{"id":66171,"date":"2016-03-17T13:01:39","date_gmt":"2016-03-17T11:01:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/social-issues-put-under-the-spotlight-from-new-african-blogger-awards-categories\/"},"modified":"2016-03-17T13:01:39","modified_gmt":"2016-03-17T11:01:39","slug":"social-issues-put-under-the-spotlight-from-new-african-blogger-awards-categories","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/social-issues-put-under-the-spotlight-from-new-african-blogger-awards-categories\/","title":{"rendered":"Social Issues Put Under the Spotlight from New African Blogger Awards Categories"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span dir=\"ltr\"> JOHANNESBURG, South Africa, March 17, 2016\/APO (African Press Organization)\/ &#8212; <\/span><\/p>\n<p>The third annual <a href=\"http:\/\/www.africanbloggerawards.com\/the-2015-african-blogger-awards-open-for-entries\/\">African Blogger Awards<\/a> competition (<a href=\"http:\/\/www.apo.af\/mmhmjb\">http:\/\/www.APO.af\/mmhmjb<\/a>) that opened for entries in mid-February has announced three new categories for social and digital influencers across the African continent.<\/p>\n<p \/>\n<p \/>\n<p>The new categories \u2013 opened in association with the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.gatesfoundation.org\/\">Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation<\/a> (<a href=\"http:\/\/www.gatesfoundation.org\/\">http:\/\/www.GatesFoundation.org<\/a>) \u2013 aim to raise awareness of social issues that affect the continent. The new categories are:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Women and Girls\u2019 Empowerment<\/li>\n<li>Public Health<\/li>\n<li>Social Issues and Active Citizenship<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p \/>\n<p>The three new categories will raise awareness of bloggers, YouTubers, Instagrammers, Facebook and Twitter account holders who are passionate about reporting stories about women and girls\u2019 empowerment, public health and social issues. For the first time, they have the opportunity to gain recognition for the essential work they do in highlighting important issues.<\/p>\n<p \/>\n<p>\u201cInfluencers are story tellers as much as journalists are, and often have access to stories that are missed in the mainstream media because of geographical limitations or staffing constraints in big media,\u201d says Murray Legg, co-founder of the African Blogger Awards. \u201cThey are able to spread news about critical issues to the audiences that they\u2019ve built. The three new categories recognise the importance of their reporting.\u201d<\/p>\n<p \/>\n<p>The Gates Foundation is the world\u2019s largest privately funded philanthropic organisation, and is committed to reducing inequity around the world. Encouraging and promoting grassroots stories about development issues are key to that work.<\/p>\n<p \/>\n<p>\u201cWe are pleased to partner with the African Blogger Awards this year in promoting some of the most important issues facing Africans today,\u201d says Dr Ayo Ajayi, Africa Director for the Gates Foundation. \u201cWe believe that bloggers and social media influencers play an important role in highlighting the great successes and continuing challenges facing African development. We look forward to engaging more with these bloggers and influencers in our work in the future.\u201d<\/p>\n<p \/>\n<p>Entries for the awards close on <strong>19<\/strong> <strong>April 2016<\/strong> at midnight GMT+2, and results will be announced on <strong>3 June 2016<\/strong> in an online ceremony.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>JOHANNESBURG, South Africa, March 17, 2016\/APO (African Press Organization)\/ &#8212; The third annual African Blogger Awards competition (http:\/\/www.APO.af\/mmhmjb) that opened for entries in mid-February has announced three new categories for social and digital influencers across the African continent. The new categories \u2013 opened in association with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (http:\/\/www.GatesFoundation.org) \u2013 aim [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4584],"tags":[428,4585,830],"class_list":{"0":"post-66171","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-africa-news-2","7":"tag-africa","8":"tag-apo","9":"tag-news","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66171","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=66171"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66171\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=66171"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=66171"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=66171"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}