Dear Editor,

On behalf of the steel pan players/group in the Linden community, especially the up and coming talented students from the Wismar Christian-burg Multilateral School, and also the young players of the Catholic Church, I ask, can someone kindly say what is the present position with regards to the $30M worth of steel pans that were acquired for Carifesta?

It was my understanding that some of the instruments were to be handed over to various sections/steel orchestras across the country to further encourage, keep alive and enhance this type of music and its quality. There are many enthusiastic young people who are patiently waiting to get on board. Now where Linden is concerned, there are mainly only two groups of regular young pan players who are well known in the community: the Catholic Church group and the Wismar Multilateral group.  The Wismar Multila-teral School group have, through love and dedication managed to gain a reputation of their own, attracting attention across the country, and also that of the British High Commissioner’s office; they had the honour of being invited by the wife of the High Commissioner to play at the Queen’s birthday function.

Now the question is this: Was there any handing out as was first mentioned? Will there never be a distribution of any sort to any group in Linden? To date, according to an instructor I spoke with, not a single steel pan has been given to anyone in Linden – why? The instructor further told me that twice he spoke to the Minister of Culture, Dr Frank Anthony, and all he said to him was “not now.” The instructor said he tried to follow up by contacting the ministry, but was told by office personnel that they were not dealing with steel pans. Trying to see the Permanent Secretary, Mr Keith Booker, is tedious – he is never in office. While the Multilateral group is eagerly awaiting some assistance from someone overseas, the condition of the instruments they are using is wretched. My understanding is that this $30 million worth of steel pan pieces have been locked up since the end of Carifesta, even although Mashramani is around the bend. Can someone shed some light in this regard?

Yours faithfully,
Frank Fyffe

Editor’s note
We are sending a copy of this letter to Minister of Culture, Dr Frank Anthony, for any comments he may wish to make.