by Queenin Masuabi | Apr 20, 2015 | Featured 1, News
Wits campus radio station VowFM has continued their winning streak by taking five awards at the annual MTN Radio Awards held at the Sandton Convention Centre on Saturday evening.
HEAR IT, FEEL IT, LIVE IT: MTN Radio Award winners Felicity Mdhuli and Mpumi Mlambo with their award. Photo: Michelle Gumede
Campus radio station VowFM walked away with five MTN Radio awards this part Saturday after being nominated for 14 awards. In the campus radio category K’pop Experience Fridays on Mugging Beats won Best Music Show while Mpumi Mlambo took the award for the Best Breakfast Show presenter. The Best News and Actuality presenter award was won by Paul McNally for The Science Inside.
McNally, who works with the Wits Justice Project, also scooped the award for Best Radio Documentary for his work on The Story of Farouk Meyer and Oscar Pistorius. In the campus and community category The Science Inside also received the award for Best News and Actuality show.
“Using radio strengths and intimacy with listeners”
McNally, who scooped three out of the five awards that VowFM won was thrilled with his success at the awards. “Using radio’s strengths and intimacy with listeners” is part of his winning formula, acording to McNally. He says that it was a really good moment for the station and credits his own success to his hard working team.
HEAR IT, FEEL IT, LIVE IT: Paul McNally holding one of his awards. Photo: provided
VowFM station manager Michael Smurthwaite says that the awards show that the station’s standard has improved regardless of the competition. “Between us and TuksFM and MFM it’s really tough,” Smurthwaite said referring to Vow’s closest campus competitors.
University of Johannesburg’s UJFM won four awards while UCTRadio (of the University of Cape Town), won an award for the their breakfast show Rise and Grind. While VowFM and the University of Pretoria’s TuksFM took the same number of awards, TuksFM walked away with coveted Campus Radio Station of the Year award for the fourth year in a row.
by Nqobile Dludla | Apr 13, 2014 | News
![Mvangeli[1]](https://witsvuvuzela.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/Mvangeli1.jpg)
MTN RADIO AWARDS: Mvangeli Nzuza won himself the News Reader (sport) award at the glittering ceremony at the Sandton Convention Centre last night.
Photo: Provided
Wits campus radio station Voice of Wits (VoWfm) is celebrating a scoop of four radio awards at a glittering ceremony at the Sandton Convention Centre last night.
The team walked away with four MTN Radio Awards: News and Actuality Show: Law Focus (Female Miners), Drama Programme: Law Focus: (The Right Stuff and Female Miners), and News and Actuality Producer: Paul McNally (Municipal By Laws and Creches in SA Townships). Mvangeli Nzuza won the Best News Reader (sports) award.
Speaking to Wits Vuvuzela this morning, station manager Michael Smurthwaite said “For the station it is a great step forward and shows the year on year growth” as the station entered the awards for the very first time in 2013 and only managed seven nominations and one award in the Bright Young Star category.
[pullquote]”Law Focus is about making our community legally literate about their rights, that certainly deserves recognition”[/pullquote]
“It’s absolutely fantastic to obtain awards in recognition of work done, especially when the awards confirm, that in the specific areas you were recognised, you were the best within the industry in the past year … These awards also encompass what a community station is about. Programming that is collaborative and works with its community structures,” said Smurthwaite.
Three of the awards obtained are for programming created in partnership with the Wits Radio Academy and the station. The radio academy is the academic space within Wits University that focuses on radio and is home to the VowFM radio station.
Xoli Matomela, news editor and executive producer for the Wits Radio Academy, said “A lot of hard work with an amazing team paid off last night. Law Focus is about making our community legally literate about their rights, that certainly deserves recognition,”
“For all those who were nominated and who won, I as station manager am extremely proud and highly appreciative of their hard work, commitment and dedication,” said Smurthwaite
CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO VOWFM LIVE
by Shandu Mulaudzi | Apr 5, 2013 | Featured 1, News
THE AFTERNOON DRIVE SHOW: MTN awards nominee Zweli Mbhele (left) with co-host Nkhensani Khosa (far right) interviewing guest Leigh-Ann Carey.
First-timers Voice of Wits (VOW) scooped seven nominations in the MTN Radio Awards announced last week.
VOW is one of a few finalists selected who received this honour. According to the website, there were over 1000 entries.
Station manager Michael Smurthwaite said this year was the first time they entered since the re-launch of the station two years ago.
“Having launched the station from an empty floor, with no skills or experience in our staff, it is fantastic that after two years of hard work, training and mentorship we have managed to be nominated seven times at the first attempt,” Smurthwaite said.
Most of these nominations are in the campus and community radio stations but in one category, VOW will also go up against stations like Talk Radio 702 and SAfm.
In the Business and Finance category, VOW was nominated for its show Bizz Buzz against stations such as Talk Radio 702 and SAfm.
Tsholofelo Semenya was nominated in the News and Actuality Presenter (Campus and Community) category and is a presenter on Bizz Buzz.
“Holy Crap I’m up against Bruce Whitfield (702) was what I first thought. I’ve admired him as a talk radio host for a while and love his business show so it was pretty daunting to know we’d be going up against one another, but also a huge compliment to know that people of high radio prestige think that my show is of a good enough calibre to stand its own against other amazing national business shows,” Semenya said.
Zweli Mbhele received a nomination for the Afternoon Drive Presenter (Campus) category as well as Music Show (Campus) for Living Electro.
“I think they show that VOW FM is one of the best stations in the country and a lot more people will be aware of that now. We racked up more nominations than some of our commercial competitors (they know who they are), which puts the ‘campus station’ logic to shame. Our management has put in blood, sweat and tears into making us a top station and I think every presenter will agree that these nominations are for them just as much as they are for the presenters,” Mbhele said.
Commenting on the relevance of the MTN Radio Awards in South African media, Smurthwaite said they are “extremely relevant as they create a platform that recognises radio broadcasters for their craft and hard work”. This raises the standard of radio across the board, Smurthwaite said.
The awards banquet will take place at the Sandton Convention Centre on Saturday, April 13.
