KIDAPAWAN CITY (MindaNews / 14 June) – The city is now in the Guinness Book of World Records for staging the world’s largest performance of Cha-Cha-Cha in one setting.
City Mayor Joseph Evangelista made the public announcement Wednesday in a radio interview with the Catholic-run DXND here.
He said that after 10 months of waiting, the management of the Guinness Book of World Records finally confirmed that the city’s performance on August 30, 2016, with 14,725 participants, surpassed Singapore’s record of more than 3,000 performers dancing the Cha-Cha-Cha.
“What an awesome feeling. Yes, we did it! Our efforts paid well,” said the mayor.
Evangelista has tapped trainers led by Diodilito Cepe Laniton, known as Idol Manoy, of the Kidapawan City Dance Sports Team to train students, teachers, government employees, and other interested individuals who would join the performance.
Laniton said it took his team at least two months to teach the participants the dance steps.
“For two months, we had to hop from one school to the other to teach them the dance. It was not that easy. When we knew we got the title, the feeling was great,” he said.
The attempt of the city government to set a Guinness record came after the city was bombarded with negative reports after the bloody dispersal of the protest rally of more than 5,000 hungry farmers who demanded rice from the Cotabato provincial government on April 1, 2016.
“It was not that simple to rebuild our image. The Cha-Cha-Cha performance on August 30, 2016, which earned the city a title at the Guinness Book of World Records, has changed the negative image, in a way,” the mayor said.
Evangelista added the city will again attempt to set another record at the Guinness as the largest performance of the “boogie woogie” of the 1950s, a kind of “boogie” that is most often danced to rock music of various kinds.
He set the performance on February next year when the city celebrates its foundation day. Evangelista said he wanted some 20,000 performers to dance the “boogie-woogie” on that day. (Malu Cadelina Manar / MindaNews)