Forty three awards will be given out Saturday during the fourth edition of the Maso Awards to be held at Comesa Hall in Blantyre.
The awards return to the commercial city of Blantyre having been held in Lilongwe last year.
Maso Awards Chief Executive Officer Augustine Mukisi said Saturday that they have new categories this year pushing the awards to 43 in total.
“We are ready to decorate artists once again as Maso Awards and this is why we have brought in new categories. People should expect an excellent event,” he said.
Some of the new additions are Best Local Sound Act, Best Fashionable Celebrity, Best Produced Event, Best Gospel Act (Female) and Best Social Media Content Creator (Female).
Apart from the awards, there will also be performances from acts such as veteran Boniface Ndamera, Jetu, Fada Moti, Trappy Beats, Slyc, Nthondwa and Chikondi Wiseman.
The grand finale comes into effect after some artists pulled out of the race having received nominations whereas there were outcries from some quarters on other nominees in the categories.
“I can assure people out there that we are transparent and credible in all our processes because the system that we have in place offers checks and balances,” Mukisi said.
He said people do their part in voting for their favourite nominees and that thereafter different players are also consulted with a committee of judges finally aggregating the results.
“The committee of judges is made up of industry experts and it functions independently and so, we have to say and there is nothing like manipulating the results,” Mukisi said.
This year according to Mukisi, their official sponsor is Fadeth Properties.
The awards are this year running under the ‘Towards Arts Export for Social Economic Growth.’
Through the platform, the festival has boosted the careers of artists such as Driemo, Zeze Kingston, Kellie Divine Njuchi, Lady Aika, Zonke Too Fresh and Fada Moti.
