BEPA calls for reopening of concerts
Following last week’s decision by government to allow sports to return to action, local entertainment promoters have made a fresh call for the reopening of the live events and performances.
With COVID-19 continuously causing disruptions across economies, the creative industry has been one of the hardest hit sectors. In Botswana, more than 15 months has so far passed with no action on the live entertainment scene due to the imposed lockdown regulations and curfews.
When the Minister of Youth Empowerment, Sport and Culture Development, Tumiso Rakgare recently announced the return of sport, there was still no talk about opening the entertainment industry. Rakgare could only mention that the annual President’s Day Competitions will not be held when referring to the creatives.
Now, the Botswana Entertainment Promoters Association (BEPA) has come forward arguing that the time has come for the country to return to some normalcy and allow for some live events to be held. Event promoters say they will work with government on the safe opening of the entertainment industry, which involves allowing of a limited venue capacity as well as compliance to all outlined safety protocols.
BEPA president, Gilbert Seagile this week told Arts & Culture in an interview that industry players have gone for far too long without any source of livelihoods, which has led to some being auctioned or served with civil imprisonment charges.
“Events promoters, service providers, performers and all production operators, many of which have already been struggling, are now selling their equipment, cars, music instruments via social media. These are service providers who have been in existence for decades and had employed our fellow Batswana. Hence more service providers’ production equipment has been attached, others have been evicted by sheriffs,” said Seagile.
He also stated that some of their members have been slapped with civil imprisonment as they defaulted in pay back their creditors.
He called on stakeholders to protect and support the entertainment indusrty.
For the safe opening, BEPA suggests that live events be opened at a 30% venue capacity or cap attendants at 100 indoor and 250 outdoor. The association suggested that the events should end at 8pm or be regulated by curfew times.
BEPA said all events must sell their tickets online and must be sold only to those who produce negative tests certificates in order to encourage people to test.
The promoters also suggested that there should be breaks of 30 minutes after every two hours to allow random fumigation.
According to Seagile, the association has done bench marking on the ongoing progress in opening events in the United Kingdom (UK), South Africa, Namibia and Lesotho.
While this is not the first call for the opening of the entertainment industry, the association stressed that without immediate action, the consequences could be dire for the economy as the industry might not be able to recover from this in a long time.