The globally-anticipated Nominees List for the 5th All Africa Music
Awards, AFRIMA, has been unveiled by the African Union Commission, AUC,
and the International Jury of AFRIMA, during a World Media announcement
held on Tuesday, August 14, 2018, at the Eko Hotels & Suites, Victoria
Island, Lagos.

The released nominees list covers the five Regional Categories divided
into Female and Male categories as follows: Best Female Artiste in Central
Africa; Best Male Artiste in Central Africa; Best Female Artiste in
Eastern Africa; Best Male Artiste in Eastern Africa; Best Female Artiste
in Northern Africa; Best Male Artiste in Northern Africa; Best Female
Artiste in Southern Africa; Best Male Artiste in Southern Africa; Best
Female Artiste in Western Africa and Best Male Artiste in Western Africa.

A total of 79 songs made it to the Regional nominees list.
Cameroon takes up four of the eight spots in the category for Best Female
Artiste in Central Africa, followed by DRC (2), and Angola (2). In the
category for Best Male Artiste in Central Africa, Democratic Republic of
Congo (DRC) takes the lead with five spots followed by Cameroon 2 and Chad
1.

From Eastern Africa, the female category Kenya holds three spots while
Uganda takes 2 with Ethiopia, Rwanda and Tanzania occupying one nomination
slot respectively. In the male category, Kenya and Tanzania maintain three
nominations each Tanzania ties with Ethiopia & Tanzania registering one
nomination apiece.

The Algerian female artistes have a lead ahead of their male counterparts
as they took four out of the six spots in the category for Best Female
Artiste in Northern Africa, with Tunisia and Egypt holding one spot each.
The Male category has Moroccan artistes occupying four of the eight spots,
Algeria 2, Egypt and Tunisia earning one nomination each.

The Southern African region is dominated by South African artistes both in
the male and female categories, with a total of nine spots, followed by
Zimbabwe- 3, while Swaziland, Namibia, Malawi, and Zimbabwe take 1 spot
each.

The Western region Male category is having great contenders between
Nigeria and Ghana. Holding up 4 spots is Nigeria, closely followed by
Ghana (3), while Guinea and Cape Verde hold 1 spot each. The Best Female
Artiste in the Western region has Nigeria and Ghana in a tie of 2 spots
respectively, with Benin (1), Mali (1), Senegal (1), and Cote d’Ivoire
(1).

While providing insights into the process by which the entries were
reviewed and graded, the spokesperson for the International Jury of AFRIMA
and the Programme Director, Cameroon TV and Radio, CRTV, Mr. Robert
Ekukole (representing Eastern Africa) explained that tasked with the
responsibility of carefully and mindfully sieving through 8,009 entries
submitted by African music professionals within the awards validity period
of August 1, 2017 to August 1, 2018, “the jury members have no choice but
to be thorough and deliberate about their work because we will be doing
artistes and creators of these works a great injustice if we don’t accord
them the review their works deserves”,
“The AFRIMA Nominees list we arrived at reflects and represents the
top-notch creative expressions of music talents and professionals within
the relevant regions and validity period. However, we also have a
challenge where some artistes failed to enter for the awards and as such
missed the opportunity to be evaluated or possibly nominated for AFRIMA”.

The AFRIMA adjudication is carried out electronically via the proprietary
AFRIMA Adjudication Software, which was designed by AFRIMA in 2014, has
been deployed for use since the 2015 annual adjudication process.

When public voting opens on the AFRIMA website on Monday, August 27, both
continental and regional nominees in the 38 AFRIMA award categories will
compete against one another for the coveted 23.9 carat gold-plated AFRIMA
Trophy. Nominees will now depend on votes from their fans and followers
spread across the globe to vote for their songs in an open voting process
via the AFRIMA website, www.afrima.org

From August 7, when the annual adjudication process began, the 13-man
AFRIMA Jury worked painstakingly and tirelessly in assessing and grading
the submitted entries which was an astronomical increase of 63% against
the 2017 entries received by AFRIMA.

Speaking on the parameters considered by the Jury during the adjudication
process, Jury member representing Diaspora (North America), Hadja Kobélé
Keita, a music executive with work experience in international music
companies like Universal Music Africa and Island Africa, reiterated the
AFRIMA objective, which is about rewarding and promoting talents and
creativity in Africa.
“AFRIMA has specific guidelines they follow in considering musical works
that are nominated yearly, besides these guidelines, we also look out for
the quality of works submitted. An artiste’s popularity will not influence
the Jury’s verdict, just because an artiste has 100 million views on
Youtube does not guarantee making the list, unless such works are produced
with high quality and represent the continent properly. Other guidelines
the Jury considers are the current trends and market position”, she
further explains.

The AFRIMA’s open voting process will occur via the AFRIMA website,
www.afrima.org. Music lovers will be empowered to decide which
artiste/song emerges winners of the 23.9 carat gold-plated AFRIMA trophy.

The 5th AFRIMA is scheduled to hold in November 2018, other activities
scheduled for the main awards events is the Africa Music Business
Roundtable, a combination of musical conference and trade expo where
stakeholders in the creative and arts industry come together to discuss
the business of music in Africa, also the AFRIMA Music Village, a music
concert and cultural festival that accommodates over 40,000 music lovers
across the continent who witness live performances from their favourite
African artistes.