Dancers devour live animal at NAFAC

WA, Nov. 24, GNA - A group of dancers from the Sissala East District of the Upper West region stunned audience at the on-going National Festival of Arts and Culture (NAFAC) at Wa on Thursday when they took turns to eat a live goat as they performed their traditional "bayile" dance.

When the dancers appeared in the inner perimeter of the festival grounds with the live goat to do this rare show, those who had never seen the dance before, found it difficult to believe that the animal was brought for a raw feast.

Many of them were therefore scared and dumbfounded when the dancers followed each other to bite the flesh of the goat and suck its blood until it was dead.

They continued to devour it before the Master of Ceremonies stopped proceedings and beckoned them to their stand.

According to indigenes from the area, hunters usually perform the dance on the death of a prominent chief of the area.

The group performed along side other cultural groups from the Eastern and Volta regions, which had their turn to showcase their indigenous dances and drama performances to the admiration of the public.

Cultural troupes from the Volta Region demonstrated their crowd pulling "agbadza" and "agboko" and "borborbo" dances, while the Eastern Region exhibited their prowess in "fontonfrom" music, "kete" and "adua" dances and other performances from the Krobo area of the region. Mr Kofi Dzamesi, Volta Regional Minister called on Ghanaians to use the nation's culture to enhance its socio-economic development.

He spelled out the cultural and linguistic diversity of the region and said the Nkonya-Alavanyo and Peki-Tsito conflicts which were well known through out the country were now virtually past conflicts.

He dispelled the wildly held view that the region was composed entirely of Ewes, saying, it was a land of contrasts with 16 languages and 41 dialects and had the largest pool of artisans in the country. Mrs. Susana Mensah, Deputy Eastern Regional Minister, said the country's current political and economic predicaments were its own making and not so much of the colonists and neo-colonists.

"We are all culpable as a result of our own mismanagement, greed, corruption, incompetence and negative tendencies.

She said it was culture at should determine the types of goods and services, which consumers may want to procure and therefore inform an investor to be attracted to that particular sector.