#InTheSpotlight Moegsien Williams - Editor-in-chief of 24-hour TV channel, ANN7.

Patron of The Journalist Moegsien Williams is a consummate newspaperman. Starting as a cadet at the Cape Argus in 1977, he has risen through the ranks to the position of editor of The Cape Times, the Pretoria News, The Star, the Saturday Star and the New Age. He is presently editor-in-chief of the 24-hour TV channel, ANN7. He had the privilege of working as night editor at the Sowetan and then Managing Editor under the illustrious editorship of Aggrey Klaaste. He has been consistently committed to building organisations within the profession. He was a founder member of the Media Workers Association of South Africa (MWASA) as well as the community newspaper, Grassroots. Like many journalists working in the eighties, he spent a lengthy spell in solitary confinement in 1985. When the country became a democracy in 1994, he was elected to the board of the Vienna-based International Press Institute (IPI) and in 1996 was a founder member and second chairperson of the SA National Editors Forum (SANEF). In 1998 he was elected as chairperson of the IPI, representing more than 1,300 editors and publishers worldwide.Moegsien Williams is considered to be one of South Africa's leading editors with almost 40 years of experience on various print titles, both daily and weekly.He is the former editor-in-chief of Independent Newspapers Gauteng, which includes The Star and Pretoria News, and was the editorial director of the Independent Newspapers group.He was editor of The Star and Saturday Star until March this year.He previously edited the Independent's Cape Town titles, the Cape Times, the Cape Argus and Weekend Argus, and the Pretoria News - another Independent title in Gauteng. Prior to that, he was editor of South, an independent weekly which played a key media role in the anti-apartheid struggle in the eighties.He was also the managing editor of the Sowetan.He is a previous chairperson and board member of the Vienna-based International Press Institute (1998-2000). He was a founder member of the SA National Editors' Forum and served as its chairperson in 1997/8.