Carisa Lee

Re­porter

carisa.lee@cnc3.co.tt

Pres­i­dent of Pan Trin­ba­go, Bev­er­ley Ram­sey-Moore, says the or­gan­i­sa­tion had to pro­vide fi­nan­cial sup­port to sev­er­al pan bands par­tic­i­pat­ing in the Sin­gle Pan com­pe­ti­tion, as the bands have not yet re­ceived gov­ern­ment fund­ing. The pre­lim­i­nar­ies be­gan on No­vem­ber 12.

“Our bands are ready de­spite all the chal­lenges, be­cause nor­mal­ly, be­fore every com­pe­ti­tion, bands would re­ceive their as­sis­tance fees to mo­bilise and get ready. But be­cause of our re­silient spir­it, they were all ready to go,” she said.

“In the steel­pan world, there is so much to do when prepar­ing—set­ting up racks, tun­ing pans, and all of that—so a small fee is nor­mal­ly giv­en to every band to as­sist with mo­bil­i­sa­tion,” she added.

Speak­ing with Guardian Me­dia by phone from To­ba­go, where that leg of the com­pe­ti­tion is cur­rent­ly un­der­way, Ram­sey-Moore said the Na­tion­al Car­ni­val Com­mis­sion, of which she is a mem­ber, is work­ing close­ly with Min­is­ter of Cul­ture and Com­mu­ni­ty De­vel­op­ment Michelle Ben­jamin to en­sure the fund­ing is re­leased soon. She not­ed that with the Na­tion­al Bud­get de­bate con­clud­ing a month ago, the de­lay was ex­pect­ed.

“We have pro­vid­ed sup­port for those that were down and out. We re­al­ly look for­ward to the re­lease so that we can move on smooth­ly,” she stat­ed.

Ear­li­er this year, the Na­tion­al Gas Com­pa­ny (NGC) with­drew spon­sor­ship for three pan bands—Cou­va Joy­lan­ders, La Brea Nightin­gales, and Steel X Plo­sion of To­ba­go. Ram­sey-Moore said pulling spon­sor­ship in Sep­tem­ber, mere months be­fore Car­ni­val, put these bands in a dif­fi­cult po­si­tion.

“Giv­en the no­tice, it’s go­ing to be ex­treme­ly dif­fi­cult for them. But oth­er bands have ex­pe­ri­enced that over the years, and Pan Trin­ba­go will stand by to pro­vide what­ev­er nec­es­sary sup­port,” she said.

The pres­i­dent al­so called on cor­po­rate Trinidad and To­ba­go to as­sist pan bands, not­ing how cost­ly it is to pre­pare for Panora­ma.

Mean­while, for­mer Tourism, Cul­ture and the Arts Min­is­ter Ran­dall Mitchell said fi­nan­cial sup­port for steel­bands is a ba­sic gov­ern­ment oblig­a­tion and urged au­thor­i­ties to sup­port the Panora­ma com­pe­ti­tion and the bands that keep cul­tur­al tra­di­tions alive.

“Steel­bands are safe spaces and so­cial an­chors for young and not-so-young peo­ple all across Trinidad and To­ba­go, and they are worth every pen­ny in­vest­ed in them year­ly by the gov­ern­ment,” Mitchell said.

He added that fi­nan­cial sup­port al­lows bands to plan, pre­pare, trans­port in­stru­ments, and sup­port play­er wel­fare.

Guardian Me­dia at­tempt­ed to con­tact Min­is­ter Ben­jamin, but calls and mes­sages went unan­swered up to news time.

Ram­sey-Moore al­so ad­dressed con­cerns from bands fol­low­ing the Prime Min­is­ter’s an­nounce­ment last week on the can­cel­la­tion of fetes at the Bri­an Lara Sta­di­um due to noise pol­lu­tion. Some bands feared the de­ci­sion might im­pact them. She re­as­sured them that the Prime Min­is­ter is in tune with the pan move­ment, con­sul­ta­tions will take place, and she does not be­lieve the sea­son will be af­fect­ed.