Frederik Luyten, spokesperson for Pukkelpop, has explained on behalf of the organization of the festival why the towel is being thrown in the ring. The fact that festival goers must be able to submit negative PCR tests of a maximum of 48 hours old makes a smooth organization of the festival impossible, it sounds, with a big sneer at the government.
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Spokesperson Frederik Luyten has explained in front of the cameras why the edition of Pukkelpop will not take place this year either. After the construction works were already stopped yesterday and ticket sales were taken offline, the organization announced this morning that they cannot guarantee a safe course of the festival under the new conditions that the government introduced on Monday at the Consultation Committee.
It was originally agreed that a PCR test no older than 72 hours would be sufficient to gain entry to the festival. Those rules were tightened on Monday: the validity period was reduced to 48 hours. This means that unvaccinated or incompletely vaccinated festival-goers with a combination ticket would have to undergo a new test on the site.
“We were initially gearing up for a capacity of up to 7,000 tests per day at the festival site. The adjusted validity limit of a rapid antigen test and a PCR test respectively means that we should triple the test capacity,” says Luyten. “That is five times the maximum capacity of the largest test villages in this country. We cannot guarantee the government that we can get this organized in safe conditions. This is simple math and a lot of common sense.”
Pukkelpop says it is surprised by the new government measure. “Over the past months and weeks, we have been in daily consultation with the government and our medical partners,” it sounds. “We have always listened carefully to all concerns, wishes and guidelines. Last Monday, the surprise was great when it became clear that the framework within which we could move as an organization was becoming unworkable.”
Whether a smaller-scale edition of, for example, three days was not an option? “With all due respect, we are three weeks before the festival”, responds Luyten sharply. “We have been negotiating for a long time over the past week. That is why our communication has also taken a while, because we just want to investigate this very thoroughly. We’ve done that from the start. If you change the rules of the game just before the game… you can’t expect Wout Van Aert to say: you can ride the race tomorrow, but it will be on one wheel. That just doesn’t work anymore.”
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