Cape Town ready for Carnival

This year, the venue moves from Long Street to the Fanwalk and promises to transform this Carnival corridor into an explosion of colour, music and dance.

"Due to the support the carnival garnered last year, we had no choice but to move to a larger space to accommodate the continually growing audience," said Jay Douwes, CEO of the Cape Town Carnival.

'Cape to Cairo'

The 2012 theme, 'Cape to Cairo' will celebrate the rich history and diversity of the city, country and continent. "The theme not only celebrates the rich art, music, culture and heritage of the African continent, it also helps raise awareness around important issues like xenophobia," said Paul Mashatile, minister of Arts and Culture.

The parade includes 11 themed pods with 80 lead performers in larger than life costumes, 9 richly decorated floats and 11 academies. Each academy has 150 community dancers and brings together 45 community performance groups from 23 different areas in Cape Town. The three best lead dancers on the night will travel to Brazil to perform at the 2013 Rio Carnival.

The event is the result of months of hard work by the carnival and event production teams, costume designers and producers, float builders, choreographers and hundreds of community members and volunteers all aimed at bringing the theme to life.

"Gem on our annual events calendar"

"The Cape Town Carnival is a gem on our annual events calendar and the Western Cape government is proud to be one of its supporters. I would like to encourage all the people of our city and province to participate in this lively event as it showcases the very best of what our destination has to offer," said Alan Winde, provincial MEC of Finance, Economic Development and Tourism.

Sponsors include the Department of Arts and Culture, the City of Cape Town, MNet, DSTV, provincial government Western Cape, Media 24 and Heart 104.9FM.

For more, go to www.capetowncarnival.com, the Facebook page or follow on Twitter: @ctcarnival.