National Stadium moves to collect monies owed by Lumumba, Hits and Jams, Kashif and Shanghai

Sep 07, 2015 News

The Providence National Stadium is seeking to recover a debt of approximately $2.6 million owed by entertainment promoters/entities, which utilized the venue for activities within the past two years.
In an public notice published in Saturday’s edition of this newspaper, the Ministry of Education – Department of Culture, Youth and Sport listed Kashif and Shanghai, Hits and Jams (HJ) Entertainment and PPP/ Civic Member of Parliament, Odinga Lumumba among three persons/entities, who are asked to make urgent contact with the Accounts Department within the Ministry or the Manager of National Stadium as soon as possible.
A source close to the issue has disclosed that these persons/entities named in the advertisement owe the Stadium an outstanding balance of over $2.5 million dollars.

PPP/C MP Odinga Lumumba

Football Promoters: Kashif Muhammad (L) & Aubrey ‘Shanghai’ Major

According to the source, the outstanding balance owed by Kashif and Shanghai and Odinga Lumumba are for football matches held at the venue in 2014 and early 2015.
Kaieteur News understands that HJ Entertainment debt is likely for shows, which the party promotion company hosted at the National Stadium.
The source explained further that the public notice was issued after several attempts made by the Ministry to collect the outstanding monies from the debtors, proved futile.
Attempts made by this newspaper to contact the representatives of HJ Entertainment, Kashif and Shanghai and Odinga Lumumba for a comment, yesterday also proved unsuccessful.
The Guyana National Stadium was built specifically to host a series of matches in the 2007, World Cup cricket. However, subsequent to the 2007 World Cup the Stadium has been looking to other avenues as a method of increasing its revenue.

HJ promoters Rawle Ferguson (L) and Kerwin Bollers

As such, with little cricket being played, the venue located at Providence, East Bank Demerara was converted for multipurpose use.
Given a seating accommodation of approximately 15,000 the National Stadium has since been the prime location for a number of national events, local football tournaments, and shows headlined by a number of popular international artistes, in recent years.