Panorama back on Track

PAN is back on the Track. Yesterday, Pan Trinbago bowed to pressure from supporters and vendors and announced that the two  remaining Pan Trinbago shows to be held at the Queen’s Park Savannah this Carnival would see the steelbands entering from the traditional eastern end and approaching the stage along the popular “Track”. After performance, the bands will proceed west to exit via the Pan Village.

Patrick Arnold, president of Pan Trinbago, made the announcement at a media conference, stating that the decision to revert to the traditional entrance for Panorama shows followed meetings with vendors located along the Track who complained bitterly about the lack of business caused by moving the entry point from east to west at the Panorama semi-finals on February 16. Arnold said: “We took the decision on Saturday, and for the semi-finals of the single pan bands held last Sunday, about 21 of the bands were placed on the east end before the show started.” He said that for the Panorama finals this Saturday, bands will enter from the east and this would apply for any other show for the rest of the season. He added that it was never Pan Trinbago’s intention for anybody to suffer any hardships.
The only other Pan show at the Savannah will be at the Dimanche Gras show on Carnival Sunday night.  Arnold acknowledged that the vendors, who had been hardest hit by the change, had supported them in the past so now was the time for Pan Trinbago to support them.

He knocked the National Carnival Commission (NCC) for having the majority of vending booths built on the eastern end of the savannah, after he made the initial announcement to change the entry point from east to west. The switch from east to west caused many complaints not only from vendors but from panmen who were crowded into a small space called the Village. One result of this was that any attempts at tuning up for the stage resulted in bedlam. Members of the public who prefer to see the bands on the Track were also disappointed having to stand in an area where rain had turned the ground into mud. While the bands and the public were at the western end of the Savannah, the vendors were on the eastern side facing an empty track and no customers.

But Arnold chastised Kafra Kambon, chairman of the Emancipation Support Committee, for the latter’s attacks on him and his organisation for the move and said unlike him, the executive and members of Pan Trinbago have always sought the pan men and women’s best interest.  “We always had a close relationship with the vendors, we had provided them with a space here because the pannists themselves need the vendors and since Saturday we decided to help them so it isn’t anything that anyone forced us into doing,” he said. “Kambon could have come into the office and had a little dialogue with Pan Trinbago instead of going to the press,” Arnold said. He warned Kambon: “Stay away from Pan Trinbago, we could handle our business and we could deal with the vendors.” It was also announced yesterday that Pan Trinbago might reconsider its decision about live television coverage of the Panorama finals once the national television station could assure Pan Trinbago that they can do something about piracy of the show. “Hopefully we could get TTT to find a way so that they could have some kind of a scrambling device,” he said. “We don’t mind TTT broadcasting our show but we are worried about the piracy.

“This is our problem. If they could find a way to stop that, we would allow the live broadcast of Panorama but we can’t really be broke on Ash Wednesday, and other people are rich off the movement.” However, Arnold said they are still working with TTT and hopefully they will come to some kind of arrangement where the show can be aired live. Pan Trinbago is also working with TIDCO for a webcast of the finals to some areas in the North American region as a form of revenue out of this year’s event.