AS THE curtain come down today on CARIFESTA X after a largely fulfilling and energising impact on this nation since its ceremonial launch on August 22, discussions have already begun between Guyana and The Bahamas on plans by the latter to host the 11th Caribbean Festival of Creative Arts.

Hiccups in staging arrangements for some programmes at scheduled venues may not have gone according to plans, for varying reasons. But this, unfortunately, has been the experience at previously held CARIFESTAs, including the last two held, respectively, in Suriname and Trinidad and Tobago.

However, according to officials of both the Guyana Ministry of Culture and the Caribbean Community Secretariat, the few disappointments apart, CARIFESTA X has been encouragingly “quite successful.” Its unique features, that included religious themes and placed significant emphases on the youth, will be among aspects to be referenced in the years ahead.

Host country for CARIFESTA XI, The Bahamas, undoubtedly stands to benefit from the experiences gained from Guyana’s staging of CARIFESTA X on a large scale, well beyond its capital with events at major regional centres.

It is to be noted, in passing, that The Bahamas was originally scheduled to stage the 12th CARIFESTA in 2012, but Trinidad and Tobago managed to work out a switch that resulted in the Bahamian government having the honour to do so in 2010 instead. Whether this has something to do with scheduled general elections in Trinidad and Tobago in 2012 may be coincidental.

For its part, Guyana — where this premier regional festival had its inauguration 36 years ago — had taken on a mammoth challenge of hosting this now closing 10th CARIFESTA with just a year to plan and execute, after a new administration in Nassau decided that it could not go ahead with the arrangements of its predecessor.

Hailed as the “embodiment of Caribbean integration,” CATIFESTA has assumed, according to the Caribbean Community Secretariat, “a pre-eminent place among the elements that define and give expression to the uniqueness of our Caribbean reality…”

This observation is perhaps a good reminder for an opposition party in Guyana that chose to engage in a politically immature game of “hide-and-peep” during CARIFESTA X, while Guyanese of ALL affinities, ethnicities and cultural streams were openly celebrating various aspects of diversity in our ways of life.

We extend congratulations to all the overseas contingents and, naturally, all at home who had something to do with making CARIFESTA 2008 the success it has proven to be. Best wishes to all leaving our shores, energised by the spirit of CARIFESTA X with its central theme to remember: ‘One Caribbean, One Purpose: Our Life, Our Culture’.