By Sellah Singini

Lilongwe, February 17, Mana: Fifteen songs comprising of five music categories of hip-hop, reggae, amapiano, local and others have been shortlisted for the on-going Dolo Kwambiri Amavotera Chakwera music challenge.

Organizers of the competition made the announcement at Bingu Wa Muthalika International Convention Centre (BICC) in Lilongwe on Monday during a press briefing.

One of the organizers, Yamikani Chinguwo said three songs will compete per each music category to find the best five winners.

“Amapiano has got three songs competing to find the best one, reggae three songs as well, hip-hop three songs, local three songs and others three songs making a total of 15 songs competing,” he said.

“The 15 songs will be uploaded on the Chakwera Challenge website (https://www.chakwerachallenge.com) today, Monday midnight so that people should vote for the best five winners. Voters will be given a chance to vote five times, one vote per music category,” he added.

In his remarks, Vitumbiko Mumba who is sponsoring the music challenge said, those who did not make it into the top 15 will be given something so that at least they can get something out of their sweat for participating in the music challenge.

He said, the top five will still walk away with 5 million Kwacha each per category.

"These artists invested their resources to produce these songs, and we cannot simply let their efforts go unrecognized," Mumba said.

“Having said that, looking at how good and nice the songs are right here, I have decided that, apart from the final day of announcing the five winners, we will have another day for a free event whereby these 15 artists can have a live performance of their songs, if they are willing to do so,” he added.

He therefore said, the whole idea of the music challenge is to have songs that are very familiar with time, technology and the current happenings in Malawi music industry that can hype the campaign for President Lazarus Chakwera.

“So, the whole idea behind this was to create some songs and music and increase the hype towards the campaign,” he said.

One of the judges of the competition, Sophie Mponda expressed her concern that few ladies participated in the music challenge.

“From my experience it is a very huge worry for me to the females, because when things like this arise, we tend to think it is only meant for males. So I therefore, urge the females to be confident and strong and participate in such activities,” she said.

The Dolo Kwambiri Amavotera Chakwera music challenge was introduced by Minister of Labour Vitumbiko Mumba during last year’s youth concert held at Civo Stadium in Lilongwe.