No stretch limousines brought stars to premieres and there were no packed photocalls, but there were awards for the best picture and best screenplay, best male and female actors, best director and best cinematographer at the unique Kakuma Youth Film Festival held in northwest Kenya in December 2007. The film-makers were all young people living in the Kakuma refugee camp, home to about 90,000 people displaced from 10 African countries.

More than 100 people made their way by foot or pedicab to the makeshift tin-roofed cinema hall, where black cloth blocked out the bright sunshine blazing down on the dusty camp and the largely youthful audiences sat on wooden benches. The day-long festival featured 20 short films, including love stories, a cautionary tale about HIV/AIDS, a look at voluntary repatriation, and a feature about polygamy and child abuse. All the films were written, directed, shot and edited by young members of the FilmAid’s Refugee Filmmaking Project, a participatory video program that puts video cameras in the hands of refugee youth and teaches them basic camera and editing skills so they can tell their own stories through video. The actors in the films were other camp residents.

"We are all from different countries, talk different languages, and we have all experienced different wars. But through film we all become one and we are all able to express our ideas, our feelings and our ambitions", said 20-year-old Idi Nuru, a member of the club. "That is why the film festival was important to us, because we were able to show our work to others."

Organized by FilmAid International, this is the only film festival in the world taking place in a refugee camp, where films are made by refugee youth, and where the only live audience is the refugee community within the camp. The films are judged by a panel of peers, refugee elders, community leaders, aid workers, and festival sponsors. The festival films are also shown the week following the festival at FilmAid’s larger outdoor evening screenings throughout the camp which draw an audience in the tens of thousands. Winners received certificates from FilmAid International, and each member of the winning productions received textbooks on a subject of their choice. The best male and female actors, best director and best cinematographer got certificates, cameras and film.

These skills also could prove useful once the refugees finally get back to their ravaged homelands. Some 80% of the camp residents are from southern Sudan, which has welcomed back tens of thousands of refugees since the signing of a peace agreement in January last year between the Sudanese government and the rebel Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army. Southern Sudan will need people with special skills to help the region recover from years of conflict. "I want to become a journalist when I return to my home in south Sudan," said 21-year-old Aliandro Lotok, adding: "The skills I have acquired in film and editing will enable me tell the stories of my people to the world."

FilmAid International, a US-based nonprofit organization that uses film to communicate lifesaving information to refugee audiences on critical health concerns and issues such as HIV/AIDS and malaria, conflict resolution, sexual and gender based violence, women’s rights and repatriation, has been working in Kakuma since 2001 and in three camps - Nduta, Mtendeli and Karago - in the western Kibondo District of Tanzania since 2002. Its programs draw average audiences of 10,000 people a night in Kenya, and up to 27,000 at a single screening in Tanzania. Established in 1991, Kakuma houses over 86,000 refugees, mostly from southern Sudan, while Nduta, Mtendeli and Karago shelter over 65,000 refugees from Burundi. FilmAid's events include the local Kenyan and Tanzanian communities that have hosted these refugees for more than a decade. In 2005, FilmAid audiences in East Africa totaled over one million.

"This program is very important to this refugee camp--it is helping to change people's behavior for the good in many ways," says a Somali community leader in Kakuma. "First of all, FilmAid brings unity to the camp; second, it provides education in a situation where not enough education is available. It has also been good to see films that promote education as a value. We have learned how to improve our relationships--and been given new ideas on how to resolve problems. People here are also receiving an orientation to the outside--to the rest of the world--and to other African countries. We appreciate that these programs are free and available to our whole families."

Over the past six years, FilmAid also has brought films to refugees and displaced people and their host communities in Macedonia, Afghanistan, and the flood-stricken US state of Louisiana. Founded in 1999 by filmmaker Caroline Baron, award winning producer of " Capote", after she learned the most prevalent problem for the hundreds of thousands of Kosovar refugees was psychological trauma and hopelessness, FilmAid is a global partner of UNHCR (United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees) and works closely with the International Rescue Committee (IRC), UNICEF, CARE, World Food Program and Church World Service. 

This story was prepared from a UNHCR news story entitled Kenyan refugee camp hosts first refugee youth festival in East Africa, by David Mwagiru in Kakuma,  Kenya; information on the FilmAid International website, and an October 18, 2007 news release from FilmAid International entitled Refugees making movies: African Refugee Youth Make Films and Create Film Festival in Refugee Camp.

 


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