Exciting lineup of Independence events

As of Friday, July 5, 2019

By RIEL MAJOR

Tribune Staff Reporter

rmajor@tribunemedia.net

AN exciting calendar of events has been prepared for this year's independence celebrations.

Activities began on Friday leading up to Independence Day on July 10.

This year's theme is ‘United We Stand Bahamas, Together We Can.’

Mark Humes, MP for Fort Charlotte and chairman of the Independence Anniversary Planning Committee, said the events being hosted this year are geared towards the” general public versus toward the dignitary”. He highlighted two new events in the calendar - the National Pride Folk Festival and the new flagraising events.

Mr Humes said: “There are two events that we are having that will be a first-time event in the celebration. The events that we have planned in particular are the National Pride Folk Festival downtown.

“We wanted to make it more open to the public coming in, so we want Bahamians to know this is really for them. We understand this is the Bahamian independence celebration, so we wanted to make this more about the Bahamian public more so than anything else.”

He added: “We recognised in years gone by we would try to combine the flag raising and pride day celebration into one event and most times that happened on a work day. Fortunately for us this year, we were able to move [Pride Day] to Saturday and we wanted to make it a festival kind of event to encourage people to come out and participate.

“The close-out concert is new as well and we decided that because in the past it would seem as if Independence ended with no sort of celebration, so we decided to end the night with a concert.”

The activities are as follows:

Friday, July 5

Official launch: 10am -1pm, Rawson and Parliament Square

Flag raising ceremony: 6pm, Sarah Ingraham, Mason's Addition, Englerston, Christie, Fox Hill, Salem, Nassau Village, Pinewood and Cynthia Mother Pratt Park.

Saturday, July 6

National Pride Folk Festival: 10am-8pm, Pompey and Marlborough Square

Sunday, July 7

Beat Retreat: 5.30pm, Parliament and Rawson Squares

Live Performances by: The Royal Bahamas Police Force; The Royal Bahamas Defence Force; The Bahamas Correctional Services Band

Tuesday, July 9

Grand Anniversary Celebrations: 8pm, Clifford Park

Ecumenical Service- Cultural Short-changed

Wednesday, July 10

The People’s Love and Unity Rush: 1pm, Bay Street

Independence Close-out Concert Celebration, Clifford Park

Gospel Concert 7pm-9pm

Secular Concert 9pm- midnight

Well_mudda_take_sic 5 years, 4 months ago

As we approach Independence Day, we find we have:

No reliable source of electrical power;
A failed public health system that is more likely to kill than heal;
A D- public education system that is short changing our children who are supposed to be the future of our country;
Grocery store prices through the roof, forcing us to eat cheaper unhealthy foods;
Horrendous airport taxes making airfares prohibitive for most Bahamians;
A banking sector and economy suffering from the serious ill-effects of the criminal enterprises run by the corrupt racketeering numbers bosses;
A country over-run by illegal immigrants with all sorts of undesirable consequences for our standard of living, including the wiping out of our Bahamian culture;
A failed political system dominated by two equally corrupt parties (FNM and PLP), both of which have demonstrated for years now their inability to attract competent, honest, hard working and respected politicians with statesman-like qualities and the leadership skills necessary to properly govern our country's affairs and attend to the needs of its people;
Successive governments with an unfriendly attitude towards the U.S., our bread and butter tourist market;
Successive governments having a very cozy relationship with the ruthless communist regime of Red China, a country well known for bribing easily corruptible politicians in other countries to "buy" as much influence as possible consistent with their world domination motive;
And so on, and so on....

So what is there to really celebrate about this coming July 10th ?!

TheMadHatter 5 years, 4 months ago

100% correct. But you watch....all kind of "jacks" will be out drinking and carrying on. Government can do ANYTHING to Bahamians and they still ga celebrate and "thank God for life". No wonder govt dont tell us where the VAT money gone....they know they dont have to. We are a happly compliant herd of sheep. Turn on the music, and we ga dance bey. Dont tell me bout no problems.

joeblow 5 years, 4 months ago

... yep! -$8 billion national debt with nothing to show for it, despite implementing VAT specifically for that purpose,

-Foreign interests dismantling our competitive edge in the financial services industry for their benefit with our help!,

-an undeterred silent invasion by uneducated, non English speaking, low skilled immigrants, and yes the list goes on and on.

I feel like taking an antidepressant!

bcitizen 5 years, 4 months ago

Light show compliments of BEC/BPL

Well_mudda_take_sic 5 years, 4 months ago

They're gonna turn-off the lights in our homes so they can have their light show!

bogart 5 years, 4 months ago

Light show not compliments of BEC/BPL... but NOT having lightning strike, bad weather, mysterious fire damaging engines, payloader digging up fuel line, chain hanging over wires, dumping garbage by light pole, repeated not enough electricity production.along with talk dis aint going to happen again........don't you know all dese decades, nation funded operations, some bribery also caught too, big salaries, huge overtime payments, experts, former big contract management ... and no reliable production for nation but blackouts problems excuses blamed on someting else and not gross incompetance. lol

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