BILL COTTON/REFORM...CARIFESTA - THE BALANCE SHEET

BILL COTTON/REFORM…CARIFESTA – THE BALANCE SHEET

Sep 02, 2008 Features / Columnists

Some of Bill’s friends will be very surprised. Maybe even appalled. Bill thinks Bharrat Jagdeo has played a blinder over Carifesta X. He took a gamble on it and it has succeeded in spades, inside and outside Guyana
It was not the easiest of calls when the baton was dropped eleven months ago. It was bold, maybe foolhardy, of Bharrat to pick it up and run with it. Disaster could have loomed.

The naysayers, especially in the letter writing classes of the Diasporae, had a field day. Guyana could not do and certainly could not do it as well as old LFS had. Old propagandists never die. Bill had an email spat with some of them; it ended, sadly, in racism. Us white people could never understand these things they said….
Bharrat was not to be put off by these negative vibes. He put young Frank Anthony in charge of a very ambitious programme. Good choice of point man. The template was there from the Cricket World Cup.

Shame it was not always followed and also that Karan Singh was not put back at the helm. Money was found – the most commonly accepted figure is $2.5M US. Nobody is quite sure from where but found it was.

Floodlights were put in the stadium, stages ordered and lights too (most arrived) and the planning began.
Judging from the Carifesta website not that much was happening, but Paloma Blanca was beavering away at her piece de resistance. Frank doing his stuff efficiently too. Nigel too.

The proof of any pudding is in eating. After a ticketing fiasco (there is no other word to describe that farce) the punters have turned up in their scores for the 700 plus events country wide.

What of the PNCR attempt to politicize and boycott Carifesta X? Another huge fiasco, Bill is sad to report. Egg all over faces.

LBJ once memorably said that he would rather have Edgar Hoover inside the tent urinating (not his word but this is a family newspaper) out rather than the other way round. With Carifesta X poor Corbin was left urinating in a trench far, far away from the tent. Indeed Bill was told he was abroad in a different trench altogether. Corbin’s supporters voted with their feet. Bharrat made plenty capital out of Carifesta. Nobody has pointed out that this is a largely African Caribbean festival put on by a not African Caribbean President.

That will have played well too in the rest of Caricom (though with more than a degree of irony, Manning seems to be pulling Caricom apart as Guyana declares ‘One Caribbean, One People, One Purpose’. Hmm).

Carifesta X will serve BJ good in the fight down over the EPA (hands up who understands that one..) 1972 gave LFS a Caribbean halo for years; will 2008 do the same for BJ?

Away from meta politics, Carifesta has revitalized the nation, given it a reason to sport, given it places to sport. All for free. It has put much art and much culture – from all over – on show. The big names have come and gone and left their seed of ideas behind. The challenge now is ‘Is there life after Carifesta?’ How do you keep the vibrancy going? How do you capitalize on the new mood of erudition and appreciation?

Bill don’t know the answer. Jagdeo might. For ten days, he has been omni-present- here, there and everywhere. Reaping the whirlwind and the rewards of a brave decision. To top it all, the soi disant ‘disciplined forces’ eventually got ‘Fineman’ and ‘Skinny’ and made them toast. Icing on the cake.

Bharrat will rarely have better political weeks than the last one. The event has come to an end, but I’m sure he must be asking if he can stretch this Carifesta X halo for another three years to 2011 and beyond. Good batting Bharrat.

Pip! Pip!

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BILL COTTON/REFORM…CARIFESTA – THE BALANCE SHEET

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