THE fifth edition of the Roil Bulawayo Arts Awards are a week away.
In a short space of five years the awards have become Bulawayo’s never-to-miss glamorous event attracting the who is who in the arts and other sectors.
This edition will see 37 awards given across various disciplines including music, dance, theatre, media, spoken word and others. The biggest award is the newly introduced People’s Choice Award.
That the awards have grown in leaps and bounds and in the process unearthed and celebrated great local talent that would have otherwise gone unnoticed is testimony to the impact of the project.
The awards have been a game changer.
From inception Roil Bulawayo Arts Awards were premised on Bulawayo standing up and celebrating its own sons and daughters in the arts sector.
Raisedon Baya
The inspiration was from a Chinua Achebe quote: “The lizard that jumped from the high iroko tree to the ground said he would praise himself if no one else did.” And that is exactly what happened. Bulawayo stood up and the rest was history.
It is important to say from the beginning the desire was to acknowledge and celebrate Bulawayo as a “cooking” pot of talent. From inception the RoilBAA have been about Bulawayo and its talent.
Of course the partnership with United Refineries Limited through their Roil brand smoothened the journey and made a lot things easy and possible. United Refineries Limited is the title sponsors of the awards but has been generous enough to allow the awards to look for extra support from other supporters.
The awards are Bulawayo and any corporates, especially those operating within Bulawayo are welcome to partner.
The years 2020 and 2021 have not been easy to many people. The global Covid-19 pandemic affected everything, the arts included.
In fact the arts were more affected than most sectors, especially in Zimbabwe. With the closing of the sector for more than 18 months it meant more than half of artistes were not producing and performing. This affected their livelihoods in so many ways. So while artistes need their skills to keep raising hope, comforting the grieving and healing the sick and affected they also need comforting, healing and a little cheering.
Saimon Mambazo Phiri
In 2020 United Refineries Limited came through and Bulawayo Art Awards happened. Through the generous sponsorship of United Refineries Limited the awards were also able to offer some relief groceries to past winners as a way of trying to cushion artistes from the heavy blow of the pandemic.
We are glad that the fifth edition shows serious growth potential.
Already the awards have three big events. We have split them into three award ceremonies. The first event covers theatre and spoken word, the second event covers fashion and literature and then the main event.
We have also seen several partners coming on board. To the organisers this is obviously a testimony of their trust in the brand. But most importantly, as the awards, try to make serious impact on some of the winners’ lives this year we introduced the People’s Choice Award. This is now the biggest award as it carries the biggest prize in the form of a stand and building material.
While the awards are about celebrating artistic excellence, we also seek to change, where we can, the lives of fellow artistes.
We take this opportunity to thank United Refineries Limited for believing in this project since day one. We also would like to thank all partners that have come through before and came through this year. It is because of these partnerships that the project is the big success it is.
The Bulawayo Arts Awards are run as a trust. The awards trustees are Nkululeko Nkala, Saimon Mambazo Phiri and Raisedon Baya.