THE Press Association of Jamaica (PAJ) will honour two media men for outstanding contribution to journalism in Jamaica, during the National Journalism Week Lyme this Thursday at the PAJ headquarters in St Andrew.

Franklyn Joseph-Marie St Juste, who has left an indelible imprint on film production, archiving and training in Jamaica, and veteran newspaperman Desmond Allen, the founding editor of the Jamaica Observer and former president of the PAJ, will be recognised by their peers for yeoman service to the profession.

St Juste, affectionately called “Chappie”, is a Trinidad-born naturalised Jamaican who has worked in film and photography for the past 54 years. His name and talent have been associated with iconic works including: The Harder They Come, the feature-length film starring Jimmy Cliff; Children of Babylon, featuring Tobi and Leonie Forbes; Time of Fury, a docudrama about several high points of Jamaican history; Marcus Garvey – Toward Black Nationhood, about Jamaica’s first the national hero; and Land of My Birth, the documentary on the emerging political powerhouse which was Michael Manley.

St Juste joined the state-run Jamaica Information Service as senior director/cameraman in 1958 and is especially known for his work as senior lecturer in film and television production at the Caribbean Institute of Media and Communication (Carimac), University of the West Indies, and director of production at the Creative Production & Training Centre. He is currently a visiting lecturer in the cinematography undergraduate film programme at the UWI St Augustine, Trinidad and Tobago.

He received his training in film production at the National Film Board of Canada; in filming for television and TV production techniques at the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), and in broadcast media management at Deutche Welle, Germany.

Allen who is currently the executive editor – operations at the Observer, is in his 40th year as a journalist, having started his career as a trainee reporter at The Gleaner on October 1, 1973.

He has worked as Kingston correspondent for the Rome-based Inter Press Service Third World News Agency (IPS) and the Madrid-based Spanish News Agency (EFE); chief reporter for the now defunct Jamaica Daily News; communications director for the International Reggae Music Awards in Chicago, United States; editor of the St Catherine Reporter and editor-in-chief of Jampress, the national news agency.

Allen left Jampress in 1992 to become founding editor of the nascent Observer, the island’s fourth daily newspaper, leaving there after four years to rejoin Jampress as executive director. When the news agency was merged with the JIS, he became director of news and information. During his stint with the JIS he served as chief media liaison officer for major visits by heads of state and governments and was lauded by The Queen.

Allen received many accolades for his work in print, including News Story of the Year in 1981 and 1983 in the PAJ Nationalism Journalism Awards and the Jamaica Broilers Fairplay Award in 2005 for his personality profile series “The Desmond Allen Interviews” published in the Sunday Observer; as well as for The Spike, a training and self-critical column for journalists, which was published simultaneously in The Gleaner and the Sunday Herald newspapers.

He was educated at Cornwall College and the School of Journalism, University of Strasbourg, France.

National Journalism Week 2012 continues today with a joint PAJ/ National Integrity Action Forum against corruption at the Knutsford Court Hotel, St Andrew, starting at 8:00 am. Tomorrow veteran journalists will be celebrated at lunch hosted by J Wray & Nephew, Spanish Town Road. The Lyme begins at 6:00 pm on Thursday at the PAJ headquarters, 5 East Avenue, St Andrew.

The Week which began on Sunday at the Kencot Christian Fellowship and was followed by the Sagicor-sponsored President’s Brunch on the Kingston Waterfront, will climax Friday evening with the National Journalism Awards, beginning at 7:00 pm at the Jamaica Pegasus Hotel in New Kingston.