More than 30 years after the Beijing Platform for Action, the fight for gender equality in the Pacific remains urgent.

Say It Loud was created to amplify the voices of Pacific women and girls through the power of creative expression — spoken word, poetry, and song.

In celebrating IWD 2026, this competition affirms that advancing gender equality is not only a policy imperative, but a cultural and collective act of resilience.

To ensure fairness, integrity and transparency, all submissions were carefully reviewed through a structured process:

•  All entries were anonymised and assigned a number — names and identifying details were removed prior to assessment.
• Where potential conflicts of interest were identified (including video submissions), entries were reviewed only by independent judges and management.
•  A first round of assessment shortlisted entries based on the key judging criteria.
• The highest-scoring submissions were then reviewed by a regional judging panel, with representation from Fiji 🇫🇯, Samoa 🇼🇸, Solomon Islands 🇸🇧 and Kiribati 🇰🇮.

This process ensured that every entry was judged fairly, consistently, and on its merit.

Thank you to all who submitted and to our regional judges for their time, care and commitment.

Link to Call out here