Miss Selasi Ama Domi-Kuwornu, a 21-year-old final year student at the University of Cape Coast in Ghana has been crowned Ms. Geek Africa 2023.
The keenly contested event was held in Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe from the 26th to 28th of April 2023.
She won herself a certificate, laptop, smartphone, and a cash prize of US$5,000. Ascend Digital also promised to give her a cash price of US$1,000 in addition to a job opportunity in Accra to enable her secure better future.
She would also be sponsored by GITEX Africa to participate in the GITEX Africa Digital Summit, from 31st May to 2nd June 2023 in Marrakech, Morocco.
The Summit is aimed at connecting tech titans, governments, SMEs, Start-ups, coders, investors, and academia to accelerate, collaborate and explore new ventures.
The international win for Miss Selasi Ama Domi-Kuwornu didn’t come from an easy side. She was contested by six (6) other young ladies knowledgeable in ICT from Rwanda, Kenya, Benin, Zambia, Zimbabwe, and Niger.
All applicants presented a solution that was original, scalable, and feasible within Africa and beyond which seeks to address challenges in Africa using technology.
The project of the girls was judged based on the theme of Transform Africa Summit organized by the Smart Africa Alliance, “Connect, Transform and Innovate” focusing on challenges that are unique to the African continent.
Miss Selasi Ama Domi-Kuwornu presented a project named, “Kasa-Cash”, an offline system that enables illiterates, physically challenged, unserved and underserved communities to be able to effortlessly perform financial services without third-party assistance.
The other young ladies presented IT solutions on ‘femme entrepreneur’ from Niger, ‘Smart Miner Monitoring System’ from Rwanda, ‘Tekeleza to solve water crisis’ from Kenya, ‘Just Live’ from Zambia, ‘Management of solar power generation systems’ from Zimbabwe, and ‘Blood connect’ from Benin.
The win comes after she won the 2019 Ms. Geek Ghana competition when she was a level 100 student of UCC.
She won the competition by beating nine other contestants by receiving ¢10,000, a laptop, internet connection for one year, and assistance to develop her Concept into prototype.
Ms Geek Launched
The Ministry of Communications and Digitalisation on October 9th, 2019, launched the Ms. Geek Ghana Competition, aimed at empowering girls in the field of ICT.
The sector Minister, Mrs. Ursula Owusu-Ekuful, launching the competition, mentioned that her Ministry is committed to highlighting the role females bring to the tech-sector and will also offer young girls an opportunity to showcase what they have.
“Students of Mamfe Methodist Girls won the International Robotics Competition, and they informed me that they have also developed a solution to the bed-bug infestation in our second cycle institutions. There are probably many more of such hidden talents utilizing technology to solve common everyday challenges,” she added.
In line with this, the Ministry called on all girls between the required age to take up the challenge in order to stand a chance of representing Ghana in subsequent years of the Ms. Geek Africa Competition.
The Minister, Hon. Ursula Owusu-Ekuful, also called on stakeholders to support the competition to encourage more girls to consider a career in science and technology. The competition will empower young girls by educating them in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM).
“I am encouraging all technology companies, telecommunications companies to partner with us so that we can provide exciting prizes not just to the top 3 finalists but to all the top 10 finalists to encourage, inspire and motivate them to continue innovating.”
About Ms. Geek
The competition seeks to change the attitude of young girls towards the adoption of ICT and also equip them with digital skills, which is in line with the SDG goal 5 objectives of achieving gender equality and empowering all women and girls.
The competition is opened to females between the ages of 13 to 25 years to submit a technology-based solution aimed at solving the basic challenges we face in Ghana and Africa as a whole.
Among the objectives is to inspire girls/women across Ghana, every year, to solve challenges in the country using technology.
It also encourages 15 percent of girls/women in Ghana to pursue careers in technology, science, mathematics, and engineering within five years.
It also aims at promoting innovation among 20 percent of Ghanaian Girls in STEM annually; and to contribute to the attainment of the Sustainable Development Goals; ‘Goal 1 – No Poverty, Goal 2 – Zero Hunger, Goal 5 – Gender Equality, Goal 8 – Decent Work and Economic, and Goal 10 – Reduced Inequalities’.