The General Delegate of the Ouagadougou Pan-African Cinema and Television Festival (Fespaco), Alex Moussa Sawadogo, announced on Tuesday that the films awarded during this 29th edition scheduled from February 22 to March 1 will be broadcast for a week , in several African cities.
“The objective is to allow populations who were unable to travel to Ouagadougou to have the opportunity to experience the creativity of the African film industry,” he declared during a conference. press organized in Ndjamena, the capital of Chad, guest country of honor for this edition.
For this current edition, he recalled that 235 films from 48 countries were selected from a list of 1,351 films all viewed by the selection committee.
“This record of films never reached in the history of Fespaco reflects the vitality of African cinema despite the difficulties, particularly financial, that it is facing today,” he said.
Regarding this year’s innovations, he announced the establishment of a “Thomas Sankara Prize for Pan-Africanism” intended to “reward producers and directors whose projects contribute to strengthening Pan-Africanism on the African continent.”
The film “Yambo Ouologuem, the wound” [portrait de l’écrivain malien Yambo Ouologuem 1940-2017 accusé injustement de plagiat] by Senegalese director Kalidou Sy is in the running for this Thomas Sankara prize, named after the former Burkinabe president, anti-imperialist and revolutionary assassinated on October 15, 1987.
The jury for this Thomas Sankara Prize section will be chaired by Rwandan Kivu Ruhorahoza, producer and director. In total, 14 films are in the running for this distinction.
Alex Moussa Sawadogo also revealed the members of the jury of the “Perspectives” section called “antechamber” where we note the presence of the head of the culture department of the Senegalese Press Agency (APS), Fatou Kiné Sène, of the director and actor Ivorian Alex Ogou, South African filmmaker Teboho Edkins as president, among others.
Twenty films, including two Senegalese films, “Une si longue lettre” by Angèle Diabang and “Timpi Tampa ou Empreinte” by Adama Bienta Sow, will be submitted for assessment by this “Perspectives” jury.
The Senegalese director and former permanent secretary of the Film and Audiovisual Industry Promotion Fund (FOPICA), Abdoul Aziz Cissé, will chair the Yennenga post-production jury where seven projects will be presented.
