By now, you’ve probably seen or heard of The Adventures in Zambezia. The animated film made by Triggerfish Studios, in Cape Town, has become the highest grossing South African film, beating others such as District Nine and the Academy Award winning Tsotsi. The film earned R6.3 million in the first three weeks of its release in South Africa alone and sits at over $28 million dollars worldwide.
South Africa is leaping into the multi-billion dollar animation industry, producing three animated movies in the last 5 years: Jock of the Bushveld, Lion of Judah and The Adventures in Zambezia.
Triggerfish Studios’ CEO and producer, Stuart Forrest, is excited.
“We’re at the beginning of a big disruption in Hollywood. We’re starting to see a new wave of media. It hasn’t finished playing out as yet as the big studios have had so much power and have managed to still hold onto that.”
Trigger Fish has been called Africa’s DreamWorks and Pixar, but Forrest says the company would rather develop their own style than copy America.
“If we were in the States, we wouldn’t be able to do what we are doing now… Our challenge is here, our voice is here and our heart is here. We want to lead the way for Africa on the world stage.”
The studio’s success with The Adventures in Zambezia has not come easy.
“The processes to raise funds are very labor intensive and expensive. We are moving to a model where we will release four or five films [a year] as we will be producing multiple projects and planning ahead more efficiently,” says Forrest.
Forrest believes that the secret to making a successful animated movie lies in their obsession to create films with compelling stories and heart-felt messages.
“Creating a film is like lightning in a bottle. You’ll only know if it works when you open it,” says Forrest.
In 2012, The Adventures in Zambezia won the “Best South African Feature Film” award at the 33rd Durban International Film Festival and also closed South Africa’s largest animation film festival, Kunjanimation.
Daniel Snaddon, the director of Kunjanimation, says that the idea behind the film festival was for animators to have their work celebrated while in the hunt for investors.
“The collaboration started off with the French Institute of South Africa, we then partnered with the National Film and Video Foundation, Westgro Financial Services and, our sponsor, the French Season South Africa,” says Snaddon.
The Kunjanimation film festival has evolved from a two day event with one workshop to a five day event with many workshops.
“It’s great to have the French as our partners. They’re the only non-Americans entering the arena to have cracked the genre. They made a movie called Despicable Me [with a $69 million budget] which grossed over $500 million at the box office.”
Snaddon says the reason South Africa is not where is should be in the industry is because many financiers look at the numbers and are not sure how they will add up. Animation is a risky business.
“You’re never really sure what the demand is going to be for any film. It only takes one big hit. Look at New Zealand for example. There was nothing, then there was The Lord of the Rings and now it is one of the go to places for filming.”
“Steve Jobs bought Pixar and lost a lot of money, his personal money, before they made a profit. It took 10 years and as soon as Toy Story hit he made all his money back and then some. It’s a question of having a long-term plan.”
Although there are many colleges offering diplomas in animation as more and more students are entering the industry, jobs are scarce.
“I’ll be honest; most of them will not find jobs. They’ll end up specializing in something else, be it web design or graphic design.”
“The lack of jobs in the industry has driven many talented animators to migrate to Europe or the USA where they comfortably live; going from project to project. People in South Africa who focus on one specific area of animation are quickly head-hunted by large companies overseas,” says Snaddon.
The Adventures in Zambezia was among 21 movies that competed for the Oscar for Animated Feature Film at the 85th Academy Awards earlier this year and it recently won Best Feature for Children at Anima Mundi 2013 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
On October 25, Triggerfish Studios will release their second animated film, Khumba. The film is already making waves on the international circuit with its premier at Annecy International Animated Film Festival in June as well as its screening at the Toronto International Film Festival.   FL

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Taking a chance on a fleeting flash

It is like running in the Olympic Games with a limping leg, no matter the obstacles; you need to reach the finish line. This is an attitude portrayed by Kenya in the aftermath of the Westgate terror attack. An attack that got many wondering if Nairobi will stand tall to face this evil and, more importantly, resolutely look forward and never turn back, as echoed by the number one citizen, Uhuru Kenyatta.
Kenya is still licking its wounds after one of the deadliest terror attacks the world has ever witnessed in September, 2013. Just a few days before that, the country’s Jomo Kenyatta International Airport became an inferno. It was not clear if this was an act of terror or arson until a month later when the investigation revealed an electrical fault started the fire.
That is when the Hakuna Matata aura kicked in; all that happened is history and life moves on. Millions of foreign visitors, on leisure and business trips, are landing at that very same airport and more shopping malls are springing up. The Kenyan government even promised to lend a hand in revamping the Westgate Mall.
Focus quickly shifted to mark Kenya’s 50th anniversary as an independent state. The year was coming to an end and there was a rush to wrap it up with a lot of festivities. On the night of December 2, FORBES AFRICA chose the country’s capital to celebrate its third Person of the Year, less than three kilometers away from the scene of terror that occurred at the mall. The recipient of the award, Nigeria’s minister of agriculture, Akinwumi Adesina, reminded all that East Africa, and Kenya in particular, is at the forefront of the continent’s ICT revolution.
During his acceptance speech, Adesina reiterated his mission to make millionaires from agriculture. He is using electronic wallets to enable farmers to receive vouchers for subsidized seeds and fertilizers. It is a system that traces its origin from Kenya, a land with no worries.
Exclusive resorts and the world’s top luxury hotels are setting up shop in Kenya. Africa’s first Billionaires Resort was opened in the tiny coastal town of Malindi, a three-hour drive north of Mombasa. Some of the resort’s investors cannot even point out the location on a map. All their trust is bestowed on their beloved friend and Italian businessman, Flavio Briatore, who operates the resort, bringing glamour, quality and uniqueness to the coast of Kenya. Some of the high-profile owners of apartments at the resort include Ferrari’s Spanish Formula One driver Fernando Alonso and former Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi.
It is once again time for the Hakuna Matata mojo.

