And while some of Belizean music's big names were at the launch, they were notably missing from today's House Committee Meeting in Belmopan, where stakeholders in the entertainment industry were given the opportunity to voice their concerns about the new trade licensing bill.
In fact, only about ten artists, promoters, and music associations showed up - along with other organisations such as BCCI and Belize City Council.
But those that did attend made full use of the time allotted to make their presentations. Many of them felt left out of the consultation on such an important decision and voiced the need for more discussions, while others feel that taxing those in a struggling industry shouldn't even be an option.
Courtney Menzies was at the National Assembly today - where the media was allowed inside the Committee Meeting room for the first time - and has this story.
Artists, promoters, and NGO's walked up the stairs of the National Assembly - many of them for the first time - to give their opinion on the Trade Licensing Bill, which would see more money out of their pockets.
And inside the Committee Meeting, everybody got their chance to speak and many of them shared the same sentiments - more consultation is needed:
Dina Halsall, Ascenthium
"We requested a 2-5 year grace period for them to conduct a census and a proper sensitisation of the industry. We realised that speaking on the bill specifically was actually unethical because of the fact that they not consult our industry or any stakeholders within the creative economy. So instead of speaking on the bill directly, we wanted to open the conversation more to what we wanted to see being done in the future, how they could actually implement the good that they thought the bill would have implemented for us into our industry and we had that conversation, they seemed energetic to do something about it, and we hope that energy persists throughout."
Andazi Panton, Flavaz Entertainment
"We came to voice our opinion because it was clear to us from the way that the bill was written that the entertainment industry was not consulted. Anybody who's actively working in the entertaining industry would be able to clearly point out that the fee schedule that the board has set out is not conducive to the type of income, or lack of income that's being made in the entertainment industry. So we came here to voice our concerns about that, about the fee structure, about the lack of consultation, and the need for proper consultation going forward, and a need for a structure fee base if this license is going to be enacted for the entertainment industry."
And while some are open to further discussions about the licensing fees, others feel that, for now, it should be done away with until the entertainment industry can stand on its own feet.
Musa Abdul Shaheed, Artist
"We basically confused and tell ourselves that we have an industry and our country does not have an industry because I do not have a salary in my phone like someone who works at Transparent BPO or yourself at News 7 that you know what is your salary for the month, I don't know what I say salary for the month, how could I pay tax?"
"Till we create an industry the right way and we have. Concrete identity as a people as to who we are and until we know that we're working at three to four different establishments in our various art forms and we know that our paintings is in some building getting sold, then you can start thinking about a yearly tax to go and perform 100 times for the year or two hundred times for the year but you can't put a tax on someone who is performing two or three times for the year."
River of Fire, Association for Belizean Artists
"We don't get a fee. If we have 5 band members, the best we could do is to say okay $500 for 5 band members, but then we have to take into account all the things it takes for that person to make it to that show and they are talking about a group sell a show for $500 and then they have to pay $200 out of it. So then what is the group going to make and then they are talking about the next aspect of this whole bill is per performance. The trade licensed is supposed to be yearly fee, it don't come by per performance. Thats just totality ridiculous on th government on any part."
And while the industry is still growing, only few of its stakeholders made it out - and the artists that were present weren't too happy about what they feel was a purposeful move.
Dina Halsall, Ascenthium
"The amount of artists in there does not go over 15 and it's sad because this is an industry that's fledgling, it's young, but there's passion here and there's passion from a lot of the creative people, when you hear the music that they make express this intensity you would expect it to translate to something like this today however they took the time to be a part of the BTB meeting and the process that took place there and I think it's sad that those things had to coincidence and like we said earlier, we wouldn't want to call it a divide and conquer tactic, but it doesn't look very good on the unifying voice that we want to present to the government that half of the sector, and we say half because there's such little musicians in this country, is somewhere else when something so important is happening right here."
Guido Gonzalez, Ascenthium
"It doesn't look very good especially since BTB culturally uses a lot of artists to enhance themselves and we do believe taking attention away from this is unbecoming in a perspective."
Courtney Menzies:
"And I'm sure your friends of colleagues were some of those same artists who were at that event, when you talk to them or when they talk to you, do you feel that they have the same views as you guys in relation to the bill?"
Guido Gonzalez, Ascenthium
"Yes absolutely, they share the same sentiments but at the same time, they are trying to prioritise and they're giving them the option to do so. But we wanted to be here to talk about these matters because we think it's incredibly important, if our opnions go unheard and our queries go unheard, the only people that are going to suffer are the artists and whatever undeveloped or unknown future artists that we don't know about."
Musa Abdul Shaheed, Artist
"Very awful turn out, there were some artists that voiced that they would show up, voice that they can't show up because of work but we see them at BTB signing cheques to go and perform an identity that isn't theirs?"
But according to many of these stakeholders, the government - to their credit - listened intently and appeared willing to take their concerns and suggestions into consideration.
Now, they wait with bated breath to see what the next step for this bill will be.
We attempted to ask both Minister Rodwell Ferguson and CEO Valentino Shal for interviews following the meeting but both declined. The chair, Minister of State, Elvia Vega, was also unavailable for interview despite being present in the meeting.
