Ngoni Dapira

MUTARE Boys’ High School carved a new history in the 2018 edition of the national DStv Eutelsat Star Awards competition after two of its students clinched the poster category awards.

Munashe Chikuni (18) and 14-year old Malvin Muparutsa from the school clinched the poster category awards with Chikuni merging as the winner whilst Muparutsa was runner-up. In the essay category of the competition, Isaiah Marikopo (19) from Allan Wilson High School in Harare was the winner  while the runner-up was Devine Madzima (14) of Dzivarasekwa High School, also in Harare.

The competition is hosted each year by leading pay-TV operator MultiChoice Africa and satellite company Eutelsat, and is aimed at encouraging students to take an interest in science and technology in general and at satellite technology in particular. Ever since the competition was launched in 2011, Zimbabwean students have fared well at international level with poster and essay sections having been won by Zimbabweans against stiff competition from peers across the continent.

In the 2015 edition of the competition Marlon Marume from Mutare Boys’ High scooped the continental title in the poster category and won a trip to Paris in France. Over the years the school has been a perrenial winner in the national competition especially in the poster category but Marlon remains the only one that has won the continental title. In 2017 Takunda Nyambuya won the national poster category.

MultiChoice Zimbabwe publicity and public relations manager Liz Dziva said the competition as usual ran at international level, attracting entries from a large number of African countries, as well as at national level, with winners and runners-up in the two sections at both levels set to receive prizes.

“We are pleased to announce the names of the national prize winners and we are hopeful that they will do well in competition against the other countries’ national winners, as their submissions have now gone for consideration at international level,” said Dziva.

She said Ghana will host this year’s DStv Eutelsat Star Awards international prize giving ceremony next week Wednesday, where the overall winning entries in the competition will be named and will receive their prizes. For the overall essay competition the prize is a trip for two to visit Eutelsat in France and then attend a live rocket launch in French Guyana.

The overall poster winner will win a trip fir two to visit the MultiChoice offices in South Africa and then go on to visit the South African Space Agency at Hartbeesthoek. The schools attended by the overall award winners will each receive a DStv installation, including satellite dish, television,decoder and free access to the DStv Education Package.