The weekly Passa Passa street dance held along Spanish Town Road in Kingston was back to its usual hype when it was held Wednesday night into Thursday morning.

Many feared that the weekly events held in Tivoli and surrounding areas might not have had the usual strong turnout following last week's shooting of five persons in the area during a joint police and military operation.

"Last Tuesday made one week since the Tivoli thing, and we never had any events since that, because di whole community was in mourning, but we will know by tomorrow (Thursday) when Passa keep to see if people afraid to come out or dem will come support it," Meely, one of the promoters of Passa Passa told The STAR on Tuesday.

However, when THE STAR contacted the Passa Passa promoter yesterday, following the event, he said he was surprised at the turnout.

"Passa gwaan good. It pack same way. A jus' sey di people dem come out a likkle lata than usual, an wi nuh too want dat because wi a guh have problem wid di police. But roun' 3:00 a.m. out deh did thin, but by 3:30 a.m. every ting pick up," Meely explained.

"To di way mi see it, it nuh look like the incident have nuh effect pon it (Passa Passa), cause mi would a si a more drastic effect," he told The STAR. "It look like people jus guh Weddy Weddy first an' den come down a Passa. But by next week, everything suppose to be back to normal."

Stars on show

He also noted that the likes of Bounty Killer, Vybz Kartel, Macka Diamond and others were in attendance, and everyone danced and enjoyed themselves as usual.

According to police reports, just before noon, on Sunday, January 13, police went into the area (Tivoli) in search of men on the island's most wanted list when they were met with heavy gunfire. They returned the fire and when it was all over five men were dead and a solider and a police officer injured.

Inspector Steve Brown, from the Constabulary Communication Network, said while he was not able to say if any of the dead men were wanted, none of those targeted in the operation were among the dead.

Residents, upset about the sudden disruption to their lives, claimed the men were murdered.