Organisers of the annual Beachfest celebration believe the event has become an established Cup Match holiday tradition — but needs more support from Government and other official bodies.

And executive director Gavin Smith has described calls for the emancipation celebration to be cancelled as “excessive and obviously ill-informed”, adding that his team was working to make the event incident-free.

An estimated 6,000 partygoers attended last Thursday’s event on Horseshoe Bay, enjoying live music, sporting events and the Beachfest Crown song competition finals. But the party, organised through the arts and culture charity the Chewstick Foundation, caused concern among some commentators who claimed to have witnessed mass drunkenness and fighting among revellers. Police later confirmed they made 12 arrests during the daylong event.

Mr Smith claimed that criticism of the event was put out of context by the media and “did not tell the whole story”.

“Despite the negative publicity, there were very few incidents at this year’s Beachfest — 12 arrests out of 6,000 people attending,” he said.

“This is really a victory, because there were no major incidents and the minor incidents that did occur were handled effectively by the police, lifeguards, Parks staff and Beachfest staff and volunteers.”

Mr Smith said he shared public concerns about overconsumption of alcohol and underage drinking but they needed to be taken more seriously and personally by everyone. He added that no alcohol was on sale during the party.

He added that the foundation had hoped to install a security gate at the public beach in order to improve security, but the move was rejected by Government.

“Beachfest cannot be held responsible for any underage drinking or overconsumption that takes place, particularly if we never provided alcohol and are not given the resources to police the issue,” Mr Smith said. Mr Smith said his group provided a detailed analysis of the potential benefits and pitfalls of the event “particularly highlighting our deep concerns regarding the negative behaviour we have seen by attendees and outlining our objectives to both prevent and manage them”.

“Central to this plan is a security gate which was denied, and resulted in the Ministry of Public Works taking on primary responsibility for security and clean-up for this public event.”

Mr Smith said he believed that, because the event is a relatively new fixture of the Cup Match holiday calendar which catered primarily to young people, officials had not taken it seriously.

“Government and other official bodies, including the police, haven’t prioritised it appropriately over the years,” he said. He added scores of police are annually placed at Cup Match cricket on Thursday while just a handful of police are placed at Horseshoe Bay on the same day, even though there are vastly more people.

“Government seems reluctant to set up a security gate around the Horseshoe Bay campus, I believe due to the unprecedented nature of it and the fear of public outcry against it. I am hopeful that, through this very public dialogue, Government will feel that they have the support of the people to move from reactive to proactive and will now support a security gate and wristbands for everyone over 18, with increased control over alcohol being brought to the beach, which is something we have been striving for years.”

Mr Smith said the event — put on by volunteers and funded through corporate sponsorship — had developed into “a new tradition that is now the largest event in the country and routinely sees repeat visitors to our shores to attend it and the other Cup Match festivities”.

“Government has put in very little in up front development or investment and may feel they pay too much on the back end. However, I would suggest that if we worked closer together in advance, that this event can be a windfall for all, and that some of the financial strain could be shared and reduced. But it takes teamwork and communication in a timely manner, working throughout the year.”

A Government spokesman said a number of official agencies had worked with Beachfest in the run-up to the event.

The spokesman added that security was under the remit of police and the organisers rather than Government, and suggested that a security gate was inappropriate at a public beach.