Accra, May 3, GNA - The Sport Writers Association of Ghana (SWAG) has stripped Nana Yaw Boateng, winner of the 2005 SWAG Table Tennis Player of the Year off his award folowing his unpatriotic act at the just ended Commonwealth Games in Melbourne, Australia.

Disclosing this at the launch of this year's SWAG Awards ceremony in Accra, Mr Ebo Quansah, President of SWAG said the association deems Nana Yaw's action to join other African athletes to seek political asylum in Australia as unfortunate hence not fit for the award.

He said that SWAG does not believe that conditions exist in Ghana for any of its nationals to seek asylum any where in the world. Mr Quansah said the behaviour of Nana Yaw is despicable and since discipline and dedication is one of the prime tenets of the Association, it would not tolerate any such behaviour or act calculated to bring the nation's name into disrepute.

The SWAG President said this year's event, the 31st Award will again be sponsored by Ghana Telecom's One Touch and will be an innovation from previous editions.

For the first time, the public would be given the chance to have a say by voting for the eventual winner of the two flagship awards - 2005 Onetouch Personality of the Year and SWAG Male Footballer of the Year through a text poll.

The awards ceremony scheduled for May 13 at the La Trade Fair site would award 21 deserving athletes who distinguished themselves during the period under review.

Mr Quansah said for the second time in the history of the awards ceremony, a distinguished personality to head the celebration of sporting achievements for the past year will be the President John Agyekum Kufuor as the Guest of Honour with the Special Guest of Honour being Sir Peter Odili, Governor of the River State of Nigeria.

He said there has been quiet a number of sports achievements worth celebrating at this year's event, starting from the qualification of the senior national team, Black Stars to their first ever World Cup and the winning of two gold and a bronze medal at the just ended Commonwealth Games in Melbourne.

Mr Stephen Badu, Head of Marketing GT Onetouch, sponsors of the ceremony said Onetouch is committed to the promotion of football and for that matter sports in country.

He said his company is also heavily involved in the promotion of women sports with over 50 percent of the players of the present Black Queens coming from the GHATEL Ladies teams scattered across the country. Mr Badu disclosed that in 2005, Ghana Telecom committed 100 million cedis towards the awards ceremony and in view of their ever-growing relationship with SWAG, they have decided to double the amount to 200 million this time round.

He disclosed that members of the public interested in voting for their sports heroes will have to do it through a special text line, 1915 that has been set aside for the award winners.

"To vote for the "Footballer of the Year" the public is required to text 'F1' for Stephen Appiah, 'F2' for Michael Essien or 'F3' for Issah Ahmed whilst for the Sports Personality of the Year Award, voters are to text 'SP1' for Ignatius Gaisah, 'SP2' for Michael Essien or 'SP3' for Stephen Appiah.

Voters whose predictions come true stand the chance of winning 200,000 cedis worth of credit from Onetouch and a ticket to attend the function from the sponsors.

The other awards categories are SWAG Female Footballer of the Year - Mercy Adu-Boahene of GHATEL Ladies, Kumasi, Premier League's Best Player - Gabriel Issah Ahmed -Kotoko Team of the Year - Black Stars, Coach of the Year - Ratomir Dujkovic, Male Athlete of the Year - Ignatius Gaisah. The rest are Female Athlete of the Year - Margaret Simpson, Tennis Star of the Year - Henry Adjei-Darko,(disqualified) Goal King - Prince Tagoe - Hearts, Top Scoring Club - Hearts of Oak, Referee of the Year - Justus Agbeko, Most Promising Star, Philemon McCarthy - Gomoa Feyenoord, Male Hockey Player of the Year - Ebenezer Frimpong - CEPS, Female Hockey Player of the Year - Ramatu Abbas- Fire Service, Discovery of the Year - Salamatu Musa - Mpraeso Secondary and Dedication and Valour, Ruby Aryee - Fire Service.

Special Awards would be presented to Ike 'Bazooka' Quartey, Goldfields Ghana Limited and Samuel Oduro Nyarko, Board Secretary of Okwahu United. 03 May 06