COVID-19: Bulawayo Arts Awards postponed to November

“Works from 31 October 2020 to 1 August 2021 are eligible for nomination. Artists can self-nominate and can also be nominated by fans,” the awards’ spokesperson, Nkululeko Nkala, said.

Nkala added that the awards platform would use the extra time to find more strategic partners and receive more nominations and entries from artists.

“After consultation with the sponsors, we also felt we needed more time to be able to come up with an award or awards that could greatly impact on a few winners. We therefore needed more time to see this to fruition. We’ll also use this time to engage more partners, and hopefully the extension will birth more creative works before we open for nominations and submissions.”

The Zimbabwean government at the weekend announced that it would reintroduce lockdown measures on 14 June to contain rising coronavirus cases in the country.

Announcing the news on national television, Vice-President Constantino Chiwenga said complacency had resulted in a spike in COVID-19 cases.

“Our vaccination against in COVID-19 is going on very well,” he said. “The country is however experiencing a surge in cases. The last seven days has seen 596 new cases and 26 deaths, as compared to the same period in May last year where we had 132 cases and six deaths.”