Johannesburg, 25 Apr 2011
Rapelang Rabana, Global Head of Research and Development for communications pioneer Telfree, has been appointed as an ambassador for the World Summit Youth Awards (WYSA), an ICT initiative of the United Nations. Rapelang has been chosen to encourage young South Africans, like herself, to take part in the WSYA and receive international recognition for their efforts.
The WSYA selects and promotes the best digital projects, products, applications and services by young and brings them together to strengthen their efforts to reduce poverty and hunger, to tackle ill-health, gender inequality, lack of education, lack of access to clean water and environmental collapse. Promoted throughout 160 UN member states, the WYSA encourages young people to use their knowledge of Internet and mobiles to create ways to put the UN millennium development goals into action.
Rapelang Rabana epitomises the new global generation of ingenious business intellectuals, able to influence how the future world works and is the perfect choice for a South African representative of the awards.
Rapelang was selected as an Endeavour 'high-impact' Entrepreneur in 2007, a global non-profit organisation that identifies and supports innovative, high-growth entrepreneurs in emerging markets. Rapelang's relationship with UN World Summit Award initiative began last year when she was the youngest Grand Juror selected among industry experts across the world, for the United Nations' World Summit Awards for M-Content that assessed over 400 mobile applications from 100 UN member states. Rapelang Rabana graduated in 2005 with a Bachelor in Business Science Degree, Honours in Computer Science from the University of Cape Town. She is without doubt, as the Mail & Guardian newspaper suggested, one of the top 100 young people you must have lunch with.
Telfree was awarded the Outstanding Regional Achievement Award for Excellence in Mobile Content at the United Nations World Summit Award (WSA) 2010 for its Telfree MzansiSMS product. This was the first time an African mobile company has been recognised by the WSA. Telfree's MzansiSMS aims to bring the lowest-cost SMS rates in the country to needy South Africans. Thanks to MzansiSMS, the lesser fortunate can enjoy cheaper cellphone services - a move that has radically transformed the mobile landscape in South Africa, where often the poorest have been paying the highest rates for mobile services.
For more information on the awards visit www.youthaward.org
For more information on Telfree visit www.telfree.com
Issued by Wired Communications on behalf of Telfree
For more information, please contact Wired Communications on 021 464 1144
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