In announcing the ban on Monday on Bounty Killer and Mavado, Home Affairs Minister Clement Rohee said his ministry had exercised a lot of patience with entertainment organizers over the types of shows they hold here, pointing out that not long ago the authorities had sat down with some of the organizers to draft a set of conditions by which shows would be guided. But he noted that these conditions had not been upheld and as such they were blacklisting Bounty Killer and Mavado.

The meetings Rohee referred to were held last year following the Guyana Music Festival which featured Jamaican reggae star Buju Banton among others, and where several declamations were made against the gay community. Though Rohee did not elaborate on the bans now in effect, Bounty Killer's explicit incitements to murder gays is believed to have been a deciding factor while in Mavado's case, the gangster image he portrays has worked against him.

Where bans are concerned this is not the first one facing Mavado earlier in the year Mavado was banned from performing in St. Vincent and the Grenadines by police authorities for his propensity towards graphic, violent lyrics which they said encourage violence. The police said the decision was also made bearing in mind that St. Vincent and the Grenadines just came out from a record year for murders and an increase in violent crimes, especially involving firearms. There were 36 murders on the island in 2007, a huge jump from 13 in 2006.