There will be fireworks at midnight tomorrow at the BTL Park. The event will be the opening of Youth Week. The first event on the schedule is an open day tomorrow at the BTL which will culminate in the evening with a “Mic to Mic” rap competition. It is a spin off from the peace rally held earlier this year by the “Artist Response to Crime” group. The organizer is Joseph Stamp Romero.
Joseph Stamp Romero, Organizer
“We are looking for the top six rappers and you know a lot of young people love to rap and we’re trying to find who the best are. I think this is a spin-off from the Artist Response to Crime event that we had recently and this is a good medium to give young people a chance to come out and express themselves through the rap medium. It is a positive event and it is for a worthy cause, to let young people know that we want them to perform and we want them to perform in a positive way. We want to offer that medium for them to perform and enjoy themselves.”
Keith Swift,
“And why do you think providing that medium is important?”
Joseph Stamp Romero,
“It is very important when you look at the event, the Artist Response to Crime event, you saw a lot of young people wanting to come out and just sing and so you have to give them something to do. You can’t say put down the gun and then give them nothing to do. They have to have something to do to occupy their times. So when there is no school there has to be something else and so there are young people from school being attracted to this event and people who are out of school. But there has to be a medium for them to vent.”
Top prize in the rap competition is one thousand dollars. That starts at 7 but it is only one of the events at tomorrow’s opening. Lincoln Flowers told us about some of the other ones.
Lincoln Flowers, Youth for the Future
“We will be having the rap competition that Mr. Stamp talked about followed by a Digicell text message competition. So all the youths could come out with their Digicell cell phone and there will be a competition. We can’t disclose the rules because we don’t want to give nobody no advantage but it will be fun, it will be something easy, you could win a brand new phone.
Hon. Penner will be giving an address to the youths to declare the National Youth Week 2009 open and after this there will be a live fireworks display at 12 o’clock to bring in Youth Week 2009.
As the theme says, ‘Youths take a stand.’ This is our chance to show that we are not only violent people, we are not only people that shoot guns, steal, rob. We also have talent and the only way to show our talent to the country is by coming out and expressing ourselves. So come out it is all free, it is for the youths, this is your week, and you have to appreciate it. Come on, get in the fun, lot of prizes, lot of activities, you could contribute in your own special way.”
The week will continue with an all day basketball marathon on Tuesday, a role model forum on Wednesday, and the youth awards on Friday.