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THE PAST IS THE PAST AS KENYA STANDS STRONG

I have two pet peeves—standing in long queues and filling out forms. When I found out that I could still get tickets to see the highly acclaimed Broadway adaptation of The Lion King in London, despite the scarcity of tickets, I was prepared to complete the lengthiest questionnaire and wait in the longest line.
It was worth it. The fine attention to visual artistry, on stage and in costume, combined with the storytelling and delivery was awe-inducing. The well-orchestrated Africanized pop music and rhythmic dance was the cherry on top.
For a few minutes, I was an excited kid again, until my companion, a born and bred Kenyan, expressed her utter disappointment at how much of a South African production it had become, saying the show once had a marked Kenyan influence. After a few minutes of diplomatic debate on the topic, the unusual nature of our conversation dawned on me. Now, I am willing to debate a big blockbuster release at the cinema or Olivia Pope’s latest shocking act, or even the previous night’s match between Arsenal and  Chelsea—not how much of a country’s influence was evident in a Broadway production.
As curiosity and doubt swirled through my mind, I decided to engage fellow Africans on their thoughts on theater. To my surprise, very few were interested. The question was thrown back at me: Is there a place for theater in Africa?
There have been some great productions mushrooming across the continent in the past few years. Fela! on Broadway was a spectacular repertoire of many of Fela Kuti’s captivating songs performed by a great cast. UMOJA, staged across South Africa, was another sublime show. More recently, SARO The Musical, a Broadway-styled and Nigerian-owned stage production signaled the revival of African theater. Clearly, Africa has a role on the global stage.
Traveling around the globe is another African trend. Being Nigerian, I’m privy to the fact that we love to travel far and wide. I dare you to find a spot on the world map that does not have a small Nigerian community present. Even more fascinating, is that Nigerians travel with their culture and some often refuse to assimilate into their new homes. As I attempted a morning jog on a cold London street, I heard the roaring blast of D’banj’s Oliver Twist blaring from an apartment block. To my surprise, it was accompanied by a yell, in pidgin, the informal lingua franca spoken across Nigeria and some West African countries: ‘Dat music dey loud, you wan cause wahala with the neighbours?’ (The music is too loud, are you trying to cause trouble with the neighbors?)
It was welcome comic relief on my lazy run, but I also smiled at how much of a global village the world is becoming. Regardless of where you go, you can always take a piece of home with you.
No one knows this better than the Caribbean community. I have a few friends from the famous islands and one thing is certain: from Barbadians to Jamaicans and Trinidadians; all are wonderfully expressive—both on and off the dance floor.
I was in a store recently, when two Jamaican ladies walked in—one of them saw my shoes and exclaimed, ‘Girl! Those shoes are just very dutty dutty!’ Her friend echoed her thoughts. I walked away with a confused smirk on my face, while inspecting my shoes for some dirt.
A quick consultation with one of my Jamaican friends solved the puzzle.
“They meant that your shoes were really, really nice,” she said laughing.
Whether it is travel, theater or language, one thing is evident—it is a new dawn. A subconscious revolution is taking place and Africans are embracing all that is inherently African. I like that I can get a decent plate of Jollof rice while in New York because someone else brought my food culture with them. I am thrilled that Ankara fabrics are no longer only seen on women in the streets of Lagos and Accra. It is refreshing to know that there is a place for African music beyond the shores of the recording artist’s home and whether it is being said in Nigerian pidgin or Jamaican Patois, a universal language is emerging. So the opening tune to The Lion King, whether it is in Zulu or Swahili, does not matter to me—it’s African.

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Big Wahala And Dutty Shoes

It is said that the camera doesn’t lie. In a split second, photographing a boy walking on a beach with a toy gun can, in so many ways, reflect global issues. The trick is making you believe it’s relevant.
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A photojournalist is aware of the story he needs to tell. His images are his tools and sometimes they make you see a completely different reality. In this image a toy gun, child, beach and the word Somalia all combine to tell you that this could be a Somali child soldier.
The reality has nothing to do with this child being a soldier. It’s supposed to be a slice-of-life moment of Ramadan.  The irony of seeing a deadly weapon, even if it’s a toy, carried by a kid on a day of festivity in an Islam based country… complete the dots.  Generalizations are never pretty.
But it shocks. The lesson is simple; readers need to understand that a photograph should never be taken on face value.
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The Camera Never Lies?

