Where is the $30M worth of steel pans that was bought for Carifesta?

Nov 01, 2008 Letters

Dear Editor,
On behalf of the steel pan players/group in the Linden Community, especially the up and coming talented students from the Wismar Christianburg Multilateral School, and also as a young player of a Catholic Church, I ask, can someone kindly say what is the present position with regards to the $30M worth of steel pans that were acquired for Carifesta?
It was my understanding that some of the instruments were to be handed over to various steel orchestras across the country to further encourage, keep alive and enhance this type of music and its quality.
There are many enthusiastic young people who are patiently waiting to get on board. Now where Linden is concerned, there are mainly only two groups of regular young pan players that are well known in the community; the Catholic Church group and the Wismar Multilateral School group.
The Wismar Multilateral School group has, through love and dedication managed to gain a reputation of their own, attracting attention across the country, including that of the British High Commissioners’ office.
They had the honour of being invited by the wife of the High Commissioner to play at the function for the Queen’s birthday.
Now the question is this, was there any handing out of the equipment as was promised? Will there ever be a distribution of any sort to any group in Linden?
To date, according to an instructor I spoke with, not a single steel pan item has been given to anyone in Linden- why?
The instructor further told me that twice he spoke to the Minister of Culture Mr. Frank. Anthony and all he said to him was “not now.” He (instructor) said he tried to follow- up by contacting his ministry, but was told by office personnel that they were not dealing with steel pan issues now. Efforts to see the permanent secretary Mr. Keith Booker is a tedious one- never in office. While the Multilateral group is eagerly awaiting some assistance from someone overseas, the condition of the instruments they are using is wretched. My understanding is that this $30 million worth of steel pan pieces have been locked up since the end of Carifesta, eves as Mashramani is around the bend. Can someone shed some light in this regard?
Frank Fyffe

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Where is the $30M worth of steel pans that was bought for Carifesta?

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