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Bongani Ndlovu, Showbiz Correspondent
The Ministry of Youth, Sport, Arts and Recreation is looking into ways in which low risk art genres can be given the green light to operate under Covid-19 regulations.

Musical concerts are deemed as high-risk art genres, while theatre in Zimbabwe generally does not have more than 50 people attending premieres of plays.

According to National Arts Council of Zimbabwe (NACZ) director Nicholas Moyo his organisation and the Ministry are working on a proposal on how to do this.

He said they had a trial run through a drive-in cinema and it went well.

“A few weeks ago, the minister engaged us and we had a trial of a drive-in cinema, to see how it works. We did the first one and it went well, there were challenges though. The minister has said, let’s try and see how we can handle them and see how we can make a case to Government, that will say the creative sector is ready to open. Let me say that it might not be all the genres there’ll be others that will open earlier than others,” said Moyo.

The low risk sports that could resume during lockdown meant to curb the spread of the coronavirus, as per the consultative document are archery, pool, swimming, athletics, rowing, equestrian, fencing, golf, polo, motorsport/BMX, shooting, tennis, chess, darts, drafts, goal ball (for visually impaired), cricket and table tennis.

Meanwhile, as a national development strategy, Government is working on a policy to have artefacts displayed in every public space in order to create more jobs for artistes and increase the consumption of art.

“We as the National Arts Council and the Ministry in the coming year, in the national development strategy want to push for the enactment of a policy for art in public places. But when that happens this means it’ll create jobs for our artistes. It will be increasing the level of consumption of our art, because when people start visiting these places, they start to appreciate the art,” said Moyo.