For the eighth year in a row, the City of Cape Town is one of the title sponsors of the annual Suidoosterfees.

The arts festival starts on Valentine's Day, Tuesday 14 February 2012 and is appropriately themed "A Festival of Love" – love for the arts, love for loved ones and love of life. It runs until Sunday 19 February 2012.

The festival was first held in 2003 with the aim of celebrating and developing Western Cape Afrikaans culture and heritage, as well as encouraging social diversity and national unity through Afrikaans. Its mission is to be affordable, accessible, and include all race, class, language, religious and age groups.

It is now a registered non-profit organisation, and has established itself as an annual event on the South African arts and culture calendar.

According to Fritz Marx, Manager: Protocol and Mayoral Events, the City's total commitment this year is R650 000, which includes cash and services.

"The City pays for posters, pamphlets, banners and flags in support of the festival," he said, as well as associated services such as traffic, waste removal and cleansing.

The City's contribution is an ongoing commitment, and it has been a sponsor for eight of the last nine festivals.

"The rationale for the City's contribution is that this is an inner city festival - there are not a lot of them - and it has rejuvenated and created an economic incentive for this part of city. Also, it's a very diverse festival - from performing arts to film to music to serious theatre. It promotes local talent."

Dr Niel le Roux, CEO: Die Burger Suidoosterfees, said everything is on track.
"We are very excited. Despite all these stories about the recession, it doesn't seem to be impacting on our programme, as tickets are selling very well."

He put this down to the fact that they keep ticket prices as low as possible, in order to enable "everyone and anyone to come and see the shows".

One or two performances have already sold out and there is talk of putting on extra performances of some shows.

The annual Mayoral Ball on 4 February wasn't even advertised as it has already sold out, he added.

He thanked the City for its financial contribution, which mostly goes towards marketing and funding certain productions which the organisers would not have been able to fund from the ticket sales alone.

As always, the festival features a host of well-known performers. This year's festival highlights include a special performance by Casper de Vries and a concert in association with kykNET to mark opera legend Mimi Coertse's 80th birthday in 2012.

Other performers include Rocco de Villiers, Bobby van Jaarsveld, Auriol Hays, Juanita du Plessis and Shimmy Isaacs.

There will be an exhibition of artworks by Walter Battiss, and a dance, the Kuier Valentynsdans on 14 February.

There will also be new theatrical productions, including the first African performance of the opera Viva la Mamma as well as plays about Mitchells Plain, sex trafficking, West Coast fishermen and marriage, a musical production about the central Karoo, as well as an isiXhosa drama, cabaret, comedy and children's entertainment.

Die Burger/RSG Tent will provide free entertainment by up-and-coming local singers.
Tickets for Suidoosterfees productions are available from Comuticket.

For more information, visit www.facebook.com/Suidoosterfees or www.twitter.com/Suidoosterfees_ or the festival website.