The 20th Ghana Journalists Association (GJA) Awards has been launched with a call on GJA members throughout the country to submit their entries.
The entries one in five categories, with more than 40 awards up for grabs, by deserving journalists.
The ceremony, which is slated for August 15 at the Banquet Hall, State House, Accra, will be held on the theme, ’Ghana in search of reliable energy to power development: the role of the media’.
Speaking at the launch on Friday the President of GJA, Roland Affail Monney, said the theme was chosen to acknowledge that the country was facing energy crisis.
“Although the crisis can be termed perennial, this time round, it has assumed an unbearable dimension: industrial and domestic consumers are suffering erratic, inadequate and unreliable power,” he said
Mr Monney said the awards ceremony was part of the association’s efforts to promote high journalistic standard and to reward members who had excelled in their work.
“GJA members who believe their works in 2014 contributed to the promotion of excellence in journalism are eligible and indeed encouraged to contest,” he said and added that entries would be received in all categories except for Journalist of the Year and the Komla Dumor Most Promising Young Journalist.
Mr Monney explained that “the GJA has decided that no contestant should submit entries for more than two categories. This is partly to encourage specialization and also to avoid the situation where there is the temptation to believe that the more awards a contestant wins makes that person the obvious choice for either Journalist of the Year or the Most Promising Young Journalist”.
According to him, that perception is untenable because in some instances, a journalist may have just presented one story or entery earn him or her the topmost award because of the journalistic ingredients displayed, including the impact it makes on development and the society.
The GJA president said the public would be engaged in selecting this year’s Journalist of the Year and the Most Promising Young Journalist, and added that “as part of that effort, the GJA will send letters to selected members of the public in all the regions, who are known to be media watchers and request them to nominate their choice”.
He said the name of the media watchers would not be made public to prevent them from being influenced.
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