WIB awardees named

THE annual Westpac women in business awards 2010 on Wednesday night saw local entrepreneur Nicole Habitien from Kokopo, East New Britain, won the title of overall winner.
Habetien is also the winner for the Daltron entrepreneurship award in this category.
The other winners are Rhoda Ilave in the IBBM uoung achievers award, which comes with a K20,000 scholarship  in diploma management; Maxine Anjiga Arua for the Trukai community responsibility award; Vele Urro for the PricewaterhouseCooper’s private sector award; Cardno public sector award was a no-competition and was awarded to Elizabeth Piskupe.
The winners struggled through personal times to become who they are today, according to the awards organisers.
For Urro, her struggle was that of determination and perseverance in getting her from a Grade 8 school leaver to a financial controller today.
They all came from different professional backgrounds, shared this common trait of starting out as nothing and becoming something.
For this, they heartily thanked the Westpac bank and its sponsors and supporters for the new opportunities.
Westpac PNG Ltd managing director Ashley Matheson said: “Change for women is not just education but also with example.”
The reason for these awards was to recognise the women whose works inspire others to achieve their dreams and contribute to the development of PNG.
“Westpac believes in empowering the women through supporting them when we realised that women were better at managing money … so we decided to provide a platform that would promote good family values,” Matheson said.
The winners were given a Blackberry mobile phone each, courtesy of new sponsor Digicel PNG, while the others received internet modems.