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The weeklong FESPACO, which begins on Saturday (February 25) in the nation’s capital, aims to provide more than just amusement. It also aims to serve as a sign of endurance and hope. It has never been postponed despite years of political unrest and Islamic extremist attacks that left thousands dead and nearly 2 million people displaced in the West African nation.
Maimouna Ndiaye, a Burkinabe actress who has four entries in this year’s competition, said, “We only have FESPACO left to keep us from thinking about what’s going on.” “This is the event that should not be postponed under any circumstances.”
The problems in the nation have gotten worse since the last iteration of the biennial festival in Ouagadougou. Two military coups were staged last year as a result of successive government’s failure to put an end to the extremist violence, with each junta leader promising security.
In two attacks earlier this month in the Sahel region of Burkina Faso, at least 70 soldiers were killed. The fighting has also sown division within a formerly tranquil populace, pitting various communities and ethnicities against one another.
Selected from 100 movies
But more than 15,000 people, including movie stars from Nigeria, Senegal, and the Ivory Coast, will be in Ouagadougou for FESPACO, which started in 1969 and is the continent’s biggest film festival.
A total of 1,300 movies were submitted for review, and 100 from 35 different African nations and the diaspora, including those from the Dominican Republic and Haiti, have been chosen to compete. This year’s fiction contestants are directed by nearly half women.
One of them is the Burkinabe producer and director Apolline Traore, whose movie “Sira” is a front-runner in this year’s competition and represents the suffering of many Burkinabes. It chronicles a woman’s fight for survival after being abducted by jihadists in the Sahel while her fiancé searches for her.
Traore is optimistic about the future of her nation nonetheless.
“Burkina Faso is portrayed by the outside world as a red nation. As they say, entering my country is risky “to The Associated Press, she stated. We may be a little crumbled, but we are not defeated.
Government representatives claim that they have increased security and will ensure the security of festival goers.
Many anticipate that FESPACO will promote national cohesion and fortify international ties.
The film festival is “an important contribution to peace and reconciliation in Burkina Faso and beyond,” according to Wolfram Vetter, the ambassador of the European Union to Burkina Faso.
After the Burkinabe government, the EU is the second-largest contributor to the event with a contribution of about 250,000 euros ($265,000).
