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Harare Bureau
THIS year’s Annual Sport Awards (ANSA) ceremony which had been set for next month in Harare has been moved to next year due to several reasons among them the prevailing economic conditions and the need to rebrand the event.

The awards were set for December 18 in Harare.

The nomination process was already underway as the Sports Commission had opened entries for nominees and was scheduled to close on November 21.

However, in a statement released yesterday, Sports Commission director-general, Prince Mupazviriho said the ceremony has been moved to next year in March.

“The Annual National Sport Awards (ANSA) ceremony, which had been scheduled to take place on 18 December, 2018, in Harare has been deferred to a later date in March 2019. This has been necessitated by the following reasons:

– The current prevailing economic conditions are not favourable to host such awards due to costs escalation.

– The need to rebrand ANSA

– Zimbabwe’s participation in the African Union Sports Council Region 5 Youth Games set to be held in December and the need to also take into account some of the athletes and officials who are still competing at various levels throughout the world.

“The above postponement is meant to ensure improvement in the quality of the awards and to ensure that the athletes and officials who would have
excelled derive maximum benefit from them.

“National sports associations are therefore advised to continue tracking the performances of their athletes and or teams and submit the necessary nominations to the Sports and Recreation Commission,” read part of the statement.

Meanwhile, the Sports Commission and Bindura University of Science Education Sports Academy will host the second national women in sport conference this Friday in Harare.

The conference will run under the theme, “Let them lead and tell their story.”

The objective of the conference is to mentor women on a number of topical issues affecting women in sport and recreation as well as to create networking opportunities for women in sport and recreation.

It will also provide a platform to stimulate and sustain development for women through sport and recreation.

Sports Commission corporate communications officer, Tirivashe Nheweyembwa, said the conference is also open to men.

“While the major target group is the women, we are not closing the door on the men because it is our firm belief that for sporting programmes to succeed at any level men and women need each other. It is therefore important for the men to also be in attendance.

“This is not one of those ordinary conferences, things are going to be done differently in that there are going to be plenary sessions during the course of the conference and the presenters will be asked questions by the delegates and at the end of it concrete resolutions will be made which will be followed through various programmes”, said Nheweyembwa.

Some of the presenters at the conference include veteran sports administrator, Angela Nyaundi, who will present on advocacy in sport while Judith Siziba will talk about participation of female students in Zimbabwe university sport.

There will also be a presentation from Lysias Charumbira on the perceived brand equity of women in sport in Zimbabwe among other topics.