The award marks the 22nd year of the passing of Ibraim Ahmed. The prize ceremonies take place annually. Each recipient receives a gold medal and receives wide recognition from the people of the Kurdistan region.

It has been awarded since 2001 with the founding of the Ibrahim Ahmed Foundation, which oversees and nominates the laureates.

The award goes to people that have made significant and influential contributions to the Kurdish language, history, politics, film, music, and culture.

The ceremony for the award is held annually in Sulaimani with the presence of intellectuals and politicians.

Bila is short for Braim. Kurds tend to shorten names for easier utterance and friendship, though it becomes a nickname for some people.

Bila Prize was awarded to Selahettin Demirtas in absentia, the imprisoned Kurdish leader in Turkey who served the Kurdish cause for most of his life. Bila Prize was awarded to Selahettin Demirtas in absentia, the imprisoned Kurdish leader in Turkey who served the Kurdish cause for most of his life. Falaknas Ocer, an HDP member of the parliament of Turkey, received the prize for Demirtas. 

Demirtas told KurdSat, 'I am pleased to express my gratitude to the Ibrahim Ahmed foundation. I am honored to win Mr. Ibrahim Ahmed's prize.'

The winners included four women and four men. Jamila Jaleel, a female Kurdish litterateur, who currently resides in Armenia, won the prize. She was followed by Nasreen Muhammed Abdullah, a military commander diplomat in Rojava or Western Kurdistan.

Nasreen is one of the founders of the Women's Protection Units, an all-female force that operates in Rojava and is one of the main parties forming the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).

Ibrahim Ahmed Fatahzadeh Mustafa was born on March 6th 1914, in Sulaimani under the Ottoman empire. Ibrahim Ahmed attended madrasa and later school in Suliamani.

He was fond of reading and studying and attained a degree from the law college in Baghdad in 1937.

In the same year, he co-authored ‘Al-Arab wa Al-Akrad’ a book written in Arabic explaining the relations between Kurds and Arabs and their rights in Iraq. Bila mentioned Kurdish self-determination for the first time, which led to his arrest and ban of his book.

Since then, he has authored numerous books, novels, and articles. His seminal works have become a milestone in Kurdish literature and history. Though a litterateur, he was an adept politician that worked most of his life to achieve Kurdish rights in Iraq and beyond.

He joined the newly founded Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) of Iraq in 1947. The KDP represented Iraqi Kurds, and it was an involved party with a large following.

After four years as a prominent leader of the KDP, he was elected the general secretary of the KDP in the party’s second congress.

He continued his political and intellectual life until 1975 when he retired and moved to London, where he passed away in 2000.