Ghana’s leading mobile operator, MTN, has presented a cheque and other corporate items to the Ghana Journalists Association (GJA) in support of this year’s GJA Awards scheduled for Saturday, 21st August 2010 at the State Banquet Hall. The sponsorship package includes a cash amount of GH¢70,000.00. In addition, MTN also presented 40 modems, 40 data Sim Cards and assorted MTN souvenirs to the GJA. The total sponsorship package is GH¢85,000.00. The 15th GJA award which also coincides with the 61st anniversary of the GJA has the theme; “Unethical Journalism and Corruption in the Media: A Danger to Democracy”. Presenting the cheque, Mrs. Mawuena Trebarh, the Corporate Services Executive, expressed MTN’s excitement as main sponsors of the event. “MTN remains very committed to supporting the media, rewarding excellence in the field of journalism and would soon be introducing new strategies of keeping this relationship alive”, she said. Mrs. Trebarh stressed on the readiness of MTN to partner with the media. On this, she recounted MTN’s regional media engagement initiative where the company continuously pays calls on all journalists across the country’s 10 regions to interact and take feedback on the products and services offered to its subscribers. “Such feedback from the media has been of help to the company’s hold of its leadership position in the country’s telecommunications industry”, she concluded. As the main sponsor of the event, MTN shall be presenting 4 award categories namely; Best Sports Journalist, Best Disability Journalist, Best Telecommunications Journalist and Best ICT Journalist awards. Receiving the cheque and the items, the President of the Ghana Journalists Association, Mr. Ransford Tetteh thanked MTN for the support and pledged that he and his team would organize an awards ceremony that would satisfy all sponsors, supporters, nominees and above all, the entire Ghanaian populace. He was optimistic that MTN would continue to deepen the good efforts it is making towards the development of the country’s media. MTN recently announced its support to the Sports Writers Association of Ghana (SWAG) awards and has also donated GH¢30,114.00 towards the refurbishment of the newsroom of the Ghana News Agency.