“In a country like ours that is just emerging from many years of despotism, we need culture to generate national dialogue and consensus.” These were the words of the minister of Tourism and Culture, Hamat N.K Bah, at the opening ceremony of the 3rd Kankurang Festival, held in Janjanbureh, Central River Region.
The event was supported by the Youth Empowerment Project in collaboration with the National Centre for Arts and Culture and its partners.
The objective of the festival is to enhance the development of Janjanbureh as a tourism destination; promote youth employment in the areas of creative tourism, while extending sustainable socio-economic and cultural benefits of tourism in rural Gambia.
The festival showcases various Gambian masquerades such as the Kankurang, Gesseh, Fairy, Hunting, Kumpo, Ifangbondi, Zimba, and among other masquerades both in the Gambia and Senegal.
Further in his speech, the Minister opined that through our shared heritage such as masquerades, languages and rituals, we can always arrive at solutions to our political and social differences. “Through our shared cultural heritage,” he added, “we can build a united and prosperous Gambia”.
He noted that the 3rd edition of the Janjanbureh Kankurang festival is based on the significance of Gambia’s cultural heritage for national development as espoused in the National Development Plan (NDP) of the Government of His Excellency President Adama Barrow.
Through culture, he said, jobs can be created in the creative heritage industries such as music, dance, community museums, tour guiding, film, and photography. Therefore, he added, the youths can get jobs and secure livelihoods. “Tax revenue from royalties of copyright of cultural products can help us generate more monies for our treasury,” he said.
While emphasising the importance of funding in developing our heritage and creative sector, Mr Bah announced his plan to develop a National Fund for Culture to help put more funds on the table for the development of our heritage. Through that fund, festivals like this one and similar activities will get funding,” he disclosed.
He commended the organising committee of the festival and thanked the Youth Empowerment Programme for their support; the board and staff of NCAC; Gambia Tourism Board and the Gambia Tourism and Hospitality Institute and the National Commission for UNESCO.
Speaking on the topic, ‘Significance of cultural heritage: masks and masquerades’, Hassoum Ceesay, the Director General of the National Centre for Arts and Culture said in traditional African societies, festivals serve to galvanise the community in a celebration of life, as it helps the people know that they are alive and also provide the opportunity to relieve the tensions and drudgery of everyday life.
Deputising for the YEP project manager, Ngoneh Panneh, YEP’s Tourism and Creative Industry adviser said the goal of the festival is to preserve culture and heritage. She added that there is overwhelming need to recognise the vital role that cultural and arts festivals play in fulfilling our global need for increased intercultural dialogue; our understanding of diversity and the promotion of harmony.
Maimuna Sidibeh, Senior Programme Officer, National Commission for UNESCO, explained that the intangible cultural heritage also looks at traditions or living expressions inherited from ancestors and passed on to our descendants in the form of oral traditions, performing arts, social practices, rituals, festive events, knowledge and practices concerning nature and the universe or the knowledge and skills to produce traditional crafts. However, she noted, in the face of growing globalisation, intangible cultural heritage is vulnerable to the pressures of change.
The Kankurang tradition is a true and deeply moving expression of local culture in Gambia and Senegal which ensures order, justice, and the collection of complex know-how. On such occasion, young circumcised boys are to learn the rules of behaviour for of community, the secrets of plants and their medicinal values, and hunting techniques. It is an empowerment of the young people of Mandinka in order to enforce the rules set out by their society. It is an expression of a common culture in order to live in peace with nature and other humans.
