Kali­fa Clyne

Pres­i­dent of Pan Trin­ba­go Kei­th Di­az says the or­gan­i­sa­tion may need to cre­ate a big­ger space for the Greens sec­tion for the 2015 Panora­ma semi­fi­nals event.He said that af­ter an­nounc­ing that this year saw the largest turnout ever for the coun­try's biggest steel­band com­pe­ti­tion.Di­az said the fi­nal de­ci­sion would be made af­ter dis­cus­sions with the ex­ec­u­tive of Pan Trin­ba­go. The dis­cus­sions were ex­pect­ed to be­gin yes­ter­day.

He was speak­ing to the me­dia af­ter a cheque hand­ing-over cer­e­mo­ny yes­ter­day at the Min­istry of Arts, Nicholas Tow­ers, In­de­pen­dence Square, Port-of-Spain.At the cer­e­mo­ny Min­is­ter of Arts and Mul­ti­cul­tur­al­ism Lin­coln Dou­glas for­mal­ly hand­ed over cheques of ei­ther $10,000 or $20,000 to sev­en of over 178 un­spon­sored small and medi­um steel­bands.The cheque amounts de­pend­ed on the size of the steel­band.This is the third year the min­istry has giv­en fi­nan­cial as­sis­tance to un­spon­sored steel­bands.

Dou­glas said every year the cor­po­rate spon­sor­ship for steel­bands de­crease.Di­az, who al­so said their was a lack of will­ing­ness from cor­po­ra­tions to spon­sor steel­bands, said Pan Trin­ba­go sup­port­ed steel­bands through mon­ey raised from the Greens."We were told by the min­istry that we need­ed to try to find ways to gen­er­ate funds."This year had the largest crowd for Panora­ma semis and we will con­tin­ue to try to make it hap­pen," he added.Di­az said the Greens was one of the more in­no­v­a­tive ideas in T&T Car­ni­val.

"Sim­ple peo­ple thought about it. We cre­at­ed a new thing and a new space to get young peo­ple to come to the pan," he added.Di­az said part of the prof­its made from the Greens were giv­en to the 82 steel­bands who par­tic­i­pat­ed in the semi­fi­nals of the com­pe­ti­tion.He said peo­ple may not see the ben­e­fits now but Pan Trin­ba­go's vi­sion was to de­vel­op the steel­pan and pan play­ers.Asked if the con­tro­ver­sial Pan Splash pool would be back for next year's semi­fi­nals, Di­az said it would have to be dis­cussed.