George Weah, the Liberian soccer legend-turned- politician, barrels out onto the sports field dressed in an electric-blue jersey. Flanked by his entourage, tussling photographers and journalists, the towering 48 year old rolls forth with the Ballon d’Or, the trophy he claimed in 1995 while playing for AC Milan, hoisted on his broad shoulders. The crowd roars and his long-time political rival, Liberia’s formidable commander-in-chief President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, follows behind dressed in a black and white lapa suit.
Weah and Johnson Sirleaf deliver muffled messages about reconciliation and the president’s column-like security guard, wearing aviator sunglasses, raises the glinting solid-gold ball into the overcast sky. Weah, the only African to win the prize, did so during the heat of Liberia’s civil war that raged for 14 years and left 250,000 dead, the nation’s infrastructure in ruins and its people deeply traumatized. The soccer star hauled the prize back from his home in Florida in the United States, where he spends at least half of his time, as a symbol of peace.
Retired and current soccer celebrities from across the continent and government officials take to the field for a friendly match organized by Weah, who last December accepted his appointment by Johnson Sirleaf as peace ambassador. Weah is now the face of the government’s latest attempt to reconcile a nation that remains deeply divided a decade after the gunfire ceased and former president Charles Taylor went into exile. But among the spectators it is clear, reconciliation or not, their main purpose is to see Weah, or King George as he is known to Liberians.
<div id="attachment_31208" style="width: 310px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-31208" decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="size-medium wp-image-31208" src="http://www.forbesafrica.com/app/uploads/2017/05/20130622-wingard-0623-300x200.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="200" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/20130622-wingard-0623-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/20130622-wingard-0623-600x400.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/20130622-wingard-0623-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/20130622-wingard-0623.jpg 1024w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />Monrovia, Liberia &#8211; June 22, 2013: Football game organized by George Weah at SKD. (Photograph by Morgana Wingard).</div>
After a failed attempt at the presidency in 2005 and the vice presidency in 2011, Weah is now tasked with helping drive forward the stalled process to reunite the nation. Many Liberians remain cynical about the reconciliation process after a controversial Truth and Reconciliation Commission, whose findings and recommendations were sidelined because of legal issues and the indictment of those among the political establishment. This is a major challenge that Weah has to confront.
A new 18-year reconciliation roadmap has been launched placing an emphasis on restorative, rather than retributive, justice.
The reconciliation process suffered a blow last year when peace activist Leymah Gbowee, who was also the head of a previous initiative, resigned after criticizing Johnson Sirleaf of nepotism and her failure to address present-day issues such as corruption. In a statement, Gbowee referred to “differences in opinion on the pathway for national healing and reconciliation” as her reason for stepping down.
When asked whether he is concerned about the reasons for Gbowee’s resignation, Weah says: “She took a long time to notice that.”
Weah’s critics say that he is not capable of the role and that he was appointed to appease young Liberians who are angry with Johnson Sirleaf’s government.
Critics such as Dan Saryee, a Liberian democracy and rights activist, says that Weah lacks a vision for national reconciliation. “Reconciliation is not just about having a sports jamboree. Sports do not address the reconciliation concerns of a farmer in Grand Kru, Gbarpolu or a fisherman in River Cess or Bassa.”
But Weah is confident that his previous work as a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador during the civil conflict, his role in helping encourage former fighters and child soldiers to disarm and his rapport with ordinary Liberians was the reason he was chosen by the president and why he is the best man for the job.
“I was the right person, because of the love that people have for me, and the way I can persuade people. I accepted it because this is the country I love. I want to see the country peaceful and stable,” Weah tells FORBES AFRICA in an exclusive interview at his residence in Rehab, a suburb on the outskirts of Monrovia.
In the coming months, Weah will embark on a ‘Listening Tour’ across 16 counties to talk to Liberians about their grievances and also facilitate dialogue between tribes that have been in conflict in the past, before forwarding his findings to the government. A similar exercise was undertaken by Gbowee during her time as head of the reconciliation initiative.
Weah is seen by many of his supporters as a man of the masses, the less-than-a-dollar-a-day Liberians who eke out an existence in a society that still remains deeply polarized economically.
Born and raised by his grandmother in a slum in Bushrod Island, and discovered and nurtured by President Samuel Doe, who was brutally executed at the beginning of the war, Weah represents an impossible dream, but nevertheless a dream for Liberians, who until the end of the conflict in 2003, had little to hope for.
“His is the only face we see to redeem us,” says Samuel Kun, a 28-year-old sociology student at the University of Liberia.
“Weah is from the ghetto so he knows what we are going through and he can [empathize] with us.
If he’s our president I’m sure things can change, it might not be constant but I’m sure he will do his best.”
