Take in hand the cultural destiny of Africa. This is what the President of Senegal, Abdoulaye Wade, wishes to do by arranging Fesman 2009, the third edition of the World Festival of Negro Arts to be held in Dakar from 1st to 14th December. This event must be "a showcase of excellence in the fertile creativity of the black world and a field of moral rearmament and mobilization of all forces of proposals for the development of Africa," says Wade.

Togo, like most African countries will attend the Fesman with the participation of many artists (singers, musicians, visual artists, ...) and writers. The President Faure Gnassingbé himself is expected make the trip to Dakar. 

During two weeks the programme will include concerts, fashion shows, sporting events and a lecture series on Pan-Africanism, heritage, identity and cultural capital of Africa and its Diaspora as well as, science and heritage of mankind.

The second black country in the world's population, Brazil, will be the guest of honor at the Fesman with a delegation of 300 artists.

The first Fesman was organized in 1966 through the initiative and the leadership of the intellectual Alioune Diop, founder of Editions Présence Africaine and magazine of the same name, and the poet-president Leopold Sedar Senghor.

Original article available in French.

http://www.republicoftogo.com/central.php?o=5&s=49&d=3&i=3862