Arts
UgaFest; Uganda’s international culture and heritage expo, in offing
Chairperson Board of Trustees UNCC Sam Kelo Okello adressing the press at Media Center.
Uganda National Cultural Centre (UNCC) has embarked on a campaign to persuade all stakeholders in the culture and heritage industry to join them in organising and holding one single cultural festival dubbed UgaFest.
According to Robert Musiitwa, the UNCC Public Relations Manager, they have tentatively set September 21 – 23, 2020 as the date for the first edition of UgaFest.
Musiitwa told The Sunrise that UgaFest seeks consolidate all cultural-oriented events into Uganda’s annual international festival that will be marketed for tourism purposes both locally and internationally.
“UgaFest seeks to merge the annual UNCC Festival with several similar cultural events that are organised by other players into one big event that we can market internationally,” Musiitwa said.
Regional cultural centres
In the meantime, UNCC has revealed plans to develop four regional cultural centres in upcountry areas as a way to promote the development and conservation of culture in those areas.
While addressing a news conference at the Uganda Media Centre in Kampala, Sam Okello, the Chairperson of the UNCC Board of Trustees said the regional centres will offer people in those regions a platform to showcase their cultures, which will translate into jobs being created and revenue generated to sustain the promotion and preservation of culture in those regions.
“Together with the cultural center, we are setting a one stop center; one of the benefits will include income for artists, employment and revenue,” said Okello.
“We need to move away from the concentrated area which is Kampala. We want to try and develop artists who are based in regions so that they can also become national icons,” Okello added.
Uganda National Cultural Centre commonly knowns as National Theatre has over the years been the only national home for artists.
Also, UNCC has noted that it plans to undertake cultural exchanges with countries like India, Turkey, Arab Republic of Egypt and Islamic Republic of Iran among others as as way to promote Uganda’s culture internationally.
Last year Okello led a group of artists under Mzizi Ensemble, to visit India where they represented Uganda at different cultural events.
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