International Press Institue Announces Appointment of Deputy Director Alison Bethel McKenzie as Interim Director

Editor’s note: Alison is one of our 2010 Power Listers.

Bethel McKenzie to Lead IPI through High-Profile 60th Anniversary World Congress in September, Following Departure of David Dadge to Pursue New Opportunities

The International Press Institute (IPI) Executive Board announced on Monday that it was appointing IPI Deputy Director Alison Bethel McKenzie as Interim Director following the decision by Director David Dadge to pursue new opportunities after overseeing two successful IPI World Congresses and strong development of the organisation’s press freedom activities.

Chairman of the IPI Board Janne Virkkunen said: “David has done an excellent job during his relatively short term as the Director of IPI, under the difficult circumstances created among other things by the global financial crisis. I have known David for many years and I know that he has been and will always be a true fighter for press freedom and freedom of expression. David is now, of his own will, stepping down from his post as the Director of IPI and it is time to thank him for his tremendous efforts to fulfil our mission as an important global press freedom organisation. On behalf of the IPI I wish David good luck in the future, whatever his coming challenges will be. Our new Interim Director, Alison Bethel McKenzie, starts her job only a month and a half before our next World Congress and 60th year anniversary celebrations, to be held in Vienna and Bratislava in September. I know that Alison will do an excellent job in leading the IPI secretariat and preparations for the next congress.”

Ms. Bethel McKenzie, who joined IPI in 2009, has over 25 years of experience in journalism, as a reporter, bureau chief, editor and media trainer. From 1995-2000 she was senior assistant city editor at The Boston Globe, supervising a reporting staff that covered City Hall, urban affairs and transportation. In 2000, she joined The Detroit News as features editor, and then became the paper’s Washington, D.C. bureau chief from 2001 to 2006, overseeing coverage of the White House. She joined the Legal Times in Washington, D.C. in 2006 as executive editor, moving on in 2007 to the Nassau Guardian, in the Bahamas, as managing editor.

Before joining IPI, she spent a year in Accra, Ghana, for the Washington, D.C.-based International Center for Journalists, as a Knight International Journalism Fellow, helping Ghanaian journalists improve their reporting skills in the run-up to the country’s 2008 presidential election.

Web: www.freemedia.at

IPI World Congress
Vienna & Bratislava
11 – 14 September 2010
www.ipiworldcongress.com