News: Poor turnout at Soca Awards

"Many artistes and soca lovers neglected to turn out for the third Annual Soca Awards which was held over the weekend in Trinidad.

The awards consisted of a weekend of activities including a media launch on Friday, a celebrity cruise on Saturday and the Awards Ceremony on Sunday evening.

The red carpet gala affair held at the Queen's Hall suffered from poor management as the show, which was scheduled to start with the walking of the red carpet at 5pm, did not get underway until minutes before 6pm.

Organisers also failed to have a guests list, forcing the media to try and gather information themselves. The actual award ceremony started after 8pm, with no list of the awards and awardees being given to the media.

Several artistes were not present to receive their awards, including 3 Canal, Bunji Garlin, Shurwayne Winchester, Iwer, Maximus Dan and Rupee.

The Barbadian artiste said later he could not make it to receive the award for Soca Vocalist of the Year (Male), because organisers of the event did not purchase his plane ticket until the morning of the show."

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