Weah’s home in Monrovia is nothing like the one in which he grew up. Concertina wire crowns the high maroon wall that surrounds his compound and is manned by guards wearing blue polo shirts and sports caps that read ‘security’.
I interview Weah in a lounge room overlooking a tiled pool, and fitted with the trappings of masculine affluence—a wooden bar, a pool table, a flat-screen TV, modern black couches backed by a window that looks out onto three luxury cars. Weah wears a crème shirt with jeans and a fitted charcoal suit jacket and holds his pair of reading glasses in his hand. I ask whether his loafers are Gucci.
“That’s hard work, not government money,” he responds sharply.
Regardless of Weah’s flamboyant lifestyle, he is seen as one of the few Liberians to have earned his riches the honest way—through hard work, success, talent and a bit of good luck—in a country where the political class and those in power are still largely viewed as a league of rogues. In 2012, Transparency International named Liberia and Mongolia as the most corrupt countries in the world in its Global Corruption Barometer.
Many of Weah’s supporters are deeply suspicious of the government and its commitment to reconciliation and are concerned this could be a trap for the political leader, who is tipped to be among the leading presidential candidates in 2017. Even within Weah’s party, the decision was met with many dissenting opinions.
Some opposition leaders and analysts have argued that Johnson Sirleaf is setting Weah up for failure to destroy his political future.
But Weah dismisses claims that he is being used as a political pawn and says that he will step down if he thinks the government lacks commitment to reconciliation and is attempting to silence him.
“We have to monitor their actions […] I’m not going to sit aside because I am the peace ambassador if the government does things that aren’t right. I think by now you should know I have character.”
<div id="attachment_31207" style="width: 310px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-31207" decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="size-medium wp-image-31207" src="http://www.forbesafrica.com/app/uploads/2017/05/20130622-wingard-0138-300x200.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="200" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/20130622-wingard-0138-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/20130622-wingard-0138-600x400.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/20130622-wingard-0138-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/20130622-wingard-0138.jpg 1024w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />Monrovia, Liberia &#8211; June 22, 2013: Football game organized by George Weah at SKD. (Photograph by Morgana Wingard).</div>
He also says the debate over the Truth and Reconciliation Commission should be reopened.
Weah says he is aware of the challenges ahead and the level of resentment and dissatisfaction among Liberians, many of whom who do not have an affordable life. These are challenges that are beyond the ethnic divisions and human rights abuses that characterized the brutal civil war. Less than two 2% of Liberians have access to pipe borne water, a mere 0.58% of people have access to public electricity, and 76% of the population live on less than a dollar a day.
“Peace for me is equitable distribution of the national wealth; peace for me means true justice,” says Weah.
Weah is optimistic about the future of the reconciliation process but some argue his entry into the 2014 senatorial race could get in the way.
“If he does run as a senator it means that his role within the reconciliation roadmap may be diminished. Weah could use this platform to mobilize more votes,” says Edward Mulbah, the senior technical advisor at the Liberia Peacebuilding Office, the body charged with organizing reconciliation activities.
But for now, Weah says there is no conflict between his political ambitions and role as peace ambassador.
The 2011 elections that Weah participated in underlined the urgent need for reconciliation. The Congress for Democratic Change (CDC) boycotted the run-off claiming they had won the first round, a claim that was reinforced by a letter by the National Elections Commission declaring them winners. That body later claimed the letter was a mistake. The day before the elections, they staged a demonstration during which police fired live rounds and killed at least one demonstrator and injured others. Johnson Sirleaf won by 90.6 % of the vote due to a low voter turnout, that the International Crisis Group (ICG) argues was due to fears of escalating violence. The Carter Center election monitoring team deemed the elections free and fair with some irregularities. This was the second time Weah had cried foul during an election.
“I still maintain that there was no transparency, there was no true democracy,” claims Weah.
Analysts predict that Weah will have a landslide victory in the Montserrado senatorial race, the most populous county in Liberia and one that is his party’s political stronghold.
If he succeeds in next year’s race, Weah will become senator of a county that is home to over 1.5 million people, 70% of who are estimated to live in slums like the one he grew up in. Weah’s childhood community of Geblah Town underlines the challenges that lie ahead. I travel to the cramped community, along rain-slicked, potholed roads, passing people drawing filthy water from square concrete wells and drainage overflowing with waste. There I meet Philip Sayon Jr, a 20-year-old CDC supporter and university student. Sayon is optimistic that things will change if Weah becomes president.
“He loves his Liberian people; he knows the soil from which he came from; he passed a lot of difficulties. He will give the people a chance,” he says.
While Weah is yet to make his real debut in the political arena, the expectations of his performance are huge.   FL

