About Yousef
Yousef Saba has been writing for Reuters since September 2018. He underwent four weeks of intensive training in London as part of the Graduate Editorial Training Programme before being stationed in the Cairo bureau, where he has covered economics and politics in Egypt and Sudan since late September 2018.
Yousef was born in Kuwait in 1994, where he spent his formative years attending a private school following British curricula. Kuwait English School had students from over 60 countries, exposing him to wide diversity from a young age and moulding his worldview.
He moved to the United States for university, earning his undergraduate degrees from Pennsylvania State University in May 2016. He began his university career in the College of Engineering, feeling pressured by societal expectations that he follow a traditional and “safe” career path.
Yousef realised early on that numbers and physics were not his forte, and began to soul search over his future. Because of the societal expectations, he had not given himself room to consider a “non-traditional” career. His reflection pointed him to a passion for news and connecting with others, which led him to declare a double major in journalism and international politics.
He dredged into the fields, throwing himself into a range of journalistic and political activities on campus. He first began interning in the undergraduate student government, as first year students did not have the opportunity to be elected representatives. A year later, he joined Penn State Network Television's PSN News, where he served as a reporter and floor manager for the studio. In January 2015, he was chosen to host the spin-off political roundtable show titled "In My Humble Opinion".
Yousef further delved into reporting via an internship at Daily News Egypt, a newspaper and website based in Cairo, Egypt. The realities of working as a journalist in an atmosphere that is often hostile to the media, activism and dissent were a daunting challenge. Through it, Yousef learned to be persistent and reinforced in his mind the importance of objective, truthful and fair news coverage. In many ways, DNE represents a dwindling existence of true balanced journalism in Egypt. There, he covered topics ranging from human rights to tourism to militant attacks. He broke the news of the Egyptian public prosecutor’s assassination for the website and several of his articles were regularly featured on the front page of the paper.
In the fall semester of 2015, he was selected through a highly competitive process to be a reporter for the Centre County Report. He then cleared a rigid audition and scored a rotation as an anchor for the programme, which is broadcast to the over 150,000 residents of Centre County, Pennsylvania. The biweekly (at the time weekly), half-hour newscast is run by students occupying all editorial and technical positions, with limited guidance from two professors. The show has won several prestigious awards, including a College Emmy Award for a newscast Yousef contributed to.
In the spring semester of 2016, he was chosen as one of 18 students, out of 90 applicants, to travel to Greece for 10 days to produce a special documentary on the refugee crisis. There, he covered refugees’ ordeal on the island of Lesbos and in Athens. It was his first experience as an international reporter and one that entrenched his desire to pursue a career as a foreign correspondent. Working under strict time constraints, in a strange place and in unfamiliar conditions, Yousef persevered and rapidly built connections with people from all walks of life, including some in very vulnerable conditions. He won a Mid-Atlantic Emmy Award for his individual report, “Crisis on Greek Shores: An Arab’s Perspective”, and was jointly awarded another Mid-Atlantic Emmy for the special documentary, "The Journey", which he co-anchored.
During the 2016 U.S. presidential election, Yousef interned at Politico in Arlington, Virginia, an experience which deepened his fascination with political news coverage, and especially furthered his interest in U.S. national politics. From January to June 2017, he served as a communications intern at FWD.us, an immigration reform advocacy group based in Washington, D.C. There, he further refined his deep research abilities and routinely presented a broad range of information in concise, clear terms. He established a newsletter for FWD.us surrogates, maintained databases, and drafted press releases, media advisories and other materials.
He moved back to Cairo, Egypt in the summer of 2017. In a severely restricted media landscape, his job options were scarce. He had a brief stint as a writer for culture website CairoScene, after which he returned to Daily News Egypt in November 2017. There, he served as chief copy editor, navigating and leading a newsroom under pressure and facing mounting obstacles.
The following September, he travelled to London to begin the Reuters Graduate Editorial Training Programme.