Regional tensions still a worry for promoters ahead of Carnival 2026

Carisa Lee

Re­porter

[email protected]

Ten­sions in the re­gion amid the im­passe be­tween the Unit­ed States and Venezuela, and Trinidad and To­ba­go’s in­volve­ment in the sit­u­a­tion, are rais­ing con­cerns among some for­eign vis­i­tors ahead of Car­ni­val 2026, says pro­mot­er Kwe­si “Hy­pa Hop­pa” Hop­kin­son.

His com­ments come days af­ter Min­is­ter of Cul­ture and Com­mu­ni­ty De­vel­op­ment Michelle Ben­jamin said 2026 was shap­ing up to be a “bumper” Car­ni­val, not­ing that ear­ly in­di­ca­tors point to in­creased par­tic­i­pa­tion and strong prepa­ra­tions for the up­com­ing sea­son.

How­ev­er, Hop­kin­son, who is al­so Scorch Lim­it­ed CEO and the pro­duc­er of Stink & Dut­ty 2026, said there could be a de­crease in for­eign­ers com­ing for Car­ni­val due to the es­ca­lat­ing ten­sions be­tween the US and Venezuela.

“There’s a lot of con­cern, es­pe­cial­ly with this Venezuela sit­u­a­tion… the pre­sumed war hap­pen­ing in Venezuela, as well as what they’re hear­ing lo­cal­ly with the sud­den ban of venues from the Gov­ern­ment, and then the noise, and the in­creas­ing liquor prices, yes, of course,” he ex­plained.

While no can­cel­la­tions have yet been re­port­ed for his events, Hop­kin­son ad­mit­ted some peo­ple have been try­ing to sell their tick­ets and cos­tumes.

“There is no good pub­lic­i­ty go­ing out there to re­store con­fi­dence among the mass­es who see Trinidad as an op­tion,” he said, call­ing once again for greater con­sul­ta­tion with the Gov­ern­ment.

“We need to work to­geth­er,” he added.

Hop­kin­son’s event was af­fect­ed by Gov­ern­ment’s re­cent ban on Car­ni­val par­ties at sport­ing are­nas, but he said a new venue has been iden­ti­fied.

“We have a venue. We’re still wait­ing on the doc­u­men­ta­tion to se­cure it, and this is for Stink & Dut­ty in par­tic­u­lar,” he said.

Shel­don Stephen, founder of the Lol­labee Group, which hosts The Xpe­ri­ence Fete—usu­al­ly at the Bri­an Lara Crick­et Acad­e­my—said his event will now take place at Skin­ner Park, San Fer­nan­do, on Jan­u­ary 1. He not­ed that there have been no can­cel­la­tions and he is al­so hap­py to show­case the new venue.

How­ev­er, Ex­ou­sia Mas band­leader Col­in Prov­i­dence re­vealed a sig­nif­i­cant slow­down in reg­is­tra­tions, es­pe­cial­ly among for­eign­ers.

“Usu­al­ly by now we would see a lot of the last-minute for­eign­ers com­ing in. We haven’t re­al­ly seen that hap­pen this year. We’re not sure what it’s at­trib­uted to, but there has been a gen­er­al slow­down,” he said.

Prov­i­dence added that Ex­ou­sia Mas had al­ready list­ed prices on­line be­fore the in­crease in al­co­hol costs and will now ab­sorb the ad­di­tion­al ex­pens­es for Car­ni­val 2026.

“It’s im­pos­si­ble for us to go back and change prices. So we have to find cre­ative ways to keep costs down while still en­sur­ing mas­quer­aders meet our ex­pec­ta­tions in terms of drinks and all of that,” he said.

Randy Glas­gow, pres­i­dent of Randy Glas­gow Pro­duc­tions, said he has been re­ly­ing on free so­cial me­dia ad­ver­tis­ing for his five events un­til the new year, as the com­pa­ny mon­i­tors re­gion­al ten­sions.

“We would on­ly ful­ly launch in the new year, when we feel no war is go­ing to hap­pen, be­cause ad­ver­tis­ing is ex­pen­sive... but we have an eye on the war right next door,” he said.

Glas­gow added that some cus­tomers have raised con­cerns and are “watch­ing and wait­ing,” but he be­lieves Min­is­ter Ben­jamin’s as­sur­ances that Car­ni­val 2026 will be a bumper year are cred­i­ble.

When con­tact­ed, Ben­jamin re­it­er­at­ed her ear­li­er state­ment that Car­ni­val 2026 will be big­ger and bet­ter.

“From all in­di­ca­tions, our Car­ni­val is go­ing to be big­ger and bet­ter. The Gov­ern­ment re­mains the main in­vestor in the Car­ni­val prod­uct, and that has not changed. The show is go­ing to be one you’ll re­mem­ber,” she said.

Trin­ba­go Uni­fied Ca­lyp­so­ni­ans Or­gan­i­sa­tion (TU­CO pres­i­dent Ains­ley King said their events have not been im­pact­ed by venue chal­lenges or ris­ing al­co­hol costs. He said prepa­ra­tions for Car­ni­val 2026 are on­go­ing and TU­CO is ready to ex­e­cute the events, pro­vid­ed nec­es­sary sup­port sys­tems are in place.

King al­so not­ed strong in­ter­est from ma­jor artistes and par­tic­i­pants in the ca­lyp­so com­pe­ti­tion, which he de­scribed as a pos­i­tive sign for the art form.

“We’re see­ing a merge tak­ing place right now, with a lot of in­volve­ment from the so­ca fra­ter­ni­ty,” he said.

Guardian Me­dia al­so reached out to the Pro­mot­ers As­so­ci­a­tion and Pan Trin­ba­go pres­i­dent Bev­er­ley Ram­sey-Moore, but there was no re­sponse up to press time.