top-tier professionals’ and that ‘thousands of foreign residents have become better integrated into local life’ because of us.

Meanwhile, respected newspaper La Opinion de Malaga wrote that ‘one million monthly visits and more than 100,000 copies printed every month’ helps recognise it as ‘the best newspaper for expatriates in Spain, combining independent journalism with an international feel’. 

The Malaga daily continued: “This award celebrates a media group that builds bridges between cultures from the Costa del Sol.”

Nominated by former Sur in English editor Liz Parry, the award was picked up by editor and founder Clarke, 56, at the Edgar Neville Auditorium in Malaga last night.

After expressing surprise in Spanish that a ‘guiri periodista’ (foreign journalist) could win such an award, he thanked his team, including Charles Bamber, Dilip Kuner and Walter Finch.

He went on to explain that journalism is ‘about being inquisitive and asking the difficult questions that people don’t want to ask’.

He added it was also ‘about being fearless and not worrying about making friends’ and, most importantly, ‘fighting for the underdog’.

In particular, he pointed to the Olive Press’s successful campaign taking on the ‘mafia tactics’ of developers in Ronda behind an infamous double golf course scheme with 2000 houses called Los Merinos.

And he added that our current ongoing campaign ‘Save our Costas’ – to protect the last few green virgin spaces on the coastline – was ‘more important than ever’, particularly in Tarifa and Almeria.

He also praised former journalists, now working at ITV, the Washington Post and Netflix, and added his ‘proudest’ moment came earlier this year when an Olive Press reporter was named ‘best trainee journalist in the UK’.

It came when Yzzy Bostyn picked up the prestigious NCTJ award in Sheffield this Spring, beating journalists at both The Times in London and the Midlands’ biggest newspaper group the Express & Star.

“And she won this while working right here in Malaga,” he explained to the audience.

He also went on to praise the incredible work of founder of the Cudeca hospice Joan Hunt, who the Olive Press included in its Expat 100 some 15 years ago.

He described her as someone who ‘fought for the underdog’ and she deserved to have an awards gala dedicated to foreigners working here in Spain.

Other winners at the ceremony included the Mijas Lions Club, Chilean poet and publisher Lorenzo Saval, Olympic swimmer Nina Zhivanevskaya and Estepona Town Hall.

Meanwhile, the German owners of a beautiful rural hotel near Ronda, Los Castanos, in Cartijima, won an award for business. Described as ‘a gem in the heart of the Genal Valley’, the couple moved to the tiny village with their two children three years ago.

Another winner was cake maker Dora Ortiz, who arrived from Paraguay, a decade ago and now counts herself as a real Malaga ‘boqueron’.

Finally, the German consulate got an award for its service to the local German community.

The awards ceremony was set up four years ago in honour of Joan Hunt, who had set up Andalucia’s first hospice after her husband got cancer in Malaga in the 1980s.

The charity Cudeca has gone on to become one of the best known and supported in the province.

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