Daraine Luton, Staff Reporter
People's National Party president, Portia Simpson Miller, holds aloft an abeng, a symbolic instrument of the Maroons, at a PNP mass rally at Portia Simpson Miller Square on Tuesday night. - Colin Hamilton/Freelance Photographer
WITH ABENG in hand and, as she claims, victory is in sight, Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller on Tuesday night announced the establishment of a Cultural Industry Development Fund, which she says will give Jamaicans an opportunity to make good on their artistic and cultural talents.
The announcement was a sneak preview of the People's National Party (PNP) manifesto, which will be launched today.
Addressing thousands of party supporters from Region Three, which covers the parishes of Kingston and St. Andrew, at a PNP mass meeting in Portia Simpson Miller Square, Three Miles, the Prime Minister said her Government will be facilitating the development of the cultural industry.
Unbounded creativity
"We know you are blessed with bold energy and unbounded creativity," she said of Jamaican youths.
"So, the little boy with a song in his heart and the little girl who needs a voice, through the Cultural Industries Development Fund which I will establish in my next term when you give me my mandate, you will be able to finance your creative ideas and realise your dreams," Mrs. Simpson Miller said.
"We must find ways to empower the next Bob Marley, Jimmy Cliff, Shaggy, Buju, Gem Myers ... Our entertainers, musicians are giants on the international stage and we are going to work with them. We are going to move the cultural and creative industries by facilitating and supporting them as never seen before," the Prime Minister promised.
She also said that the PNP is committed to the transformation of Jamaica's inner-city communities to what she called 'winner cities'.
The Prime Minister said her party will also be focusingon community development and will be creating more training centres, not just in the urban areas but right across the island.
daraine.luton@gleanerjm.com
