Minister: Carifesta cheques being printed

AFTER months of complaining, local artistes can breathe a sigh of relief, as payments for their Carifesta performances are being made.

Dr Nyan Gadsby-Dolly, Minister of Community Development, Culture and the Arts, told Newsday this on Wednesday.

She said: “The payments started last week and are ongoing. We are printing cheques as we speak an all artistes will be paid by the end of next week, barring any queries.”

The 2019 Caribbean festival of Arts (Carifesta) took place from August 16-25 in TT.

The event was established in 1972 to celebrate the arts, foster a vision of Caribbean unity and advance Caribbean culture regionally and internationally. It was also set up to be a catalyst for strengthening Caribbean integration and the bonds between the islands, artisans and cultural practitioners.

Although the public praised this year’s Carifesta XIV, hundreds of singers, dancers, musicians and people behind the scenes such as the stage technicians, sound engineers and set designers were left unpaid. Artistes were upset that their foreign counterparts were paid but they were not.

A number of them took to social media to vent their feelings.