The Ashanti Regional chapter of the Ghana Journalists Association (GJA) has launched the 2025 Ashanti GJA Excellence Awards in Kumasi.
The Awards are open to all media practitioners within in the region, with entries of works published or broadcast from January 1 to December 31, 2025.
The two categories are Division One: Best in Sports, Education, Arts and Entertainment, Business and Economy, Environmental Science, Climate Change, Crime and Court. Division Two: Best Feature, Columnist and Feature Article.
A special award, christened “the Kofi Badu Award”, in honour of the Chief of Staff of Otumfuo Osei Tutu II, the Asantehene, has been instituted to honour veteran and retired journalists, and the ultimate award “Ashanti Region Journalist of the Year”.
The Vetting Committee of the Awards is made up of Sebastian Richie Freiku, Deputy Editor of The Chronicle Newspaper; John Yeboah, GBC/TV; Akua Asieduwaa, Oyerepa TV and Radio; and Dr. Atta Poku.
No contestant can submit more than two entries per category and that submission of entries began on September 9, 2026, with the Awards scheduled to take place in the first week of October.
Speaking at the launch, the Ashanti Regional Chairman of GJA, Kofi Adu Domfeh, disclosed that the process of getting more journalists registered was below expectation due to some reform process at the national level, hence the application for this year’s awards will be open to all media professionals in the region irrespective of their GJA membership status.
Mr. Domfeh disclosed that to ensure that media professionals in the region have a dedicated space to undertake activities that promote media excellence, the Ashanti Press Centre project remains on course, noting that via the support of Otumfuo Osei Tutu II, GJA has secured a space for this project, with the Regional Lands Commission assisting with the requisite documentation to enable GJA to commence work on the project.
He acknowledged that Fidelity Bank and Access Bank have already advanced financial support to help GJA turn this dream into reality, expressing gratitude to both banks for their commitment to the development of the media in the Ashanti region.
He disclosed that capacity-building programmes for members is a major goal for executives, and therefore have not relented in this drive, revealing that within the past year, they facilitated and connected several journalists to various training opportunities, particularly with the support from Reporters Without Borders Germany and through the support of Erastus Asare Donkor.
He assured that executives of Ashanti GJA remain committed to delivering on their mandates through “transparency, accountability and collective responsibility”.
The Regional Chair further appealed to corporate communities in the region to support the Awards, towards promoting quality journalism and professional media practice, noting that currently journalism is at the crossroads in this era of deepfake, misinformation, disinformation and the rapid advancement of artificial intelligence.
The Regional Chair urged media practitioners to let critical verification, accuracy, fairness and balanced reporting to remain at the heart of what they do, stressing that their professionalism is what would make the “difference.”
According to him, the work done by journalists is what every community needs to thrive, hence every community deserves the best of journalism and can be achieved when the GJA builds the right partnerships and receive the necessary financial and institutional support to deliver on this shared vision.
From Oswald P. Freiku, Kumasi
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