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Friday, July 11, 2025

NCBA stands by results

The rules were there for every­one to see

by

20140311

In the face of mount­ing dis­ap­proval of the 2014 Band of the Year (Large) re­sults, Na­tion­al Car­ni­val Bands As­so­ci­a­tion (NC­BA) chair­man David Lopez is adamant that the re­sults are of­fi­cial and fi­nal. The re­sults, an­nounced on Ash Wednes­day on the NC­BA Web site, re­vealed that Neal & Massy Trinidad All Stars won the cov­et­ed ti­tle, por­tray­ing Sailors Ashore at a Trop­i­cal Fi­es­ta.Yes­ter­day, Lopez said many bands were dis­qual­i­fied by the NC­BA for in­fring­ing the rules of the com­pe­ti­tion.He added: "The rules of the com­pe­ti­tion are on our Web site for every­one to see. The process is very in­de­pen­dent and not un­der the purview of the NC­BA, but strict­ly for the judges to make de­ter­mi­na­tions."The rules are con­tained in a 31-page doc­u­ment. One of the rules is that par­tic­i­pat­ing mas bands could lose 50 per cent of their points if rev­ellers did not wear full cos­tume on Mon­day.

Bands can al­so be dis­qual­i­fied for hav­ing any­one un­der the age of 18 play­ing in the band.Lopez said: "When bands reg­is­tered, they paid mon­ey to the bank for the cat­e­go­ry they wished to com­pete in, and got an elec­tron­ic card up­on do­ing so."Be­fore it is print­ed and hand­ed over, they must sign to in­di­cate that they un­der­stand and shall abide by the rules."I can­not pin­point which band broke which rule. That is a ques­tion for the judges. Un­der the rules band­lead­ers can no longer ma­nip­u­late the sys­tem as the com­pe­ti­tion is no longer un­der the con­trol of just one man."The rules of the com­pe­ti­tion are pre­cise, trans­par­ent and clear and the NC­BA as­sumes that every­one who signed on to par­tic­i­pate in the com­pe­ti­tion un­der­stood them and would ad­here to them."Na­tion­al Car­ni­val Com­mis­sion (NCC) chair­man Al­li­son De­mas con­firmed her or­gan­i­sa­tion had re­ceived a let­ter from at­tor­neys rep­re­sent­ing Ron­nie & Caro, and added, "We ex­pect to get an­oth­er let­ter from the at­tor­neys for Ros­alind Gabriel. The NCC shall for­ward both to the NC­BA."At­tor­neys for the NCC will ad­vise us on what, if any, ac­tion the NCC can take to re­solve this mat­ter, bear­ing in mind that this is an NC­BA com­pe­ti­tion sub­ject to NC­BA rules and reg­u­la­tions."

Ron­nie: We played by the rules on Tues­day

Most vo­cal in chal­leng­ing the re­sults is Ron­nie Mc In­tosh, leader of Ron­nie & Caro, whose pre­sen­ta­tion Riv­er Come Down copped the Down­town Band of the Year ti­tle but failed to make it among the top six in the com­pe­ti­tion or­gan­ised by the NC­BA.Mc In­tosh said, "I am wait­ing on my at­tor­ney to know the next step to take, but I am tak­ing this thing down to the wire."NC­BA is say­ing that we went off route on the Mon­day. We are baf­fled, be­cause we didn't know Mon­day mas is con­nect­ed to Tues­day mas. In the past, Mon­day mas has not af­fect­ed Tues­day's pa­rade. There are not sup­posed to be any manda­to­ry rules for Mon­day."But we ad­hered to the rules of the route on Tues­day. Every­thing was in or­der on Tues­day–the route, the time we spent on stage, every­thing; we stuck to the rules of the com­pe­ti­tion."

Pas­sion leader: I saw it com­ing

Al­so com­ment­ing yes­ter­day, Mas Pas­sion leader and T&T Car­ni­val Bands As­so­ci­a­tion (TTC­BA) chair­man Ger­ard Weekes said, "I pre­dict­ed that Trinidad All Stars would win Band of the Year."

He had felt so be­cause All Stars com­pet­ed on both days in full cos­tume."I took the time and read the rules prop­er­ly and stuck to them," said Weekes. "The 31-page doc­u­ment con­tains sev­er­al rules, all crit­i­cal to the Band of the Year Com­pe­ti­tion and the pa­rade route. The NC­BA re­serves the right to change the rules at its dis­cre­tion."Ap­par­ent­ly most band­lead­ers didn't read the doc­u­ment care­ful­ly. Mere days be­fore Car­ni­val, band­lead­ers rushed and signed the rules."One of the rules was that you could lose 50 per cent of the points if your band didn't wear full cos­tume on Mon­day. All the bands in sep­a­rate cos­tumes on Mon­day could have been dis­qual­i­fied."Many bands al­so didn't know that points award­ed on Mon­day were added to their Tues­day pre­sen­ta­tion. That, too, was in the rules."You could al­so have been dis­qual­i­fied if you had any­one un­der the age of 18 play­ing in your band."Bands could have al­so lost 50 per cent of their points for any route vi­o­la­tion."

Against the rules

NC­BA re­serves the right to dis­qual­i­fy bands if:

�2 The reg­is­tra­tion re­quire­ments have not been met or were sub­mit­ted af­ter the dead­line.

�2 Un­truth­ful, in­ac­cu­rate or mis­lead­ing in­for­ma­tion has been sup­plied.

�2 The band, its band­leader and or its pro­duc­er fails to abide by the rules or the ap­plic­a­ble pro­ce­dures and re­quire­ments re­gard­ing stage per­for­mance.

�2 Band mem­bers and/or its band­leader ex­hib­it be­hav­iour that is dan­ger­ous to them­selves or to the oth­er par­tic­i­pants.

�2 The band fails to ap­pear for its stage per­for­mance.

�2 The band fails to com­pete in full cos­tume on both Car­ni­val Mon­day and Tues­day.

�2 The pro­duc­er fails to amend the reg­is­tra­tion form as to the size of the band and then the band ap­pears in the com­pe­ti­tion with a dif­fer­ent size of band.

�2 The band fails to com­ply with the strict time re­stric­tions re­gard­ing stage per­for­mance at the Queen's Park Sa­van­nah judg­ing venue.

(Source: NC­BA Web site)


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