By Staff Writer
A week after the Zzina awards ceremony, the number of views has almost doubled as Ugandan music lovers from all over the world continue to watch the awarding ceremony that appreciates Ugandan music. For the first time ever, the seventh edition of the awards were held online due to the social distancing guideline that prohibits public gatherings as a way of preventing the spread of the deadly coronavirus.
Despite the grim situation occasioned by the pandemic, Ugandans cast their worries aside and took to the various online platforms to enjoy a spirited and entertaining award ceremony that spanned 3 hours and forty minutes of nothing but pure fun and entertainment.
The show had 22,000 live viewers across all the platforms on which it was broadcasted live, such as; the MTN, Talent Africa and Galaxy FM facebook pages. By press time, the show had 400,000 views.
While announcing the artiste of the year, Sen Somdev, the MTN Uganda Chief Marketing Officer said that MTN was delighted to put a smile on Ugandans faces during these hard times as the world battles the coronavirus pandemic.
“We are trying to keep people happy in these troubled times. So any contribution that we can make to keep the smiles going makes us feel proud so we are here to sponsor people’s smiles through music,” said Somdev before announcing Eddy Kenzo as the artiste of the year.
Dr Innocent Nahabwe, the proprietor of Galaxy FM the radio station that hosts the annual music awards appreciated MTN for supporting the Ugandan music industry over the years.
“This is the second year that they have directly sponsored the Zzina awards. These awards are all about the love of Ugandan music and we appreciate our relationship with MTN on this,” Nahabwe said.
He noted that as the main sponsors of the awards ceremony, MTN Uganda took care of the production, shooting and videography to ensure that Ugandan music fans enjoy the online awards show.
“A lot of artistes and fans are very happy with the awards and although they were online, as lovers and supporters of Ugandan music, we achieved what we set out to achieve and even more,” Nahabwe said.
While announcing the Luga flow artiste of the year who happened to be Fefe Busi, Jimmy Ssempuuma the marketing manager central region at MTN Uganda mentioned MTN’s support towards music and specifically rap music with MTN Pulse Rap battles an initiative which was concluded early this year as well as sponsoring the HipHop awards for the last three years, among many other music- related initiatives.
