PANAFEST Opens With Impressive Candlelight Procession

Cape Coast, Aug 30, - An impressive candle-light procession, known to be the most solemn and revered event on the 10-day programme of PANAFEST, ended at the Cape Coast Castle last night, crowning a busy and successful opening day for the third Pan African Historical Theatre Festival. Torches and candles were lit at the Mfantsipim Junction where all marchers had converged by 9 p.m. amidst choral music provided by about ten Cape Coast-based choirs and singing bands. The procession filed slowly through designated routes through Victoria Park to the Cape Coast Castle. Many of the foreign participants said last night's reverential march was their second experience. When the procession finally reached the main court of the Castle, the participants were treated to soothing choral music from a mass choir and other forms of performances put up by visiting groups. All the performances were done in candlelight since lights in the castle had been turned off temporarily pending the inauguration at 12 midnight of newly installed floodlights for Fort St Jago, Elmina, and Cape Coast castles simultaneously. It was Uma Lampe-a 20 member Dutch-Surinamese group and the Jamaican poet Muta Baruka who kept the large crowd lively while they waited for the lights to be turned on. Dressed flamboyantly in attire which made them look more Yoruba or Wollof, members of the Uma Lampe sang and danced to the beat of drums and beaded gourds which they brought all the way from Surinam. The group performed three out of their repertoire, the first of which is called "barja" - a recreational dance song which group leader "Efua" Marian Markelo says is a fusion of West-African and Ameri- Indian musical traditions. The crowd grew hysteric when bare-footed Muta Baruka took over the microphone and started a fiery chain of poetry recitals beginning with "the system". The crowd acknowledged with a thunderous outburst when Baruka yelled out "the system is a fraud. Brother Africans - we got to learn from history. Kwame Nkrumah says only African solutions can solve African problems". In another recital, the Jamaican poet urged the youth of Africa not to be lured to Europe and America for so-called greener pastures because, as he put it, "ino good to stay in a whiteman country too long". Earlier in the day, it was Elmina which went gay as chiefs, 'asafo' companies, tourists, foreign delegations and government officials all converged on the forecourt of the Elmina Castle for another solemn event - the Memorial and Remembrance Day celebration. There was the usual drumming, dancing and musketry but the highlights of the ceremony were wreath laying at the entrance of the slave dungeon in the Castle in memory of African heroes and those who died during the infamous slave trade. Libation was also poured in memory of the ancestors of Edinaman and Ghana followed by a tribute to a long list of Pan-Africanists and black freedom fighters. A ram was slaughtered as a symbol of atonement for all the atrocities which accompanied the slave trade. Delegations from more than 30 countries worldwide are participating in the 10-day festival which is being organized under the auspices of the Organization of African Unity under the theme ''The re-emergence of African Civilization- Uniting the African Family for Development''.