International Women’s Day ‘As a journalist, the Covid-19 outbreak has brought me closer to people and our readers’ – Vidya Gappy |17 March 2021

As customary on March 8, Seychelles joins the world to celebrate the International Women’s Day. This year’s theme chosen by the United Nations is ‘Women in leadership: Achieving an equal future in Covid-19 world’. Since the beginning of last week, Seychelles NATION in collaboration with other ministries has been portraying successful and resilient women. Seychelles NATION in collaboration with the Ministry of Youth, Sports & Family continue to feature bios of women frontliners in the fight against Covid-19.

Women in Seychelles are surely the backbone of the society and have been in the forefront of this pandemic, be it in the health, economic and social sector. Today we speak to Vidya Gappy, a journalist at the national newspaper Seychelles NATION where women make up about 50% of the newsroom.

Question: How has your experience as a frontline worker been? Writing for Covid-19, daily news, the elections and so forth?

Vidya Gappy: It is the first time that any of us go through such an experience. As soon as they announced the lockdown last year, we knew that the lockdown would not apply to essential workers like journalists and that we had to come to work. With Covid-19, journalists had to become more creative because, aside from the Covid-19 updates, there were not much news items and events. We had to interview more people and come up with human interest stories, make use of technologies to get interviews and gauge the concerns of people in the community. Our greatest role was to educate and as journalists we received a lot of questions from people wherever we went.

As for daily news, there were understandably fewer press conferences, events and meetings that the media had been used to.

Live press conferences became a regular part of our lives and this put some pressure on us because we were not used to these. The pandemic forced us to work in shifts also; it was nice to have some colleagues around to keep the newsroom lively but it was also a downer not to have our other colleagues there.

We also experienced our first elections held during a pandemic. To note, it was my first election coverage in Seychelles but I had some experience working several elections in Mauritius. It was very interesting and challenging at the same time because, at some point, journalists were being treated as novices when we are not. Given that the Election Commission was new, there were some fine-tuning to be made and I hope that we will be able to better work together in the future.

We were also fortunate to witness a historical transition of power and people had to adapt to a new way of doing things. There had been some pre-election fears that there would be protests over the results, which did not happen and we thank God for that. Journalists had to rapidly adjust to the changes – the new ministers, the new President and his way of doing things. We have had to constantly stay on the alert.

Question: What have you gained from this experience?

Vidya Gappy: As a journalist, the Covid-19 outbreak has brought me closer to people and our readers. People would randomly call or text me so that I could bring their queries to the attention of the relevant authorities, and they expected an answer to their questions. This had brought me closer to a lot of people which I love because I am a people’s person. And people do not hesitate to talk about your work; they would stop me in the streets just to say they liked something I’ve written or to pass on their questions for the next press conference.

Question: What is your proudest moment while working in this trying time? And the challenges?

Vidya Gappy: One of my proudest achievements during this period was that the paper came out every morning, no matter what. To ensure business continuity at work, we had to break up into two teams – my team was my made up of a young professional and a senior journalist. We worked hard to make sure that the newspaper came out with the support of our CEO, even though there were fewer workers on hand and fewer news items.

I am also proud that I was present to report on many big announcements or events throughout this year. Covid-19 updates, the election results, the announcement of a new president and the swearing in ceremony – I had the opportunity and privilege to cover all these major national events.

As for the challenges, it was quite difficult to work from home and still send in articles because I have a 10-year-old daughter who had daily Zoom classes. I had to play the roles of mother, teacher, woman at home and also a worker – that was very tough! I was exhausted and still is; I cannot wait for school to start.

Question: Do you feel that women have played a significant role in helping to fight against Covid-19? Explain.

Vidya Gappy: I feel that journalists who are mothers were more at a disadvantage compared to some other working mothers who were able to stay with their children and follow up on their studies. The hours we work and the time we reach home made this almost impossible for us, particularly during this pandemic when there were fewer people to work but many pages to fill. I feel very sad because all of the other mums in my child’s class had the opportunity to look at their children’s work, while when mine showed me her work I would be completely lost.

Yes, women played a significant role in fighting against Covid-19. Without my mother in law who looked after my child, I would not have been able to work for example. The moment I call her she would come and pick my child up, and she was the only person I had to help me out. In every single sector, women have been the pillar during this difficult period and without women the country would not have been able to surmount its many challenges. Women make up the majority of nurses at the hospitals, there are even a lot of female doctors now, and everywhere you see women at the forefront so hats off to all these women.

Compiled by Elsie Pointe