Mondi Shanduka – 2008 Category Winners

Thabo Mkhize, 31, has worked as a journalist for the past nine years. He spent the first seven years of his career with South Africa's largest weekend newspaper, the Sunday Times, based in Durban and later in Johannesburg before he joined The Times during its inception two years ago. Mkhize was awarded a National Diploma in Journalism from the Durban University of Technology and graduated in 2000. Three years later he was named the Vodacom Editors' Choice Provincial Journalist of the Year winner, an award given to outstanding young South African journalists and in the same year was voted the ‘Most improved journalist' and ‘Best employee Sunday Times Durban Bureau' - awards that earned him a promotion to the head office in Johannesburg where he continued doing the general news beat and writing for other sections of the paper including Insight, Sports and Lifestyle.

He has been experience covering international events including a visit to Fifa's headquarters in Zurich for the announcement of the host country for the 2010 Soccer World Cup. He has also journeyed to Iraq to cover the unfolding humanitarian crisis resulting from the ouster of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein in 2003.

In 2005 he was a recipient of the Alfred Friendly Press Fellowship which is afforded to mid-level journalist with great potential from a developing country. The fellowship gave him an opportunity to work for the St Louis Post Dispatch in St Louis, Missouri, in the US. The five months he spent at the newspaper saw him attending journalism training classes and these included a two week training at the famous Poynter Institute for Media Studies. Since joining The Times, Thabo has continued to contribute to the Lifestyle section of the Sunday Times. He has also branched out into the realm of multimedia reporting, by shooting video footage for The Times' online multimedia portal.