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Chasing A THROUGH BALL TO POWER

In silence and solitude we traverse the scrub-specked grasslands of Kenya’s famed Masai Mara in search of an elusive leopard spotted the previous day.
The rains have begun and newly formed rivers and gorges pockmark a terrain sketched with the region’s emblematic acacia trees. Shuka-clad Masai tend cattle on conservancy land fringing the national reserve and copious wildlife blankets the expanse. But few of the roughly 700,000 tourists who descend annually upon one of  the Seven New Wonders of the Natural World remain. Soon, shuttered camps will reopen and from July through October crowds will return to witness the Great Migration of countless wildebeest, zebra and other game transiting from Tanzania’s adjoining Serengeti National Park.
Navigating the muddy soil, even in a tank-like vehicle, proves challenging. But perseverance rewards us with remarkable sights. A buoyant Thompson Gazelle inexplicably chases a rare Denham’s bustard, lions feast on zebra remnants, the carcass of a newly killed giraffe sadly succumbs to scavengers, while herds of majestic elephants lumber across the plains. Bones and skulls litter the landscape, but rebirth abounds. An endangered cheetah lounges amid camouflaging scrub just meters from her two young cubs. Babies of every endemic breed suckle their mothers’ teats as siblings frolic nearby. It’s the natural order of things and I feel privileged to behold this diverse kingdom without mobs encroaching.
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Unfortunately, serenity masks peril as escalating human-animal conflict and an ivory poaching pandemic threatens survival of the animals we come to see.
Enter the crusaders, one of whom is Kenyan native Richard Roberts, founder of The Mara Elephant Project (MEP). It works alongside government and environmental groups—including the Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS), American-based Escape Foundation and prominent NGO Save The Elephants. The privately funded non-profit organization was created in 2011 to help communities “combat the increasing human-animal discord” and augment anti-poaching efforts. In 2012, the Mara suffered 149 elephant mortalities, 139 of those attributed to poaching.
“Too many elephants were getting killed. Something needed to be done to help farmers and wildlife coexist Without wildlife there is no tourism… and tourism is wildlife’s savior. There are more eyes on the ground and more incentive to protect the animals,” says Roberts. And as the tourist industry accounts for 14 percent of Kenya’s GDP, raking in $1.2 billion in 2011, that’s a lot of incentive to keep visitors coming.
“A funny disconnect exists. The Masai love tourism but don’t like the wildlife. They don’t see the correlation,” adds Marc Goss, director of MEP and manager of Mara North Conservancy.
But that’s not a universal sentiment, especially amongst the more than 100 Masai, who have thus far benefited from sponsored training at the Mara’s Rekero Camp guide school. For them, the dual crisis is evident as I learn from Teketi “Stephen” Nabala, my ardently well-informed guide from the exclusive Ngerende Island Lodge.
“We [Masai] benefit greatly from tourism, economically and socially. Exposure to more people and increased education is beginning to open eyes to the importance of protecting our ecosystem.”
Recent demonstrations in the Mara calling for stronger government action substantiate changing attitudes.
Since the reserve opened in 1948 on a scant 520 kilometers­—today park and conservancy land spans more than 1,500km2—tourism has exploded. The Masai Mara alone generates $50 million annually.  In the mid-nineties, privately-managed conservancies sprouted on the reserve’s perimeters when Masai began leasing newly-owned parcels of formerly communal land to lodge operators. This arrangement provides income, employment and camp-endorsed community support for residents, while visitor fees ($70 to $100 for non-East African residents) subsidize Conservancy management and preservation efforts.
But it’s a precarious balancing act. Animals don’t recognize boundaries and often venture outside protected areas. In the past two years, farmers increasingly greet encroaching elephants with violence, while the acute resurgence of poaching continues unabated. These are complex and convoluted issues stemming from Kenya’s ballooning population (up from seven to 43 million since 1963), traditional pastoralist Masai culture embracing agriculture, limited arable land and the revitalized, highly profitable, high-demand illegal ivory trade.
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Although the MEP collars and monitors Mara elephants, maintains a network of paid informants and two roving general security teams, “our resources are insufficient,” says Roberts.
Hoping to secure an airplane and additional security teams this year, it all comes down to funding.
“We’re seeing that poachers are becoming more organized and lethal, further emphasizing the need to expand MEP,” Goss interjects.
“The good news is that the KWS has many dedicated employees with whom we share information and resources. Kenya is very lucky to have one central wildlife service, which eliminates the kind of bureaucracy Tanzania has,” says Roberts.
