04 Aug 2025

Four members of the Okavango Deaf Polka Dancers will participate in the 2025 Bay Area Deaf Dance Festival (BAIDDF) in the United States of America from August 6 to 10.

In an interview on Thursday, the Okavango Deaf Polka Dancers team leader, Pinkie Mothibedi expressed delight at the opportunity for the dance group to participate in a festival of such magnitude.

“It is a great milestone for our group to represent Botswana on the international stage. They have always wished to represent the country and raise the Botswana flag high,” she said.

Mothibedi said the festival, billed for San Francisco was a platform for the dance group’s members to meet other equally unique members of the deaf community from across the world.

She said while in San Francisco, the dance group would participate in dance workshops, leadership training for people living with disabilities, training on arts as a business and would also stage a performance.

The dance workshops would teach participants how to discern vibrations, which she said would help them improve their dance craft.

Mothibedi said the festival would be a one-of-a-kind affair as audiences would listen to the music sound through earphones while the performers would detect it through vibrations.

The 15-member Okavango Deaf Polka Dancers group was formally established in 2018 by deaf out-of-school youth.

Mothibedi said the inspiration to form the group followed a performance by the youngsters during a deaf workshop that was organised by the then Okavango Sub District Council in 2017.

She said as part of efforts to support their dream of evolving into professional dancers, members of the group were sent on a benchmarking mission to Kgalagadi region to familiarise themselves with the Polka Dance genre.

As proof that they had since grown, she said they later participated in the National Arts Competitions as the sole deaf group in the Polka Dance category, and have improved their standing over the years.

Mothibedi thanked the sponsors who supported their San Francisco trip such as Ministry of Youth and Gender Affairs, Ministry of Sports and Arts, Uncharted Africa Safaris and others.

The BAIDDF is an annual event organised by Antoine Hunter, artistic director of Urban Jazz Dance Company.

This year’s edition, the 13^th since inception, will attract deaf artists and dance groups and companies from across the world. ENDS