Africa-Press – Cape verde. The Ministry of Culture and Creative Industries and the Porto Novo City Hall are working on preparing the application for the São João festivities to be declared an intangible heritage of humanity.
Mayor Elisa Pinheiro, speaking at the opening of the Santo Antão agricultural fair, promoted by the Porto Novo council, as part of the São João festivities, which are celebrated on 24 June, said that the local authority and the Government have been working to ensure that the candidacy is presented “quickly”.
“We have been talking to the Minister of Culture and Creative Industries about this issue and we want our São João festival to quickly become an intangible heritage of humanity. We want São João to be ours, but also the world’s,” said the mayor of Porto Novo.
The mayor said she believes that “the process will be completed soon.”
The Minister of Culture and Creative Industries, Augusto Veiga, had already promised, at the end of 2024, during a visit to Porto Novo, to work with the city hall and promoters in the internationalization of the São João festivities, “associating this popular manifestation with tourism”.
Augusto Veiga, on the occasion, said that São João constitutes one of the projects that should be allied to tourism, with a view to the internationalization of these festivals, which have been part of the national intangible heritage since 2017.
The minister reaffirmed the government’s intention to advance the process that will lead to the elevation of the São João festivities to the status of intangible cultural heritage of humanity, promising to bring representatives from the United Nations Educational, Cultural and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) to Santo Antão to learn more about this cultural event.
The festival of São João, which mixes the sacred with the profane, is considered the greatest cultural manifestation of Cape Verde, elevated, in 2013, to municipal intangible cultural heritage and, in 2017, to national intangible cultural heritage, in view of its “national relevance for memory and identity”.
The Government and the city council have implemented a plan to safeguard these festivities, which, in addition to the requalification of the pilgrimage route and the chapels of São João, also includes the construction of the national pilgrimage museum by 2026.
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