Further encouragement derives from the new constitution that empowers the county rather than local government to oversee the Mara.
“We’re hopeful that things will improve with decentralization and the recent election of Narok County Governor Samuel Tunai. If all private sector revenue coming from Narok was used in a transparent manner it would be the third richest county in Kenya. If that money was used sustainably, we would solve a lot of these issues,” says Goss.
“In the past, administrators ignored anything going on outside their boundaries,” notes Ol Chorro Conservancy Manager James Hardy.
“Everyone is now realizing that we’re in this together and that one region’s problems ultimately affect and belong to all [regions]. We’ve recently established a conservancies forum to address issues and voice concerns on a national level.”
It’s Roberts’ birthday and he’s invited a few friends to celebrate. Pouring rain, snorting hippos and the menacing yelps of hyenas provide the soundtrack. Yet even in the relaxed ambiance of Roberts’ tented camp, conversation turns serious. Will the newly decentralized government be as effective as hoped? Will education help mitigate the human-animal and poaching crises? Will national reserve and conservancy entrance fees get to the right places and be used efficiently?
Before returning to my tent, I’m treated to a bedtime story that hinders any chance of peaceful sleep. It’s the tale of a huge and beloved Mara elephant named Heritage, who, although collared, had twice been wounded and treated for farmer-inflicted injuries. “We thought this elephant was blessed with a cat’s nine lives. Then a few weeks ago he was poached,” Goss laments, clearly taking it personally.
Heritage’s death adds yet another to the toll of seven mutilated bulls discovered in Mara West last December. Since January, 74 elephants have been slaughtered in Kenya. In 2012, a reported 656 elephants were killed (149 in the Mara), up from 578 in 2011. Samburu and Tsavo National Parks are especially vulnerable, the latter having lost 12 elephants, including a two-month-old calf, in March. In total, wildlife organization Born Free estimates that more than 32,000 elephants have been killed since the beginning of 2012.
Fueled by an insatiable Asian appetite for ivory, particularly amongst China’s newly affluent, the “shifta” with suspected links to Al-Qaeda, as some speculate, through Al-Shabaab in neighboring Somalia, are infiltrating Kenya in record numbers. With a kilogram of ivory fetching up to $2,000, this illicit industry nets an estimated $7 billion annually.
Most illegal large-scale ivory seizures over the last three years have originated in Kenya and Tanzania, which, alongside Uganda and five Asian nations were targeted at the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) conference in March for failing to adequately crack down on the ivory trade.
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-31201" src="http://www.forbesafrica.com/app/uploads/2017/05/IMG_2517-300x200.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="200" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/IMG_2517-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/IMG_2517-600x401.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/IMG_2517-768x513.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/IMG_2517.jpg 1024w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />
The good guys face tough odds as organized cartels, allegedly unscrupulous officials and outdated Kenyan laws that impose absurdly tame poaching penalties, conspire against them.
That said, notwithstanding a recent poor track record, Kenya has long been at the forefront of wildlife conservation. One of the first African countries to ban trophy hunting in 1973, Kenya vehemently opposed the CITES edict permitting China to purchase non–poached ivory and is currently countering Tanzania’s attempt to remove elephants from the endangered species list. To date, Kenya has allied with 16 African nations (two-thirds of the 23 member African Elephants Coalition) to quash the proposal that will repave the way for legal ivory sales.
Despite international outcry and support, officials and NGOs in Kenya and throughout Africa are fighting an uphill battle. A CITES report last June documented the highest African poaching numbers in a decade and the most ivory seizures recorded since 1989. The contraband ivory trade has more than doubled globally since 2007 and is three times larger than in 1998.
“The new wave of killing elephants in Africa is in many ways far graver than the crisis of the 1970s and 1980s… there are fewer elephants and demand is far higher. Record ivory prices in the Far East are fueling poachers, organized crime and political instability across the African elephant range and the situation shows no sign of calming,” wrote Save The Elephants founder Iain Douglas-Hamilton in the January-March issue of conservation journal SWARA.
Like most visitors, I journeyed to the Mara in pursuit of spotting big game. But, I depart with something far more indelible than beautiful photos, muddy shoes and Masai beaded jewelry. I take with me a profound awareness and renewed appreciation for the consequences of human infringement on our fragile planet. And a fierce desire to do s

