Oral Ofori of TheAfricanDream.net bags another US award, this time in Washington DC
AYOO Africa organized its prestigious Top Ten D.C. Awards 2020 for African businesses in the Washington D.C. metro area of the United States (US) on June 19, 2020. In which awards, Mr. Oral Ofori, CEO of TheAfricanDream.net, was nominated in the media and film category https://hopin.to/events/ayoo-africa-top-ten-dc?ref=29c0db582d96
Wikipedia says Mr. Ofori is a Ghanaian-American award-winning digital media producer and blogger, freelance journalist, entrepreneur, and writer. I will however like to put this out there that from knowing Oral for almost a decade, this humble dude shirks all those titles and simply prefers to be known as a digital-storyteller.
Despite those of us who know him well and his love for helping people, some of us still think he deserves some of the positive accolades he shies from. Which is why some of us were right when we called him the Africa-US media magnate. He has interviewed and profiled many notable Africans who are making a difference in Africa, the Americas, and indeed the African Diaspora.
Speaking of the African Diaspora in connection with the Ayoo Africa Awards, the organizers disclosed that as COVID-19 ravaged, they noticed individuals and startups who despite the hardship continued to innovate from home and even sometimes outside. The protests across the US, that showed diverse people united against racial injustice through #BlackLivesMatter also brought to light a reckoning that exposed the fact that even though all companies worry about their financial future, African-owned startups, and minority entrepreneurs across DC and the US were particularly at a higher risk. Ayoo however saw the resilience of a select few and wanted to acknowledge their courage and work with its Top Ten D.C. Awards.
As an Ayoo awardee, Mr. Ofori has given so many young talented Africans and African-Americans a platform to display their skills or talent, many have become household names in their craft through him. As a digital-storyteller, Mr. Ofori captures the African hope and dream in his many stories about happenings in Africa and the African-American communities. Since 2014, Ofori has been host and producer of #TheAfricanDream show aired on Fairfax, Virginia Public-access television in the US.
The nomination was already a win for the man who has in the past decade produced and hosted over 60 episodes of #TheAfricanDream for TV in the US and telling the African story from an African perspective through his US-based communication consultancy, TheAfricanDream LLC. A week before the date of the awards, when Oral first received the nomination news, he took to his social media platforms (here is what he posted on Facebook: https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=3024029340980318&id=758539970862611 to express his humbling gratitude to his supporters. Then to discover that he made it to the finals and became one of the awardees was just amazing.
As one of TheAfricanDream.net correspondents in Ghana, I called up my his boss (he prefers I call him by his first name though) on his achievements in the African-American media, in his modesty, Oral Ofori dedicated the Ayoo Africa Award to his supporters and clients as he told me: ‘This award is yours, we got this far because of you, and we congratulate all our fellow winners. Thanks to you we are all now winners!’
He added that “We just want to thank you for the support, it continues to play a huge role in motivating us. Let me also thank Rexford Nkansah, Isaac Agbasi, Richard Lauter, yourself Oppong Clifford Benjamin, Joshua Anny Osabutey, and all the many others I’m failing to mention for the amazing ways in which they’ve stood by me since we started this journey way back in Ghana and from when we won our first national award here in the US in 2013 for Diversity Empowerment as an independent TV producer.”
Indeed, like most start-ups, TheAfricanDream.net also depends on the support of people to run, and knowing Oral, he’s always welcoming of people with talents and determination. Find out more about him at his official website http://www.oralofori.com or visit his news site at http://www.theafricandream.net and search Oral Ofori to read specifically about him. He’s on Twitter and Instagram as oralofori too.
AYOO Africa is a digital media platform based in Washington D.C. that curates content from different local news sources through an online cultural magazine and community platform covering experiences from music, food, startups, artists, film, and events from across the globe. Their Top Ten D.C. Awards 2020 featured 9 categories including Community & Governance, Nightlife & Events, Technology & Innovation, Music & Entertainment, Culinary, Curators, Art, Design, and Media/Film in which Oral emerged as a winner.
Congratulations! Oral Ofori!
(Story: Oppong Clifford Benjamin)
