Ladies and gentlemen,

We write to inform you of the postponement of the KORA 2009 Awards ceremony.

The main reason for this being the inefficiency of the voting system due to the inability of some CFI TV partners (to whom KORA is given for free), to diffuse the KORA countdown which should enable the populace to vote fairly and equitably.

Looking at the voting results published on our website: www.koraawards.org, you will notice very serious disparities between the points of artistes in the same group, with some Artistes having no points at all because the TV partner in his country did not diffuse the signals sent to it by CFI via satellite, and this could render the results invalid.

At the end of the voting period of three groups out of seven, some artistes did not have even one vote count from their own countries; this is inconceivable because the Artiste himself, his parents or relatives must have voted.

You will agree with us that the major focus of KORA 2009 is the '1 million US dollars' to be given to the « The Best Artiste of The African Continent » it is therefore essential that the selection of the winner of this award is done properly and impartially, in a way that is un-opposable by everyone.

After a meeting we had in Ougadougou with CEOs of francophone National Television stations on March 4th during FESPACO 2009, we realized that the National Television stations did not understand the importance of disseminating the Countdown on the right dates to allow a smooth running of the event.

It is therefore obvious that we do not only need to repeat the voting operation but to postpone the KORA AWARDS Ceremony to a later date during the dry season when we can be sure that it will not rain. The ceremony is supposed to take place in the biggest tent in the world "TENSILE 1", if it rains during the ceremony, this will be a disaster since it is a live show because the sound quality will not be acceptable to broadcasters.

In West Africa, especially in Nigeria, the month of December is in the middle of the harmattan season; we have therefore decided (in collaboration with our partners) to move the event to Sunday 20th December, 2009.

The postponement of the date from April 11, 2009 to December 20, 2009 will:

1. Enable us to approach all program managers of all the CFI TV partners and explain to them the merits of retaking the dissemination of the KORA Countdown as this will not only enable the public to vote properly but they also could benefit from it because they could insert their own adverts in the course of the said emissions.
2. Enable us to carry out an awareness and communication campaign to the public before the commencement of the said emissions which were produced by the same production team and on the same stage to ensure the same quality.
3. This will also permit our principal partner, Lagos State to complete the construction of the site on which TENSILE 1 will be erected.

We know that this postponement will cause some uproar but we remain convinced that voters and viewers will be happy on the evening of December 20, 2009 when they will see on their small screens at 18 GMT, the KORA AWARDS ceremony in its splendor and accuracy.

Having relocated KORA from South Africa to Nigeria, we owe ourselves and the public a duty to produce an event without any flaws.

It is obvious that we are morally obliged to retain the votes already obtained to date, in order to be fair to those who have already voted.

For and on behalf of :
KORA Music Awards Limited

Click Here for a full list of nominees