LYCO to rebrand National Schools Youth Arts Festival
The Light of Youth Creative Organisation (LYCO) says it will rebrand the National Schools Youth Arts Festival (NASFEST) as a way of putting Malawi on the map.
Drama festival is part of freedom of expression whereby the voice of people is heard especially young people who are voiceless in the society.
NASFEST is an annual youth festival organized by LYCO a Lilongwe based youth registered organization.
As LYCO, it organizes a series of competitions aimed at creating a platform for youth of different arts disciplines to display the arts works and geared towards achieving promoting reading culture, stage acting, traditional dance, short story writing and film production among others.
The organisation is working tirelessly towards preparing for the Mega Drama Festival which will take place from 2nd to 3rd February at Kamuzu institute for sports and BICC respectively.
Speaking in an interview with the Malawi News Agency (Mana), LYCO Executive Director James Kitchen said they want to rebrand NASFEST activities as one way of uplifting and putting Malawi on the Map.
“We want NASFEST to be a fully fledged youth arts festival whereby youth artists from all arts disciplines shall have their own platform to display their arts work,” Kitchen said
According to Kitchen the organisation also wants to recognize students who are working hard to uplift arts in Malawi. These students will be given learning resources such as computers, internet access, decoders and assorted books among other items.
“We are doing this after observing the need of ITC internet as well as books in schools.
“When we are giving out cash as prizes we see no meaning and no impact for the event, this time around all schools will benefit equal learning resources and will empower them for better Malawi,” he said.
Every year the festival brings specific theme to compete and display their art works through drama, songs poetry and traditional dances among others .This time around the theme falls under ‘Youth in action to eliminate harmful cultural practices’.
Some of the participating schools are Tsabango CDSS, Lilongwe Girls, Zingwangwa, Joyce Banda, Luwinga and Phwezi Boys secondary schools among others.
Activities shall include cultural dances, theatre performances, poetry and music among others.
Ralphael Sitima, Lulu, Malinga Mafia, Luckier Chikopa, Patience Namadingo and Sangie will spice up the event with their performances on both days.
Since its inception in 2009, NASFEST has been working in collaboration with Ministry of Youth Development and Sports, National Theatre Association of Malawi and Film Association of Malawi among others to help build a good platform for the in and out of school youth to nurture and showcase their talents and keep their dreams come true.
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