The Journalist Association of (W) Samoa (JAWS) in collaboration with the UNDP Samoa Multi Country Office conducted a media training focusing on Corruption Awareness and Investigative Journalism in the country.

Held at the Tanoa Hotel Conference Room on Monday, the two half-day training tackles trending issues of human interests and its connection to corruption mainly in government entities.

JAWS president, Lagi Keresoma told Samoa Observer in an interview that the training has opened the eyes of the media to have a deeper understanding on how to go about in covering corruption in the country and in the government.

"There was a good point I highlighted from the training and that is, not all bad stories are corrupt stories and the media needs to upgrade their standard of coverage on corruption within the government and everywhere else," she said.

"The training provides a huge opportunity for the media to follow up on stories about corruption because most of the media do not know how to identify corruption properly.

"It's also a good opportunity for the media to look at covering nepotism in the government, conflict of interest being practiced where the higher-ups are hiring their relatives or close friends without advertising the position."

The goal is that by the end of the training, all media are able to absorb greater knowledge on how to go about covering corruption for the benefit of the members of the public.

One of the discussed trending stories in the country include the Pago Pago-registered Kite Runner which entered the country without proper travel documentations and which the Minister of Works, Transport and Infrastructure, Olo Fiti Vaai said was a "pleasure boat" and therefore did not require inspection by officials.

The media were queried on how they could follow up on the issue, especially the corruption identified in the whole practice of bringing in the boat.

Meanwhile, some of the key objectives of the training include; understand and explain UNCAC, Teieniwa Vision and anti-corruption and related challenges in Samoa; Being able to link public integrity agency reports to UNCAC, Teieniwa Vision and anti-corruption reporting in Samoa; Understand existing anti-corruption mechanisms in Samoa along with pending mechanisms; and Identify the role of the media in highlighting UNCAC, Teieniwa Vision and anti-corruption, and how journalists can be consulted as part of national policy-making.

The training is an initiative made possible with the support of the UN Pacific Region Anti-Corruption Project.

All media practitioners in the country as well as students undertaking Diploma and Degree at the School of Media and Journalism at the National University of Samoa (N.U.S.) attended the training.