Yinka Adeparusi is a photojournalist who uses his camera lens not only to record the "what," but the "why" of a scene as well. He now works for the National Mirror newspaper in Lagos after time spent as a trainee reporter and photojournalist at two other Nigerian publications, The Punch and New Age. Adeparusi graduated from the prestigious Lagos State University School of Communication, achieving double honors in both photojournalism and cinematography.

The winner of multiple awards for his work, Adeparusi feels especially drawn to reporting human rights issues through powerful images. He hopes his work exposes the problems confronting his immediate environment and Nigerian society in general.

In his winning photograph, Adeparusi captured an image of several children about to paddle home from school in Makoko, the slum where they live which is raised on stilts over Lagos Lagoon. Education is often described as one of the most powerful weapons against poverty. But in the Makoko floating slum, the poorest settlement in all of Nigeria, many children have little hope of ever seeing the inside of a classroom. These kids are a few of the lucky ones.

Link to paper: http://nationalmirroronline.net/new/