The Malawi University of Science and Technology (Must) Cultural Festival is this weekend taking place for the third time. The festival, held at Ndata campus in Thyolo celebrates science and innovations in line with culture. Our News Analyst BRIAN ITAI caught up with Atikonda Akuzike Mtenje Mkochi, executive dean of the Bingu School of Culture and Heritage:
celebrate the culture. |
Courtesy of Atikonda Mtenje
Q: You are going into the third edition of The Must Cultural Festival. Can you give us a brief background of the festival?
A: The Must Cultural and Research Innovation Festival started in 2023. The idea was to see how culture and heritage can synergise with science and technology. We believe here at Malawi University of Science and Technology that the mandate of Must is to promote science and technology, we believe that it cannot be done in a vacuum. It has to be done in the context of the people, in the context of culture and heritage otherwise our scientific innovations will be completely irrelevant if we do not understand what the people want, what the people of Malawi are and how whatever innovations we will be making will be addressing the people of Malawi. So, we thought of ways in which we can celebrate that, celebrate the people of Malawi, celebrate the arts and cultures and see how we can respond to the people through science and technology by understanding their arts, culture, heritage and celebrating and promoting them.
Q: So, looking at the direction you have taken, are you anywhere close to achieving what you initially set out to achieve?
A: Yes, we are. We can see some improvements over the years since the commencement of the festival. The inaugural festival was more for people to understand what we set out to achieve, but you can see that we have since grown and are so much better. This year, maybe I didn’t also mention that we are, apart from having the festival, having workshops where we are in the communities and helping people with skills concerning pottery making, but we are using scientific technologies to help them. We are also having another workshop on making musical instruments as well as using science and technology. All that will translate more into the festival which will come on Friday and Saturday. In this case, we will be showcasing other innovations in arts and culture. For example, we also are into promoting endangered art forms such as storytelling. Storytellers will be coming to be part of the festival.
Q: So far what has been the response from stakeholders concerning the festival?
A: The communities around have always been supportive. We have had them since day one and we have had dancers coming in from Goliati. They are always a major feature during the festival. In the last festival, we had traditional dancers from as far as Chikwawa, Khulubvi and they really enjoyed the festival. This year, we are bringing in more people, m o r e communities. Our industry partners have also grown. So far we have a corporate sponsor for the festival. It means now many have understood the concept of the festival. We now have Standard Bank which believed in the festival and loved the concept of the event. Through the Joy of the Arts they are giving us K40 million.
Q: How are you leveraging this platform and the arts and heritage school that you have here?
A: We are leveraging this as an opportunity to stand out and talk about culture and heritage and talk about these issues. If you see in Malawi, lately there are more festivals coming in. There is now the National Arts and Heritage Council law that was passed, meaning that it is a good time now to advance arts and culture and the Bingu School of Culture and Heritage at Malawi University of Science and Technology plays a critical role in bringing in industry partners and research and the communities to drive the agenda.
Q: What should people look forward to come Friday?
A: So, on Friday we have a conference for researchers, students, industry partners and others. These will be in different fields such as culture, heritage and many others. But on Saturday, we will have performances. We have guest music artists that we have invited, visual artist, children who will be performing. Secondary school pupils in schools surrounding Must will also participate at the festival and of course our students and staff members.
