Celtel Africa Challenge

Celtel Africa Challenge is a televised academic competition for students of East African universities. The programme is an extension of Celtel’s corporate social responsibility initiative known as “Making Life Better”. It is produced by Richard Reid, who also produces College Bowl and Honda Campus All-Star Challenge in the United States.

Celtel Africa Challenge is hosted by John Sibi-Okumu.

Game Format

Celtel Africa Challenge is a question and answer game played between two teams of three players each. The game is played in four rounds. The first three rounds are called Face-Off Rounds. The fourth round is called the Ultimate Challenge.

Face-Off Rounds

In each of these rounds, there are two types of questions: Face-Offs, worth 10 points each and Bonuses, worth 20 points. In each of the three Face-Off rounds, a different player represents the team answering Face-Off questions. That player is the only one who can answer for his or her team.

On Face-Offs, after the entire question is read, the first player to signal gets to answer. If s/he answers correctly, the team gets a Bonus question. If s/he answers wrong, the player representing the other team gets a chance to answer the Face-Off. If that player answers correctly, his or her team gets the Bonus. Bonuses are played by the entire team.

In each Face-Off round, there are four new categories. In each category there are four Face-Off questions. Each Face-Off has a related Bonus question. The last player to correctly answer a Face-Off selects the category for the next Face-Off.

Ultimate Challenge

At the end of the three Face-Off rounds the teams play the Ultimate Challenge. The team that’s behind goes first. If there’s a tie, there is a coin toss and the team that wins decides if it wants to go first or last. Each team gets a turn to play the Ultimate Challenge. There are four new categories from which to choose. When it’s a team’s turn to play, the players confer and select the category. Once a category is selected it is no longer available.

In the Ultimate Challenge, the team has 60 seconds to answer 10 questions. The questions are read rapid-fire one after the other. Team members can confer on answers. Any team member may call out an answer. The first answer heard by the moderator is the one that will be accepted. As long as there is time remaining, teams can keep coming back to questions which they missed or on which they passed.

If a team answers all 10 questions correctly it scores 500 points. As a reward for its perfect score, each team member receives a $500USD Bonus. Even if the first team to play the Ultimate Challenge does not take the lead in the game, the second team plays the Ultimate Challenge because the team members have a chance to win the Bonus money.

The team with the most points at the end of the Ultimate Challenge wins the game.

Grants and Prizes

Celtel provides grants to the 16 participating universities and to the students who represent the universities at the Celtel Africa Challenge Championship Festival.

Universities who participate in the first-round of the knockout competition receive $5,000USD and each player receives $500USD.

As the competition progresses the monetary and other grants increase:

• Quarter-final universities receive $10,000USD and each player receives $1,000USD
• Semi-final universities receive $15,000USD and each player receives $1,000USD plus $500USD in educational materials
• The runner-up university receives $25,000USD and each player receives $1,000USD plus $1,500USD in educational materials
• The champion university receives $50,000 and each player receives $1,000USD plus $3,500USD in educational materials

In addition, players who teams sweep the Ultimate Challenge round in any televised match receive a $500USD per person bonus.

Tournament Results

Season 1

Opening Rounds

Quarterfinals

Semifinals

Finals

Season 2

Preliminaries

Kenya

With the change from automatic selection for universities, sixteen Kenyan universities were entered into the preliminary elimination round, held in the University of Nairobi on 1 November 2007. The universities were:

• Africa Nazarene University
• Catholic University
• Daystar University
• Egerton University
• Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology
• Kenya Methodist University
• Kenyatta University
• Kabarak University
• Masinde Muliro University
• Maseno University
• Moi University
• Pan African Christian University
• Scott Theological College
• Strathmore University
• University of Nairobi
• United States International University-Kenya

• St Paul's University, entered as the alternate university

After the elimination process and seeding, Strathmore were seeded first, Egerton second, Kenyatta University third and Moi University fourth. The seeded universities proceed to the competition, to be held in January 2008.

Uganda

Eleven Ugandan Universities fielded teams to the national competition, held at. These were:

• Bugema University
• Busoga University
• Islamic University in Uganda
• Kampala International University
• Kampala University
• Makerere University
• Makerere University Business School
• Mbarara University of Science & Technology
• Ndejje University
• Nkumba University
• Uganda Christian University

The eventual winners and representatives of Uganda at the international competition were Makerere University, Mbarara University of Science and Technology, Nkumba University and Uganda Christian University.

Tanzania

Ten Tanzanian universities took part in the national competition to select the country's representatives to the international competition. These were:

• Ardhi University
• University of Arusha
• University of Dar es Salaam
• Hubert Kairuki Memorial University
• Mzumbe University
• The Open University of Tanzania
• Sokoine University of Agriculture
• Saint Augustine University of Tanzania
• Tumaini University
• Zanzibar University

The teams that qualified were the University of Dar es Salaam, Hubert Kairuki Memorial University, Sokoine University of Agriculture and Saint Augustine University of Tanzania.

Malawi and Zambia

The 2008 challenge sees the entry of universities from Malawi and Zambia. The number of teams entered in the international competition remains the same, with the format changing to include two teams from either country.

External links

• Celtel Africa Challenge official site
• Celtel official site
• Richard Reid TV, Producers of CAC