By ARTESIA DAVIS, Guardian Senior Reporter, artesia@nasguard.com

Trinidad and Tobago has agreed to let The Bahamas host the Caribbean Festival of Creative Arts (CARIFESTA) in 2010, Prime Minister Hubert Ingraham announced Saturday.

He made the disclosure during a press conference at the conclusion of the Caricom conference, held in Nassau last week. The Bahamas was supposed to host the festival in 2012, but Trinidad and The Bahamas have swapped places. This will be the first time the country has hosted the festival.

The previous PLP administration had made plans to host the festival this year, but those plans were scrapped when the FNM became the new government last May, because the necessary preparations had not been made. Guyana will be the host country this year.

Trinidad and Tobago's Prime Minister Patrick Manning said his country had hosted the festival three times since 1992 and that "in the spirit of brotherhood" the twin-island state had decided to give The Bahamas the chance to hold the event.

Culture Minister Charles Maynard said last year that the PLP had not made the arrangements for the country to meet the deadline for the 2008 festival. He

slammed the PLP when he announced that the festival would have to be postponed. Maynard said at the time: "Had they done something then, we wouldn't be where we are today. We are endeavoring to host over 30 nations and we needed stages for everything, from theatrical stages to town stages for big bands."

However, the PLP claimed that the FNM government canceled the event because it lacked the political will to honor the PLP's commitment to host the event. The PLP said that it had allocated $2 million for preparations for the festival.