The 2018 Awards, which would be held on the theme: “Marketing – a Catalyst for Driving Ghana beyond Aid,” is slated for Friday, September 28 in Accra. Launching the awards, Mr Kojo Mattah, the National President of CIMG said the theme for the year was strategically chosen to support the government’s goal of moving Ghana out of an aid-dependent economy to self-sufficient and prosperous nation.

He said the government’s bold decision would result in building a nation that was able to provide the basic necessities for its people without recourse to external support from donor agencies and governments in the developed world.  He noted that ‘Ghana beyond Aid’ was a rallying cry and a call to duty for all citizens of the country, both at home and elsewhere in the Diaspora, to mobilise the synergy of the varied abilities and experiences for the country’s development.

Mr Mattah said: “The Ghana beyond Aid rallying cry, is a call on research institutions, academia, captains of industry, investors, individuals and professional bodies to pool our expertise, to support the government’s effort at industrialising and expanding the economic frontiers of this country”.   

He added that the call was also for a complete and immediate paradigm shift from mere slogans from officialdom, to a pragmatic, result-oriented approach to resolving the myriad of economic challenges facing the county.He said the CIMG was conscious of the explosive results the nation could achieve if all citizens should buy into the rallying cry and call of moving the country beyond aid, adding that, “there is not a single model country in the world that has become economically transformed through the receipt of donor aid and by dictates of the Bretton Wood Institutions”.

Mr Mattah indicated that over the years, the awards had inspired many industry leaders to refocus their organisations into more marketing oriented companies, adding that the results had been refreshing.

On his part, Mr Daniel Kasser Tee, the Vice President of CIMG, who doubles as the Chairman of the awards planning and selection committee said the award covered six major competitive areas, which were hall of fame, personalities, media/marcoms organisations, business organisations, product and not-for-profit organisations.

He added that, “the non-competitive is the CIMG President’s Special awards which are given to a noticeable female and male achiever in any endeavour of life that contributes to national progress”. On the CIMG hall of fame, he said companies who had won awards in a category for three consecutive times were inducted into the CIMG hall of fame on the fourth win and this year, three organisations would have to justify their continuous stay in the CIMG hall of fame.

Speaking on the process of selecting award winners, Mr Kasser Tee said, would be vigorous, and that has started with corporate entities filling out corporate diaries for their activities within their award areas for the year under consideration.He said adverts were then placed electronically, in the press and letters sent out to request for nomination of candidates for the categories after which the nominated candidates were asked to provide complete a detailed questionnaire to justify why they should be the preferred choice.

He said the completed questionnaires and supporting schedules as well as evidences were reviewed with the support of focus groups, drawn from captains of industry and academia, and guided by the Institute’s research partners.

This year, Nielsen and Media Monitoring Services would play the role of research partners as noted by Mr Kasser Tee, adding that, the partners would compile the results of the assessment for final presentation to the governing council of the CIMG.

He also said the Executive Council of the Institute reserved the right not to award a category, especially if none of the nominations meets the basic set standards of the awards.