Carifesta Ten… and then?

There was a poignant symbolism to Carifesta’s homecoming, its return, thirty-six years later, to the place of its birth. The arrival of Carifesta here just over a week ago marked an unplanned diversion from a journey that ought to have taken it elsewhere and the homecoming hype was nowhere near adequate enough to cause the regional cultural festival to fully regain the sense of purpose that it lost in that journey.

Carifesta’s Board of Directors
Carifesta’s Board of Directors

What Guyana did was to grasp a fumbled baton and in so doing to ensure the continuity of a process which, in truth, is in need of fixing so that it can regain a original sense of purpose; and whatever your views on the condition of Carifesta it would be churlish not to applaud Guyana’s decision to take on the job of hosting Carifesta X. If nothing else, that decision served to maintain the agreed periodicity of the event and in that regard the region owes us a debt of gratitude.

Over time, Carifesta has had to take its place in a lengthy queue of weighty regional issues, some of which have perhaps made more persuasive cases for priority attention. Then there is the question of whether or not the region’s political leaders have any real commitment to culture as a vehicle for taking the Caribbean forward or whether Carifesta is not simply a ‘nice thing,’ something that buys governments’ political currency to be spent later, somewhere on the hustings.

When the festival eventually ‘returned home’ to Guyana after its travels of three decades and more throughout the region it bore the distinct resemblance of a prodigal son that had strayed far from all the lofty ambitions decreed at its birth and was in need of nourishment.

The Caribbean celebrates
The Caribbean celebrates

Some of the regional cultural icons said that much during the series of enlightening symposia that were perhaps the centerpiece of an otherwise fairly ordinary festival. They bemoaned the neglect of culture and the sloth in the creation of a more adequate regional publishing and made no secret of their view that the politicians were largely to blame for the ‘cultural condition’ of the region. The best we can do is hope that their pleadings will count for something more than the publicity gained from the high-profile nature of Carifesta X.

Certainly, the point made by Nobel Laureate Derek Walcott – that for all the hype associated with Carifesta there really isn’t much to celebrate in a region where the arts remain undervalued and the creative artists under-recognized – is altogether valid.Walcott’s point ought to form a substantial part of whatever post-event evaluation of Carifesta X eventually surfaces. What happens to that evaluation is, in large measure, a function of the inclinations of the region’s political leaders; and that is a less than reassuring thought.

There is a tiresome boorishness to the propensity by the region’s politicians to want to intrude into every conceivable sphere of ordinary life, to bend everything and, where they can, everyone to their will. It is a practice that manifests itself in the needless complication of fairly straightforward issues, the preoccupation with ‘control’ and the bureaucratization of processes that are best left to run on their own momentum or to be managed by people who know, without interference; and when those processes go askew, as they frequently do, to seek to distance themselves from the consequential chaos.

That is why what is needed is the hastening of the long-recommended process towards the setting up of a regional cultural secretariat, with the vision and the resources to provide a culturally relevant focus for Carifesta. The political leadership of the region – by virtue of their myriad other preoccupations – are by no means the best choice to manage an undertaking of that magnitude. Carifesta needs a permanent, secure home run by expert caretakers.

As far as Carifesta X was concerned, Guyana could really do no more than accommodate the rest of the region’s creative people and their respective offerings for nine days. We could do little more in circumstances of our own under-preparedness; the fumbled ball robbed the event of one year of planning time and in the end Carifesta X was what it was – a link in a chain of continuity.

That having been said we could have done without the glitches like the free-ticket fiasco, the lack of any real sparkle at the opening ceremony, the under-preparedness at some of the venues and the double – booking of two performing groups at the Theatre Guild. Of course, the truth is, that even in the best of circumstances our organizational capacity is often weighed and found wanting, a deficiency that derives from an unfathomable tendency by our planning people to overlook some of the simplest logistical details. Here, the local organizers must take the blame.

The point that must be made here is that while it comes as no surprise that Carifesta’s ‘emergency stop’ here did not bring about the desired transformation of the regional festival, the fact is that no one really expected that to happen. At least, however, we were entitled to expect that shows would begin on time, tickets would be distributed with a measure of efficiency and troupes from sister Caribbean territories would not be double booked for the theatre. At this level those things are simply not excusable.

Here, it is not a question of enjoining a blame game but of wondering aloud as to how many times we will make the same mistakes before we finally learn from them.

On the other hand -and the point is being restated for emphasis – there can be no question of blaming Guyana for what, in the final analysis, was the failure of the event to reinvent itself. That would have taken a bear miracle. Now that Carifesta X has come and gone it is that process of reinvention – rather than the apportioning of blame for the things that went wrong – that must now begin; otherwise, two years hence, it will be more of the same.

Both Henry Muttoo and Al Creighton appear to be singing from the same song sheet with regard to the need for a new incarnation of Carifesta, something that sets the whole thing within a paradigm that is more permanent, more predictable – perhaps a permanent cultural secretariat charged with full-time responsibility for putting the event together. That would serve two purposes. First, it would ensure that the region’s premier cultural showpiece gets the quality of attention that it merits. Secondly, it would remove the responsibility for putting Carifesta together from short-term planning committees overseen by politicians whose agendas cannot always be trusted to coincide with the altruistic motives of the creative artist.

As for what the original purpose of Carifesta really is, that, I suppose, depends on where you stand.. As far as some people are concerned the whole idea is simply to create what we in the Caribbean loosely describe as a cultural melting pot. The problem with the cultural melting pot idea is that it has a tendency to conjure up visions of the very “free for all” to which Henry Muttoo refers and which he says is serving to compromise the quality of the event.

Muttoo has a considerable point. We really need to decide whether Carifesta should accommodate a host of well-intentioned but ultimately under-prepared inputs or whether the whole thing is about a product that is professional as well as pleasing.

What one expects will be a review of Carifesta X that focuses on, among other things, the long-recommended establishment of a regional cultural secretariat which can assume responsibility for the delivery of the Carifesta product every two years.

As far as Carifesta X is concerned, It would of course be easy to take a sort of at-least-we-did-it-anyway posture as a convenient means of evading the kinds of criticisms which, however well-intentioned, are bound to give rise to unkind reactions. This is precisely what Carifesta
does not need. Whenever we have tried to gloss over weaknesses in our society people, ordinary people, simply respond with knowing grins or with cynical expressions. That should not be allowed to happen.

The problem with candid evaluations, of course, is that these often become part of the politics of the event – so that their real significance is lost and their criticisms and corrective recommendations are ‘rubblished’ as partisan prejudices; which is perhaps the primary reason why bipartisan solutions to problems are a rarity in Guyana.

Be that as it may, the worst thing that we can do is to seek solace in the fact that we did it anyway and not to quietly take account of what else we could have done. Such a posture would only serve to undervalue the significance of Carifesta and to condemn the whole thing to the sort of periodic “free for all” which is exactly what it is intended not to be. (Arnon Adams)