2301

A New Wave Of Killing

<h4>Rumours</h4>
<h4>by Mongane Wally Serote</h4>
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="size-medium wp-image-31072 alignleft" src="http://www.forbesafrica.com/app/uploads/2017/05/wally-serote-rumours-197x300.jpg" alt="" width="197" height="300" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/wally-serote-rumours-197x300.jpg 197w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/wally-serote-rumours-300x456.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/wally-serote-rumours.jpg 329w" sizes="(max-width: 197px) 100vw, 197px" />
This is the second novel by poet and former political activist, Mongane Wally Serote. The first, Revelations, was published two years ago.
This book is definitely not Serote’s best work but it may appeal to supporters of the ANC, the movement in the book.
Rumours describes the hangover after the apartheid regime. We learn how living in exile affected the lives of comrades and their families.
Keke, the protagonist, is a Umkhonto we Sizwe veteran and failed CEO of a cellphone company. He also struggles with issues at home.
Keke abandons his family and job and ends up a homeless alcoholic. This thrusts him into a spiritual journey, where he attempts to reconnect with his family and find a purpose for his life in post-apartheid South Africa.
The author’s obsession with so-called media rumors is resonant of the ANC’s disapproval of the press exposing corruption and bad governance. The controversial arms procurement by the South African government is justified as preparedness for the defense of the ‘African Renaissance’. The overall message is that the west is to blame for Africa’s failures.
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<h4>Armed and Dangerous</h4>
<h4>by Ronnie Kasrils</h4>
&nbsp;
I approve of books like this, even the second time around. This is an updated version of the 1993 edition. Anyone who has enjoyed the sweet taste of a free South Africa should know of the grim and grimy struggle that helped create it. In this, former government minister, Ronnie Kasrils does it justice. Kasrils is a principled humanist with a conscience that was the father of his role as an operative in Umkhonto we Sizwe—the armed wing of the African National Congress.  As a young man, he abhorred the casual violence and hatred directed against black people; this is what drove him into exile everywhere from London to Luanda.
There are a few surprises in the book, including the snippet that Kasrils had a relationship with the late singer Miriam Makeba, who used to slip into his flat posing as a domestic worker.
The sting is in the tail. Kasrils, ever the party man, uses the last few paragraphs to register his dismay with the government he helped put in power. A very unexpected and thought provoking end to a weighty tome. Sounds like the prelude to another book, Ronnie.
<h4>Ruth First and Joe Slovo in the war against Apartheid</h4>
<h4>by Alan Wieder</h4>
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="size-medium wp-image-31071 alignleft" src="http://www.forbesafrica.com/app/uploads/2017/05/2ibdlld-202x300.jpg" alt="" width="202" height="300" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/2ibdlld-202x300.jpg 202w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/2ibdlld-300x445.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/2ibdlld.jpg 308w" sizes="(max-width: 202px) 100vw, 202px" />
Alan Wieder’s Ruth First and Joe Slovo in the War Against Apartheid offers a refreshing read for any enthusiast of South African history.
Focusing on one of the most prominent couples in the anti-apartheid resistance, Wieder’s novel retells their story through the oral narratives of those around them. The author reveals a complex marriage between the two people who changed the world of politics.
A journalist and communist party member, First turned resistance fighter after being exiled from South Africa for her outspoken views against the regime. Her influence around the globe was silenced by the apartheid government after she opened a booby-trapped envelope-bomb in Maputo, Mozambique.
Slovo led a life as dangerous as First’s. The student activist, lawyer and co-mastermind of Umkhonto we Sizwe, the African National Congress’ militant arm, Slovo lived to see South Africa become a democracy in 1994.
A reader looking to get an insight into the behind-the-scenes activities of a revolution will not want to skip this book. It goes beyond a boring history lesson, bringing to life never-before-seen personalities and struggles.
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<h4>Springboks, Troepies and Cadres: Stories of the South African Army (1912-2012)</h4>
<h4>by David Williams</h4>
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-31070" src="http://www.forbesafrica.com/app/uploads/2017/05/1772367_121204202028_Bob_Springboks_Troepies-204x300.jpg" alt="" width="204" height="300" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/1772367_121204202028_Bob_Springboks_Troepies-204x300.jpg 204w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/1772367_121204202028_Bob_Springboks_Troepies-300x440.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/1772367_121204202028_Bob_Springboks_Troepies.jpg 500w" sizes="(max-width: 204px) 100vw, 204px" />
Springboks, Troepies and Cadres takes the reader on a journey through 100 years of the South African Army and the three major wars in which it fought: both World Wars and the Border War.
It all started with a command from Britain in 1914 to seize control of German South West Africa so Germany could not gain access to its colony’s shores—a campaign successfully carried out by the newly-created Union Defence Force, which spawned the creation of the South African Air Force. The move set the scene for South Africa’s political landscape, sparking an uprising by the Boers who had been part of the war against the British Empire years earlier. It ultimately led to the establishment of the “purified” National Party in 1948.
South Africa’s strong sense of citizenship between conscripts and volunteers created a diverse culture that allowed for the implementation of a unique blend of military tactics. This was a major factor in the South African Army being touted as one of the world’s greatest in the 1980s.
The book is laden with facts but keeps the reader engaged, even those with only a vague interest in the military.
<h4>Dystopia</h4>
<h4>by James Siddall</h4>
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="size-medium wp-image-31073 alignleft" src="http://www.forbesafrica.com/app/uploads/2017/05/BT3ezMj-196x300.jpg" alt="" width="196" height="300" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/BT3ezMj-196x300.jpg 196w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/BT3ezMj.jpg 288w" sizes="(max-width: 196px) 100vw, 196px" />
Dystopia is an autobiographical book about South African journalist, James Siddall, and his journey through alcohol and benzodiazepines addiction as well as his descent from a glittering media career to becoming the scourge of pubs and shebeens of the Kwa-Zulu Natal province. Siddall was an award-winning journalist, who became deputy editor of Playboy magazine at just 26, and lived a life filled with fast cars and beauty queens. But along the way Siddall’s drinking got out of control. His life had transformed into one that involved excessive drinking, drugs and even prostitution.
The memoir, cleverly written, follows the black hole of substance abuse, tracking Siddall’s life as he becomes homeless and loses his job. The book is often repetitive as it tells the story of an addict who continues to relapse. Eventually he is faced with a court order sentencing him to a two–year stint at a rehabilitation center, where he struggles with sobriety and the fight to become a functioning human being and a working journalist.
An easy read, raw, brutally honest and for many reading it, it may hit home. It delves into myths and misconceptions surrounding addiction. But one may struggle to find anything different about this book.

