On behalf of His Royal highness Prince Salman bin Hamad Al Khalifa, Crown Prince, Deputy Supreme Commander and First Deputy Prime Minister, His Highness Shaikh Mohammed bin Mubarak Al Khalifa, the Deputy Prime Minister, today attended a ceremony as part of the inaugural Bahrain Awareness Awards, held at the Ritz Carlton Hotel in Manama.This year’s Awards, which were launched by the Labour Market Regulatory Authority (LMRA), focus on the ‘commitment to paying the wages of domestic helpers’, and serve to recognise the important role of expatriate labourers within Bahrain’s community.
During the ceremony, the Chief Executive Officer of the LMRA, Ausamah Al Absi, delivered a speech in which he highlighted the aims of this year’s awards. He added that the competition helped to motivate young Bahrainis to drive awareness among all segments of the Bahraini society of the need to ensure that the rights of all are protected in the Kingdom for years to come. He emphasised the important role played by His Royal Highness the Crown Prince in further developing human rights in Bahrain, a key priority of the Kingdom’s sustainable development programme. He concluded by saying that the winners who competed in the Bahrain Awareness Awards have produced 23 distinctive pieces of work, all of which won the hearts and minds of both the judging panel and the public.
Al-Absi added that this group of young participants have worked for seven months and used various social media platforms to promote their work among Bahrain’s community. He said that their combined work has reached 750,000 individuals with 59% of the viewers from neighboring GCC countries, prompting the competition’s organisers to expand the scope of the awards to include citizens and residents of all GCC countries in the second iteration of the competition.
During the ceremony, the Deputy Premier highlighted that respecting rights is a fundamental component of any modern community, adding that the wide participation of Bahrain’s youth in the competition serves to demonstrate the Kingdom’s commitment to reinforcing rights and tolerance within the community. He praised the role of the LMRA in launching the Bahrain Awareness Awards, highlighting that expanding the scope of the awards to include citizens and residents of all GCC countries in the second iteration will further support Bahrain’s commitment to guaranteeing the fair treatment of foreign workers in accordance with international best practice.
The Deputy Premier reviewed the work of all the award winners, and extended his congratulations to them and wished them every success with their future projects. A number of ministers and senior government officials also attended the ceremony.
Winners of the Bahrain Awareness Awards include:
1. In first place: Mr. Mahdi Rafi – short film entitled Maria
2. In second place: Ms. Sana Allah Mohammed Ali – short film entitled Shades
3. In third place: Mr. Omar Farooq – short film entitled The Housemaid
4. In fourth place: Ms. Zainab Al Haddad and Isa Hijris – short film entitled The Suffering of a labourer
5. In fifth place: Ahmed Ali – short film entitled My Right
6. In sixth place (Master Card award for outstanding creativity): Sayed Alawi Hashem – short film entitled That Day
7. In seventh place (Master Card award for outstanding creativity): Khalid Al Janahi – short film entitled Countless Giving
