The Tribune

By KHRISNA RUSSELL

Deputy Chief Reporter

krussell@tribunemedia.net

TWO major Junkanoo groups yesterday blamed a lack of funding for their decision to scrap participation in the 2019 New Year’s Day Junkanoo parade.

Despite previous reports that Music Makers and Prodigal Sons had been disqualified from participating in the parade, officials from both Category A groups said seed funding from the government was simply insufficient and forced their choice to sit out.

However, as the receipt of seed funds is a contractual obligation, President of the Junkanoo Corporation of New Providence Silbert Ferguson said one of the groups – Music Makers – will have to pay back half the money.

While Music Makers signed an agreement to receive $30,000 in seed funding, Prodigal Sons only received $15,000.

The $30,000 seed contract stipulates there must be participation in both Boxing Day and New Year’s Day parades. Any group receiving $15,000 is only expected to show up for the Boxing Day parade.

Both groups were disqualified in the Boxing Day parade and blamed congestion in the set up area for not being able to assemble on time and as stipulated to participate.

Mr Ferguson said: “When you sign an agreement with the government of The Bahamas for seed funding for Junkanoo it says two parades. If you sign a $30,000 contract with them it’s for two parades. The Music Makers only participated in one parade they will have to return $15,000 to the government.

“The Prodigal Sons as I understand it also received the $15,000 and they performed in one parade. They have nothing to return.”

Neither group pushed back against the possibility of having to return seed money, but they explained the funds are insufficient and were used as they should have been. Mr Ferguson also confirmed that both groups gave the JCNP advance notice that they would not attend the New Year’s Day parade, which gave the organisation sufficient time to plan.

According to Music Makers treasurer Perry Thompson, showing up for both parades was also a challenge in the 2017-2018 parade cycle. However, he said this year all of the seed money was exhausted on the 2018 Boxing Day parade when it should have covered both parades.

“We didn’t come out and the primary reason was from lack of funding,” Mr Thompson said yesterday. “We got $30,000 from government, $15,000 for each parade. That was supposed to assist us for Boxing Day and with the New Year’s Day.

“Quite frankly government has been our sponsor for the last several years so the $30,000 that we get we put into one pool to assist with the preparation of our costumes. Commonwealth Bank came in to assist us with a portion. Outside of Bahamas Telecommunications Corporation, who helps with the girls, that’s it.”

He also said: “So we are really in a serious predicament when it comes to funding. That has always been our challenge and continues to be the challenge today. Despite that, we do this for the love of Junkanoo. We appreciate the culture called Junkanoo, we love the culture and whatever it means we will be a part of it. It doesn’t discourage us from wanting to come to Bay Street.

“The only discouragement is not being able to obtain funding to be able to compete on the same level as the rest of the major Junkanoo groups.”

Asked to reveal when the group knew it was not possible to rush in the New Year’s parade, Mr Thompson said: “We were hoping and expected some things to come through and tried to meet with certain hierarchy people but that fell through so that put a dilemma on us trying to get the extra funding. It wasn’t for lack of preparation.

“Even with Boxing Day it was a whole lot of challenges that the public didn’t know about. We were held up from 7.42pm until 9pm. The police wouldn’t let us through so we weren’t able to assemble how we needed to. So we had to start up with the brass not lined up properly, with the girls not lined up properly. That was a main source of the disqualification.”

But Mr Thompson added that in his view to disqualify groups is “tasteless and insensitive”.

As for returning the seed money, he said: “That is a decision the government of The Bahamas has to make at the end of the day. Because for me it’s not like the funds weren’t used, they were used properly and adequately and if you look at the size of the group we were bigger than last year, the costumes were pretty (and) they were colourful.”

For his part, Prodigal Sons leader Eric Knowles said his call to not participate was due to the lack of funds to pay for trucks to transport costumes and show pieces. He told The Tribune he usually uses personal funds in addition to seed money, but these were exhausted.

He said: “We received help from the ministry. It was like $15,000 for one reason or the other and it contributed to the support that we would have gotten but we missed some parades based on Hurricane Matthew. And I honestly believe that that basically hampered our effort to get full funding so we got half which basically funded one parade in the A category. We wanted to do the New Year’s Day but financially I just didn’t have it.

“We got $15,000 everyone else got their $30,000. If we had gotten maybe another five thousand it would have covered our trucking issue.

“You could have the stuff but if you don’t have the money to pay the fellas to bring the trailer head and stuff they ain’t moving.”

Regarding whether he would return seed money, Mr Knowles said: “We got half of the seed funding. But if the ministry is pressing us to give some of that back then I guess we have to comply. Even though we got half of it that should have been for one parade which we did.”