Govt probes music tender awards

LEKOPANYE MOOKETSI
Correspondent | Monday July 22, 2013 00:00

 

Acting deputy director of the Department of Arts and Culture, Bopelo Gaothuse, said he was not going to talk about the sound equipment failure since they were going to launch an investigation.  'It is an internal issue that we are going to address,' he said.

The national finals for the contemporary music category had to be pushed to another day after technicians tried to fix the sound problems the whole day (Saturday) but failed. The contemporary music competition, which covered back track artists, promising artists, live bands and DJs' categories, was supposed to start at 9 am, but the technicians were still grappling with the equipment late in the afternoon.  At some stage, Department of Broadcasting Services (DBS) technicians were also giving a helping hand. 

Apparently the company had started to assemble the sound equipment that morning.  Usually for shows of that magnitude, the stage and sound equipment are set overnight.  Fearing that it was getting dark, the clearly embarrassed Department of Arts and Culture officials had to postpone the show to Monday.  An employee of the department, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said they had been let down by the company.   He said the inconvenience forced the Department to engage another company for the Monday show.  

He was disappointed that company officials were not even answering their phones when called to map the way forward.Despite the Saturday mishap, one of the artists, who performed on Monday, DJ Bunz, said the competition was well organised.  He added that the sound system that was used on that day was superb.