Minister Richards Praises Sugar Mas’ Success

(ZIZ News) — Minister of Culture the Hon Shawn Richards has described the recently concluded Sugar Mas 44 as a success.

Speaking on Freedom Radio’s “Issues” programme on Thursday the Minister thanked everyone involved, from the Carnival Committee to the patrons.

“I’ve been able to speak to quite a large number of persons who have said to me that we had a very good carnival. As such I want to take the opportunity to thank the Carnival Committee, I take this opportunity to say thanks to the patrons, thanks to the sponsors, thanks to the various individuals who would’ve participated in the activities, thanks to everyone who made Carnival the success that it was,” he said.

When asked why the major shows were moved to Port Zante instead of keeping them at Warner Park, Minister Richards said the cricket field was out of the question due to the Nagico Super 50 Tournament.

He said “That had to be taken into consideration if we had taken a decision to use the Warner Park cricket facility to host the Carnival activities. You would’ve needed to give the grass time to recover from any activities taking place there”

He also noted that Carnival Village needed extensive repair.

He said Port Zante solved several problems such as parking, space, and disturbance of nearby residences.

He explained that “In terms of parking I have not heard any complaints coming from anyone because I think we had adequate parking space over there. Persons within residential areas being disturbed…again we did not have that.”

He also stated that “from a logistics standpoint, because of the size of Port Zante I think we were able to nicely place a number of booths down there. Chairs, booths for media houses, VIP section, all of those things were nicely placed.”

He did note that some persons complained about the wind and the cold and he said going forward they would make a decision on whether to return to that site for future Carnival events.