The Gambia government has begun the sensitization and mobilization of the population for the observance of the 9th Roots Festival, a biennial event which will be staged this year from 30 May to 7 June 2008.
In a television discussion programme on Monday night, the director general of the National Council for Arts and Culture and the chairperson of the Festival Organizing Committee said the campaign has began early because the programme planned for visitors from the diaspora in search of their roots is unprecedented and designed to involve people in all parts of the country.
The festival will start on 30 May with a carnival procession from the outskirts of the city of Banjul into the July 22nd Square, according to the programme.
There will then be a welcome ceremony at the square featuring an address by President Yahya Jammeh.
This will be followed by a display of Gambian culture with performances, dance and song by the country’s different ethnic groups as well as groups from countries in the sub-region.
The next day will feature a colourful regatta on the Gambia river, including a boat race.
In the subsequent days there will be a trip by boat across the river to Juffure, the celebrated birth place of Kunta Kinteh, who was captured in the 19th century and taken into slavery in United States of America.
Centuries later, his great great grand son, Alex Haley, immortalized the story of his enslavement in a family saga televised in as series titled “Roots” and also documented in a book of the same title.
The television series mesmerized America and became a worldwide phenomenon.
More cultural events will follow in Juffure where the visitors will be able to call on the Lady Alkalo, the village chief.
Another boat trip will bring the visitors to a wharf town in Bwiam, across the river, and through the Bintangbolong, a tributary of the river Gambia, to join road transport for a short overland trip to Kaninlai, President Jammeh’s village of birth.
Another destination is to the island town of Janjanbureh, in Central River Region, where cultural performances will be staged.
The programme will climax in Kanilai where initiation ceremonies into adulthood will be staged for the visitors.
The visitors, mainly descendents of ancestors from Africa, will be coming from the United States and United Kingdom.