The International Committee of All Africa Music Awards (AFRIMA), in partnership with the African Union Commission (AUC) has announced that it received a total of 9,076 entries for possible nominations at the awards ceremony.
The 2022 entry sets a new record for the highest entries since the award was created in 2014 to celebrate African music.
Chinonso Ihekire, Communications Manager, AFRIMA, disclosed in a statement that the figure, which was garnered from entertainers across all Five regions on the continent as well as Europe and North America, represented a 2.2 percentage increase from the 8,880 entries recorded in the 2021 edition. The entries submission began on Monday, May 30 and closed by midnight on Friday, August 5.
Speaking on the record-breaking entries, AFRIMA’s Juror representing the diaspora (North America) Hadja Kobele said: “This development is a clear indicator that AFRIMA is the pinnacle of African music globally, and Africans value the importance of celebrating themselves, as culture remains one of our strongest tools for global unification, as well as economic growth.”
Interestingly, from the array, the Eastern African region led the trail with 2,890 entries, representing 31.8 percent; while the West African region followed closely with 2,863 entries, representing 31.5 percent; and the Southern African region joined in the race with 1,659 entries, representing 18.2 percent; while Central Africa comes fourth with 941 entries, representing 10.3 percent; complementing the 373 entries from Northern African entertainers who represented 3.8 percent, while the remaining 349 entries from the diaspora represented 4.1 percent of all total submissions.
In line with the AFRIMA 2022 calendar, a 13-member jury is expected to arrive in Lagos, Nigeria, on Thursday, August 11, for an 8-day adjudication process that would select the nominees across all existing categories. The jury is composed of seasoned experts across all five regions in the African music industry, as well as the diaspora, specifically in North America and Europe.
A world media announcement of the nominees will take place on Monday, August 22, 2022, to publicly unveil the nominees. A week after, on Monday, August 29, 2022, the AFRIMA Voters Academy, as well as music fans and followers around the globe will begin to participate in the public voting process, which will be held on the AFRIMA website www.afrima.org.
