Letter: Councillors, officials fail filmmakers
IT was with bated breath that the participants of the Township Film Factory sat waiting for their names to be called. All night I heard them “oohing” and “aahing” about the amazing decor, the phenomenal big screen and the mime artists positioned at each table.
They truly felt like stars. The organisers, Shoot 97, managed this programme with excellence and on graduation night they turned the NMMU Vista Indoor Sports Centre into a Hollywood-style awards venue.
Some 75 participants from across Nelson Mandela metro were trained at KwaLanga, Gelvandale and New Brighton libraries. This resulted in 15 documentary films being produced by these trainees during the four weeks of their training.
The team of 16 facilitators and staff members was responsible for training these participants in the theory and hands-on experience of documentary filmmaking – culminating in this prestigious graduation on Wednesday March 16. These participants, many of them matriculants who could not afford to pursue tertiary studies, walked away with an NQF5 certificate in scriptwriting from Walter Sisulu University.
With the current growth of the film industry in South Africa and the many possibilities for film makers in the Eastern Cape, initiatives like this one generate much hope and promise. Strange that with all the money spent on this initiative and the grand occasion of the graduation ceremony (thanks to generous funding from the National Lottery Development Trust Fund) only about a dozen of the so-called dignitaries from Nelson Mandela metro saw it fit to attend an event.
Excluded were the partners, parents and friends of the participants, due to these so-called dignitaries having confirmed that they would attend – and then never showed up, more than 150 of them.
I find it insulting that public servants, in the employ of the metro and paid by taxpayers’ hard-earned money are arrogant enough to confirm attendance and then not show up. Many of those who graduated from the programme were looking forward to sharing it with their loved ones, but were denied the opportunity by the representatives of the metro, who insisted that certain councillors and “dignitaries” from the metro attend instead.
It’s pathetic that so-called leaders with egos bigger than their common sense should dictate the fate and future of our beautiful metro. I contend in the future we should insist that there should be nothing about us, without us.
