This year’s #OSC Day marked annually on 18 May, showcased the best in a fusion of cultural and artistic diversity, at the Festival of the Greater South – Peoples in Motion, Living Cultures.
Held at the OSC’s headquarters in Addis Ababa, the Festival wowed audiences including diplomats and expatriates, students, and members of the public, with performances by world-renowned musicians, poets, dance troupes, and the creative arts.
Revellers were treated to lively music by Trinidad and Tobago-turned-Ethiopian national, Ras Kawintseb and his Ethiophrika Reggaestraa of Shashemene with Sydney Salmon, chairman of the Jamaican Rastafarian Development Community (JRDC); Le Trio Joubran, three Palestinian brothers with riveting oud traditional music, the Ethiopian Bands, Yod Abyssinia Cultural and Pulse music.
Festival of the Greater South featured Poetry in memory of Palestinian poets Abu Nada and Refaat Alareer, killed in the ongoing Gaza conflict, with poems by Chehem Watta (Djibouti); Maria Clara Sharupi Juan (Ecuador); Tagel Seifu (Ethiopia) and Sek Norn (Cambodia), accompanied by the music of Pulse Music Band (Ethiopia) and the live painting of Chalys Leye (Senegal).
Contemporary fashion by Palestinian designer Taline was on display – struct on the catwalk for the first time, by Ethiopian models, symbolising unity in regional diversity.
Raul Paz of Cuba crowned the show, with beats that kept guests on their feet until the end of the Festival, the last in the series of activities by the OSC to mark the significant Day.
Early on Friday 17 May, the OSC hosted a reception, at the organisation’s headquarters, for Member States, ambassadors, diplomats, and OSC staff members, followed by a public lecture with Addis Ababa University by Abel Prieto, President of Casa de Las Americas and former Minister of Culture of Cuba, and Secretary -General Manssour Bin Mussallam, in which views and reflections on the greatest south cultures were exchanged
18 May is designated OSC Day, out of a resolution at the Organisation’s first General Assembly in Geneva on 6-8 December 2021, that declared the annual observance of the special Day, which aims to showcase the achievements of the Organisation and promote the ideal, cultures, and aspirations of the peoples of the Global South.
