Voting for Kuza ICT Awards to start on April 22

Communications Authority Director General David Mugonyi has announced that voting for Kuza awards will take place from April 22 to May 22.

He said the Authority initiated the Kuza Broadcasting Awards about seven years ago to recognise excellence in the subsector.

"The voting period will run from 22 April to 22th May 2024, after which a jury will retreat to assess the outcome and list of final winners," he said.

He made the remarks on Wednesday during the launch of ICT Week and the Kuza ICT awards at the Sarova Stanley hotel in Nairobi. 

Mugonyi said after careful reflection and invaluable feedback from the industry, they realised they could add more value to the two events by merging them and expanding the Awards to incorporate the entire ICT sector.

"The Awards shall now be called The Kuza ICT Awards," Mugonyi said. 

"This union allows us to energise ICT Week, create broad-based industry awards and benefit from the synergies of having an all-inclusive event."

Under this new arrangement, Mugonyi said ICT Week, 2024, will culminate in the first edition of the Kuza ICT Awards.

He said the expansion broadens the scope of the Awards to recognise excellence across the various regulated services in the ICT sector.

"Kuza means to ‘nurture’ which is exactly what we hope to achieve," he said. 

Mugonyi said the ICT theme for 2024 ,“Innovation for a Sustainable Digital Future”, is a challenge to the ICT sector to own its leading role in the social and economic transformation of Kenya.

"ICT Week and the Kuza ICT Awards are pivotal channels for powering the Digital and Creative Economy pillars of government’s Bottom-up Economic Transformation Agenda," he said. 

Mugonyi said ICT Week is a platform designed to maximise the  Authority’s public engagement with the ICT sector.

"The ICT Week has allowed us to improve relationships with sector players, increase collaboration and hasten innovation, all of which help to move this important sector and the country’s socio-economic agenda forward," he said. 

The 2024 ICT Week will run for two days and will feature discussions on diverse emerging issues in the ICT sector.

On the third day, the Authority will host the Kuza ICT Awards, which will include other sectors such as Telecommunications, Postal and Courier Services.

ICT Week, 2024 will take place from  June 5 to 6, 2024 with the Kuza ICT Awards on June 7, 2024.

Voting for 2024 Kuza ICT Awards will be across nine categories:

1) Broadcasting Award

2) Postal and Courier Award

3) Telecommunications Award

4) Green ICT Award

5) Cyber Security Excellence Award

6) Child Online Protection and Safety Award

7) Women in Tech Award

8) Lifetime Achievement Award

9) People’s Choice Award

Kenyans can vote through SMS short code 15601 at no cost as well as online at www.kuzaawards.co.ke.