10 Jan 2017

 The hugely successful maiden hosting of the Kasi 50 Music Festival on the December 31 at Liquor Bars in Francistown has prompted the organisers to turn the festival into an annual event.

The organisers stated that this would revive the seemingly fading entertainment of the second city, particularly during festive seasons. This news was shared by the festival’s head organiser, Tebogo Toteng in an interview with BOPA on Friday.

Toteng explained that the Kasi 50 Music

Festival, which was free to all revellers, was conceptualised this year as a way to mark Botswana’s 50th independence celebration and that the event would change for the better every year.  

The festival, he said, featured Francistown-based musicians, in particular, artistes from Monarch. Hundreds of revellers, he said, thronged the festival venue to dance the night away  to music from 20 local artistes. Some of the artistes that performed at the music festival included the likes of Chase, Star Luu, Bicko Gee, Big Nose, Boiterg T.S.O.O, DJ Stan and DJ Tebza, among others.

Asked why they chose Monarch to host the event, Toteng stated that Monarch was close to his heart as the main sponsor and organiser as he was born and raised in the area.

“There is a misconception about Monarch, that it is a rowdy neighbourhood with criminals of callous nature, but I disagree. This music festival served as a mythical buster to the entire nay sayers and proved the doubting Thomases wrong that Monarch is a peaceful location where revellers can come for entertainment and have fun without any harassment till the wee hours of the morning. I can attest to the public that despite hundreds of revellers who came for the Kasi 50 Music Festival and partied with us till the morning, we recorded no injuries, theft or negative incident whatsoever. The revellers were peaceful and everyone was having fun,” he said.

For security, Toteng noted that they had 15 volunteer security personnel and also had the assistance of the Botswana Defence Force and Botswana Police Service, who were on patrol that night to ensure the music festival ended without negative incidents.

Despite the late marketing and advertisement of the event, Toteng quipped that the huge crowd turn-up really surprised them as they had not expected such a large attendance.

He attributed some of the event’s success to riding on a festive waiver provided to the entertainment industry by the Minister of Youth Empowerment, Sport and Culture Development, Thapelo Olopeng in increasing entertainment hours during the festive season.

“The decision by Olopeng to increase entertainment hours during December really benefited the festival and we are hoping the same extension will be given to Batswana again the end of 2017. Another notable contribution to the success of our event was the support we received from the owners of Big and Bold Bar, Stan and Lillian Grismeir, who allowed us to utilise the space in front of their complex to set up our stage and equipment as well as meet the event’s other needs,”

Toteng said he was impressed by all the acts that took to the stage that night, saying it really show cased the talent that Francistown possesses, especially in Monarch.

For the 2017 edition of this festival, Toteng said they would start planning for it well on time and would also look for sponsors to help pay the perfoming artistes.

Furthermore, he said they would rope in other types of arts to give people variety of entertainment. Poetry and traditional music are some of the genres that will be featured on this year’s Kasi 51 Music Festival.ENDS