Carnival has begun, so has the bacchanal

Tue, May 27, 2014

The term “bacchanal,” probably of Roman origin, has long been associated with what we would today call “spree” or gay abandon. Over the years it has become twinned with the most prominent festival in the Caribbean, Carnival, a marriage of our colonial past and our African heritage. Sadly, it also has taken on another meeting in Caribbean context, that of controversy and confusion.{{more}}

Unfortunately, Carnival and that adverse interpretation has more and more continued to infect our sense of what the festival ought to be, to the extent that not only is it synonymous with the spirit of spree and gay abandon, but one now almost instinctively associates controversy with Carnival.

It would, therefore, not be a surprise to most of our readers that once again our Carnival season is plagued with controversies, mostly associated with finances and the administration of the festival.

The miracle in all of this, perhaps best explained by our own social contradictions, is that in spite of these inherent contradictions, the festival has continued to grow and develop. Carnival, year after year, makes an invaluable and sometimes incalculable contribution to economic and social life in the Caribbean and is a major factor in attracting tourism spending outside the traditional tourist season. Indeed it is a significant catalyst for intra-Caribbean travel.

In recognition of this, Caribbean governments, and to a lesser extent the private sector as well, are major contributors to the funding of the festival. But the administrative arrangements are still largely state-controlled and therefore subject to all the vicissitudes of the prevailing administrations. This exposes the festival to many of the problems affecting the central government, especially those connected with financing.

A fortnight ago, the local Carnival Development Corporation (CDC), made a public appeal for a quarter of a million dollar bailout by Government to cover debts accumulated from last year. Now, the controversy has deepened with the decision by the CDC to exclude the mas bands from preparing costumes for the contestants in the Miss SVG 2014 show, following a request by the mas bands for payments which have been outstanding since 2013.

When the impasse does not involve the mas bands, it is the soca artistes or the steel orchestras.

While we have come to expect a fresh round of bacchanal each season, this type of controversy and bad blood between the administrators and the components really does nothing to advance the festival. Challenging times such as these call for creativity in addressing the financing of the different aspects of the festival and a willingness to scale back and cut out those aspects of festival which add very little value.