00:00Soka heavyweight and three-time Soka Monarch title holder Fianne Lyons says she doesn't
00:07have any ill will toward Tuco tabulator Samantha Richards.
00:12While the woman's sacking is unfortunate, according to Lyons, her comments were unheard
00:17of in all her experience in the competition.
00:21I was dumbfounded.
00:22Whether you're a tabulator, once you're affiliated with the judging process, it is my opinion
00:29and the opinion of many, many people that you should not be giving information.
00:35Lyons says the tabulation was not vetted.
00:38Richards was unable to separate her emotion from her job, but the incident raises other
00:44questions.
00:45Lyons, as a contender on one hand and producer of the Soka Monarch on the other, she says
00:52she's well aware of both sides of the coin.
00:56When you're performing in a competition, you want to make sure that you'll be judged fairly,
01:02the integrity of the judges are intact, the competition is sound and everything is on
01:07the up and up.
01:08And now from the perspective of somebody who's put on a major competition like Soka Monarch,
01:14I was also responsible for making sure that the judging aspect of it was above board.
01:21So my judges, meaning the ones that we approved, had to present a particular level in order
01:33to even qualify.
01:35Fayan and her husband, Ian Bungee Galan Alvarez, are co-owners of the Viking Band.
01:41Bungee's Carriot was a contender for the road march.
01:45The incident raises a hornet's nest of questions.
01:48For instance, Lyons says the tabulation criteria was changed from the song a band comes on
01:55stage with to the number of times a song is played on stage.
01:59How do you quantify the amount?
02:04When you wheel the song, because sometimes the DJ wheels the song and plays it again.
02:08So if I play the first chorus of the song, hype up the coin and wheel it and then play
02:13it again, is that two players?
02:16I don't know.
02:17That's why I'm saying, I'm asking, because it's not clear to me, is it two players?
02:24So then if I wheel the song three times, does that constitute as three players?
02:28To level the playing field, over the years, artistes have been barred from hopping on trucks.
02:34It's been a long-standing rule that you cannot hop a truck to influence the DJ to play a song.
02:42So, like years ago, artists used to be on the Savannah and they would stay right there.
02:48And every time a truck passed, they'd jump on it, jump on it, jump on it.
02:51And that would be an advantage that the bigger artists had over the smaller artists.
02:56If you're a bigger artist, of course, you'd probably get more sway with the DJs because
03:00you're on the truck, as opposed to a younger artist who probably had a tune that's probably
03:05just as good.
03:07But now, there are perpetual complaints by masqueraders, like this group who literally
03:13begged the disc jockey to play their tune of choice to no avail.
03:17Maybe it's time, she says, for masqueraders to be given some sort of digital identification
03:23so they can request their song of choice for the stage.
03:27Macarena, please!
03:29Macarena, please!
03:35How much more of this is prevalent?
03:38But then, again, it boils down to the rules being clear.
03:43If it's judged by the people, then nobody should have an issue.
03:48If when they say, we're going across, we want to cross the party, and the majority say party,
03:52then play party.
03:53That's what they want.
03:55They pay the money.
03:56This is masqueraders.
03:58And they are the ones on the stage.
04:00They are the ones who are demanding, I paid my money in this band and this is what I want.
04:04So if they want party, no problem.
04:06But I want people to understand, this has not been a party versus car race issue.
04:11But the Vikings will never be counted as sole losers.
04:15They're just calling for transparency.
04:19We stay relaxed and come back the next year.
04:21And Lyons says they're well within their rights to withdraw from competition if necessary,
04:28and she's confident her fans will understand.
04:31We are paying to enter a competition,
04:33where we still don't understand how it's operating.
04:36I'm paying money to enter the competition and it's not free.
04:39And finally, Lyons says there's no beef between Bungie and Marshall.
04:44The issue, she says, is greater than personalities.
04:47It's principle.
04:49Urvashi Tewari, Rupert Lyon, TV6 News.
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