A FERMANAGH woman is making an exciting return to her roots as she steps into the role of BBC district reporter for Fermanagh.
With a passion for storytelling and a deep connection to the local community, Elaine Mitchell is poised to bring fresh perspectives and insights to the regions news landscape.
Elaine’s journey back home not only marks a significant career milestone, but also highlights the importance of local voices in shaping the narrative in Fermanagh.
“I have been 22 years in the BBC this year. I have worked all around the house in the BBC. I have worked over in production, I have done the journalism side of things, I have done the technical side of things and I spent eight years doing the agriculture reporter job where I was on BBC Radio Ulster six days a week giving out all the farming news,” Elaine told the ‘Herald.
“I then took an opportunity to do the North East district job for a year and as I was wrapping up on that Julian [Fowler] was leaving so the district report in Fermanagh job came up. I jumped at the opportunity and I am delighted to be taking it up.”
The BBC reporter is excited about moving home to Fermanagh and representing the farming community.
“I loved doing the farming news. It is our biggest industry by far and there is so many stories to cover there, so it absolutely something I will be doing. If anybody has anything that they think the BBC should be covering just come to me and we will do what we can,” she said.
Elaine is also looking forward to meeting and building connections with the people of Fermanagh.
“I do know my way pretty well around Fermanagh so I am looking forward to getting out and about to all the areas, meeting loads of people that I know and people I don’t, building good contacts and hopefully telling lovely stories about Fermanagh,” she explained.
“You will never have a quick chat with a Fermanagh person and I am very used to that. I love meeting and chatting to people, I just hope that people do come up to me and chat away because that is how you find stories by talking to people and finding out the stories that people are interested in.”
Not only is Elaine excited to meet the local people, she is eager to reclaim her Fermanagh accent.
“My husband says that he thinks whenever I’m back I am going to go sliding back into my Fermanagh accent. He thinks I’ve had the corners knocked off since I have been in Belfast for the last 20 years, so I am looking forward to getting my full-on Fermanagh accent back again,” added Elaine.
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