A new, local award to honour NGOs

Star Metro, 28 Feb 2008

They will be judged on quality of services, transparency and accountability

A new platform has been raised to recognise non-governmental organisations (NGOs) in Malaysia with outstanding achievement.

Resource Alliance announced the first Malaysia NGO Awards that is aimed at advancing Malaysia’s non-profit sector with the help of ExxonMobil and Yayasan Nanyang Press.

“We have decided to discontinue the Asia Pacific NGO Award momentarily and establish NGO Awards for individual countries in Asia,” said the company’s regional representative, Jessie Tong.

The ExxonMobil subsidiaries in Malaysia also contributed RM70,000 for the Malaysia NGO award 2008. Tong said it’s not easy to compare the NGOs from Asia who have equally diverse standards.

This, she continued, provides more avenues for the organisations to compete. She also said that they intend to bring back the Asia Pacific NGO award after its participating countries in Asia has their own platform for such competitions.

Previously, the Asia Pacific NGO Awards was the only regional competition of its kind, organised annually by Resource Alliance and Citigroup Asia Pacific to help develop a strong NGO sector.

The competition attracted NGOs from Hong Kong, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan and Thailand.

The Deputy Finance Minister and Wanita MCA chief Datuk Dr Ng Yen Yen who attended the launch said that the award served as a benchmark as well as to recognise contributions of the NGOs in Malaysia.

“NGOs play an integral part in nation building and are an important alliance to the government. They play a pivotal role and I hope this would ensure continued progress and development,” she said.

Four national winners will be chosen out of ten finalists by an independent judging panel. The NGO of the Year will win a RM12,000 cash prize and a trophy.

The organisations will be judged based on quality of services delivered, efficiency of resource management, transparency, accountability and financial management capabilities.

Entries must be submitted before April 12 with relevant documents and complete details on the form, which can be downloaded from www.resource-alliance.org.