The 2006 edition of the Tobago Heritage Festival opened at a make-shift tent village in the carpark of the Dwight Yorke Stadium in Bacolet last weekend.

Many expressed concerns as the rain belted down for a brief period, resulting in a half-hour delay of the show.

The weather soon cleared and the large crowd in attendance was treated to an explosion of drama, song and dance.

Now in its 20th year, the festival’s spotlight would most certainly be focussed on the two-week premier cultural event of the Sister Isle.

But questions continue to hound the Orville London-administration of the Tobago House of Assembly (THA) for mashing down the Shaw Park Cultural Complex, which was regarded as the home of the Heritage Festival and all other major cultural events in Tobago.

Several cultural activists have condemned the action of the PNM-controlled THA for moving with such haste, to reduce the Shaw Park Complex to mere rubble after it had served the cultural fraternity in the Sister Isle for donkey years.

“We just don’t understand the reasoning behind the plan to tear down Shaw Park without first providing a suitable, alternate venue for big cultural shows in the island,” fumed one man.

“We are not against development, but it would have been better to the THA to build a new performing arts complex at a different location and keep Shaw Park until that new facility was completed,” he argued.

“Now we have to be fishing and looking every time we have a major cultural show to put on. It just does not make sense.

“It would seem that somebody would be making a lot of money renting tents and stage equipment to the THA,” noted the culture man.

TnT Mirror’s probing has also uncovered information that there are problems with the designs for the new performing arts facility, to be constructed at the Shaw Park site.

Meanwhile, Secretary for infrastructure, Witney Alfred, announced during his contribution to the 2006/07 THA Budget debate that a whooping $15 million contract had been awarded for the foundation works phase of the new Shaw Park facility.

This has raised some eyebrows in the Sister Isle, as more questions have surfaced on how the foundation of a facility could be constructed while the final designs remain outstanding.