By Juliet ETEFE
A festival that celebrates and showcases the rich cultures of the country’s diverse communities, dubbed the ‘Cultural Oneness Festival’, has been scheduled to take place at Tamale in the Northern Region from November 13 -16, 2024.
Themed ‘Leveraging on our Strength for Shared Growth and Prosperity as One People’, the festival seeks to promote cultural awareness and unity, unique traditions, arts and music.
The Cultural Oneness Festival is expected to contribute to fostering mutual understanding and consolidating unity while developing and growing the tourism industry and attracting investment.
It will feature a diverse range of activities, including tours of tourist sites, a cultural durbar, and an economic development business forum where investors and think tanks from different sectors will dialogue on issues of economic transformation, focusing on areas such as agriculture, tourism, arts and culture, youth development and entrepreneurship through digitisation and many others.
The activities will also include an immersive street carnival, a fashion show and a musical concert.
The Chief Executive Officer of The Taste of Afrika, organisers of the Cultural Oneness Festival, Tengol K. Kplemani, speaking at the official launch in Accra, holds strongly that it’s about time the country united in its diversities while promoting its cultural heritage, adding that at large, the diverse cultural heritage of the African continent needs to be deliberately promoted.
He is hopeful that just as last year, the festival will contribute to promoting unity and inter-cultural cohesion and present a platform for Northern Ghana to be showcased to the diaspora as one of the country’s interesting tourism destinations for lovers of unspoiled cultures and adventure.
Executive Director of the National Commission on Culture, Nana Otuo Owoahene Acheampong, noted the country making meaningful progress requires that it embrace its culture and all its manifestations while at the same time welcoming contemporary initiatives, but with caution.
“For us to make any meaningful progress as a nation, we need to embrace our culture and all its manifestations while at the same time welcoming contemporary initiatives, but with caution. We are all aware that today, globalisation has rendered a lot of cultures around the world susceptible to pressure from foreign cultures, forcing many cultures to be on the brink of extinction,” he said.
He added that as the country gets closer to another election era, promoting cultural harmony and oneness among the citizenry is crucial.
In his remark, His Royal Highness Jira Buipewura Adbulai Jinapor II, Paramount Chief of the Buipe Traditional Council, urged that the organisers and the country as a whole remain resolute in its commitment to celebrating cultural diversity, promoting dialogue and harnessing the profound potential of culture to effect positive change.
The festival, he said, “shows the level of commitment in promoting, projecting and redefining the cultural landscape of our desired creative pursuits.”
He also acknowledged the sponsors and lauded the initiative, saying: “Your collective commitment and effective collaboration propelled our shared vision for a more vibrant and inclusive cultural realm.
“Your voices possess the transformative power to ignite conversations, innovations, change and a prerequisite for pro-activeness in the course of the true vision of cultural oneness. May your creativity and innovation continue to illuminate the world, inspiring generations yet unborn.”
Others, including the Executive Chairman of the African Tourism Board, Dr. Cuthbert Simphiwe Ncube, lauded the Cultural Oneness Festival initiatives while emphasising that it’s an add-on to the continent’s efforts to showcase its cultural heritages.
The four-day event is being organised by The Taste of Afrika, in close collaboration with the Harlem Tourism Board, African Tourism Board, Northern Development Authority, National Commission on Culture and Ghana Tourism Authority.
