The Sunday News
Peter Matika, Senior Life Reporter
IT was a show envisaged to be one of the biggest in the city with a godly line up consisting of Jamaican star Busy Signal, South Africa’s Busiswa, Judgement Yard, ZimDancehall stars Winky D, Sir Calaz, Killer T, Tocky Vibes and local rapper Calvin (that Luveve Boy). It was one not to miss.
It was indeed going to be a historic event, but it has instead gone down in history as one of the biggest and most disastrous flops in entertainment history.
The reason given for the alleged poor and pathetic show pointed fingers at the administration skills of the promoters Y2K promotions.
Rewinding back the minutes to just before last Friday’s disaster which saw fans throwing bottle missiles at the stage and ultimately turning the event into a chaotic warzone, fans had trouble gaining entry into the show due to a bad ticketing system.
With the main charge being the poor sound system which saw Winky D and his band walking off the stage during his set, fans, one by one began throwing bottles at the stage and the organisers.
With much being said and written about the show, with fingers pointing in every direction, who is to assume the blame for the catastrophe, which left the City Hall car park carpeted with fragments of shattered bottles and debris from broken equipment?
Could it be the artistes, with much blame being laid on Winky D for walking off the stage during his set? Was it the promoter’s inability to secure a quality sound system and security? Or was it the fans for failing to maintain composure and discipline?
Well, some local promoters blame Y2K Promotions, who they say underestimated the city and took the people for granted.
“Stores will never be the same. They never did their homework; this is a prestigious city with prestigious people. The people don’t want to be taken for granted. All the blame lays on them (Y2K Promotions). From the start, their security was pathetic, how could they hire just a handful of cops for such a big event? Gaining entry was also a headache but the highlight was the sound. I mean you have a superstar coming to perform and you hire something that should be used at a children’s birthday parties. That is just unacceptable they deserved what they got and let them continue licking the wounds of their losses,” said a promoter from an award winning agency.
The promoters also accused Y2K Promotions of negligence, stating that it wasn’t in accordance with the city by-laws to sell liquor in bottles.
“Everyone knows that when it comes to such shows anything can happen. Security comes first. You need to invest in security in terms of police and bouncers to maintain crowd discipline. In this case as I mentioned they took it for granted and look at the way things turned out, the City Hall was left with a carpet of broken beer bottles and glass.
“It is against the city laws to sell liquor in bottles at an open show like this, cans are preferable, as they are less harmful and are easy to dispose of,” said the promoter.
