115 steelbands get $$

UPDATED:

Community Development, Culture and the Arts Minister Dr Nyan Gadsby-Dolly yesterday said 115 unsponsored steelbands will receive cheques amounting to $1.3 million to assist with their Panorama preparations.

Gadsby-Dolly revealed this at a distribution ceremony at the ministry in Nicholas Tower, Port of Spain.

She said, “It is a pleasure again to make this investment in the pan industry to be able to assist unsponsored steelbands with their Panorama operations.” On Panorama on Sunday, she commented, “The event was a very good one...I think Pan Trinbago deserves a very warm congratulation for having a well-run, efficient show. I think it finished before 12 am, which is a record at any Panorama. “To see so many young people involved, to see so many people in the wider industry at the pan sites, at the judging sites selling their jerseys, I think it is spreading a wonderful industry and I want to congratulate the pan industry for what they do every year for TT. It is a very positive step.”

She presented cheques to representatives from the four Pan Trinbago regions:Carlan Harewood from the Eastern region (who also collected on behalf of Tobago), Gerard Mendez of the Northern region, David Balbosa from the South/Central region and Keith Diaz, Pan Trinbago president.

Asked if she thought the murder of Japanese player Asami Nagakiya in 2016 would have a negative impact on the perception of pan, Gadsby-Dolly said, “I have seen a number of foreign pannists in the panyards. “Obviously there would be some people who would be (overly concerned) by that type of circumstance, but there are quite a number of other people who would have taken that in stride and still return to TT to take part in the celebrations.”

Asked to comment on a travel-risk advisory from the Government of Canada advising its citizens to exercise a “high degree of caution due to violent crime in TT,” Gadsby-Dolly said, “I have not heard about the travel advisory from Canada, but I have heard about the others that we have had. The fact is, our crime rate would cause people to advise their citizens to be careful, and that is something you have to do around the world, and I don’t think TT is any less safe than anywhere else around the world. All the precautions that anybody else would take in a big city, they would take in TT.”