By Lerato Matheka
MASERU — The Econet Telecom Lesotho Morija Arts and Cultural Festival has engaged a new events organising company.
The director of the annual festival, Thabo Leanya, told the Weekender that the popular gala will this year be co-ordinated by Consumer Connectedness Events Company (C2).
C2 is a South African company that is also involved in the running of the annual Mangaung Cultural Festival in Bloemfontein.
“The festival committee has appointed C2 to oversee the marketing and public relations campaigns of the event,” Leanya said.
“The company is famous for organising the Mangaung Cultural Festival in Bloemfontein hence its resume speaks for itself.”
He said C2 had suggested that the Econet Telecom Lesotho Morija Arts and Cultural Festival be moved to the last week of October.
“The festival is going to be very different from the past galas,” Leanya said.
“The month of October would see extensive celebrations.
“The first week would cater for the festival’s school cultural competition between 11 districts including Semonkong.
“The actual festival would be hosted for four days as usual, starting from Thursday the 28th to Sunday the 31st.”
Last year the festival started on September 30 and ended on October 4.
He said moving the dates was also likely to boost attendance because the “last week of September is still a bit chilly for an outdoor activity, forcing people to think twice about attending”.
Leanya said they were looking to engage a large number of local artists “because the festival should benefit Basotho”.
“We are going to have road shows where local artists would get a chance of promoting their projects while helping create the hype for the festival,” he said.
“We are already having meetings with associations that represent artists so as to identify potential participants.”
Leanya said they also planned to “meet the public half-way” by providing transport to and from Morija, about 40km from the capital Maseru.