dreamstime_m_19199524

Book Reviews

<h3>CARTIER</h3>
Steeped in equal amounts of history and whimsy, Cartier has been right up there with the top watch and jeweler brands. It was founded by Louis-François Cartier in 1847, whose pieces were very popular amongst members of royal families, movie stars and the über wealthy—King Edward VII of England once referred to Cartier as “the jeweler of kings and the king of jewelers”. Cartier’s watch designs and movements have evolved over the years but it remains true to itself with many of their pieces, such as the Tank, only changing to reflect current fashion trends.
The Tank MC Skeleton is made from palladium and is a self-winding watch, the first movement produced by Cartier. It has an oscillating weight and its entire mechanism is visible through the sapphire case back. The Tank MC Skeleton has a power reserve of three days and is water resistant up to 30m. It is made from 138 individual parts, 20 jewels and at its widest side is 43.90mm.
<h4>Price: $49,340</h4>
<h3>PANERAI</h3>
Giovanni Panerai opened his first shop on the Ponte delle Grazie bridge in Florence in 1860. The watchmaker began producing watches for the Royal Italian Navy and in 1916 patented Radiomir, a radium-based powder that illuminates in the dark, which was used in its submersible watches. The design of Panerai has changed very little in the 153 years that it has been producing timepieces. The watchmaker produces a limited number of pieces, with just 70,000 released to the market annually.
The Panerai Radiomir 3 Days Oro Rosso, while simple in design, is made using 162 components and 21 jewels. It is quite chunky at 47 millimeters (mm) in diameter and 5.3mm thick and has a power reserve of three days. The back is made from clear sapphire crystal and the watch is water resistant up to 50 meters.
<h4>Price: $23,610</h4>
<h3>PIAGET</h3>
Georges Édouard Piaget started his first workshop on his family’s farm in Switzerland in 1874 by making high-precision movements that were supplied to other watchmakers. Piaget gained fame as word of his expertise spread and in 1943, the company registered the brand, selling and designing watches under the Piaget name. Piaget’s grandsons grew the founder’s legacy and footprint, making Piaget watches internationally recognized and sought-after timepieces.
The Piaget Altiplano Date is a classic Piaget piece with a caliber 1205P, the world’s thinnest automatic movement at just 3mm, housed in a record-breaking 6.36mm case. The sapphire crystal case shows the 221 parts and 27 jewels used in the design. It has a 44-hour power and comes in two variations: 18-carat white gold with a black alligator leather strap or 18-carat rose gold with a brown alligator strap.
<h4>Price: $26,740</h4>
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<h3>IWC SCHAFFHAUSEN</h3>
The International Watch Company (IWC) was founded in Schaffhausen, in the east of Switzerland in 1868 by American-born Florentine Ariosto Jones—once a director at E. Howard &amp; Co., America’s leading watchmaking company at the time. IWC quickly made a name for itself by using the precision of Swiss craftsmanship blended with modern American engineering technology. It is this combination that has kept the demand high for watches produced by IWC.
The IWC’s Big Pilot’s Watch Perpetual Calendar Edition, or Le Petit Prince, is limited to just 270 pieces and makes use of a Pellaton automatic winding system—a mechanical movement that allows for a seven-day power reserve when fully wound. Made with an 18-carat gold medallion featuring an engraving of Le Petit Prince, it has a perpetual calendar with displays for the date, day, month and year in four digits as well as a perpetual moon phase.
<h4>Price: $47,020</h4>
<h3>ROGER DUBUIS</h3>
Roger Dubuis is a relative newcomer on the luxury watches scene but since its establishment, by Carlos Dias and its namesake founder Roger Dubuis in 1995, it has been a pioneer in its own right. It produces the only flying tourbillon watch in the world—a highly sophisticated movement. It is also the only watchmaker in the world whose entire collection carries the Poinçon de Genève; the most sought after certification that can be bestowed upon a watch.
Roger Dubuis’ Skeleton Flying Tourbillon features a hand-wound mechanical movement with a power reserve of 60 hours and is water resistant to 30 meters. Its case has a diameter of 42mm and the watch is comprised of 165 components with 19 jewels. The design makes use of the currently very popular pink gold in its case, clasp and screws, which is all brought together with a genuine alligator, hand-stitched brown strap.
<h4>Price: On request</h4>

29818

Time To Shine

What do you remember from the 2012 Olympic Games in London? Was it hearing the names of countries you never knew existed? Watching Usain Bolt dash his way into history? The reuniting of the Spice Girls? For Tebo Dambe it was watching the Botswana team march in the opening ceremony wearing her designs.
“Seeing Tebo Couture designs at the London Olympics was a blessing… [My designs were] among renowned designers like Stella McCartney, Ralph Lauren, Giorgio Armani and Cedella Marley just to name a few. Tears dropped down my cheeks as I watched my hard work being paraded down the track and I remembered the hardships that came before it.”
It was a milestone on the painful journey from Botswana to the United States and back again. When Dambe accepted a scholarship from the Botswana government to study at The Academy of Art University, in San Francisco, her dreams began to take shape. Once graduated, she returned to her home country but things didn’t work out and she headed back to the United States, where she worked as a marketing director for an architecture firm.
“When the market crashed many [architecture] firms were retrenching… I was fired,” says Dambe.
She struggled to find a full-time job. Disheartened, she began to wonder where things went wrong in her life. It was then, at her lowest point, when she returned to her passion.
“I’m an artist, I was born an artist. I’ve been doing art, which is fine art, drawing and painting, since I was young… I locked myself in my room and said ‘You know what? I’m going to draw again.’”
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="size-medium wp-image-31182 alignleft" src="http://www.forbesafrica.com/app/uploads/2013/10/CTP1912-200x300.jpg" alt="" width="200" height="300" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/CTP1912-200x300.jpg 200w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/CTP1912-300x449.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/CTP1912-600x898.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/CTP1912-768x1150.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/CTP1912.jpg 684w" sizes="(max-width: 200px) 100vw, 200px" />
Dambe spent hours in her room with her sketchpad and before she knew it she had completed her first collection. With no clients or money, she took business by the scruff of the neck and Tebo Couture began to take shape.
“I had learned everything I needed to know to run my business at university… you learn how to do a logo, business cards and how to create websites…”
She took pictures of her friends wearing her designs and posted them on social media sites. Just as things were looking up, disaster struck.
“I was involved in a car accident. I had a Landrover and my car literally burned to ashes. Most of my clothes that were in the car burned as well. I am so blessed that I am still here right now… I realized that materialistic things were not that important.”
All hope was not lost. She worked harder and soon the orders started rolling in along with a few celebrity names. Among them: actress LisaRaye McCoy, actor Michael Jai White and TV shows such as Law and Order: Los Angeles and Jersey Shore. Dambe also received calls from two Botswana presidents and an ambassador.
“I am very grateful to have dressed the ambassador of Botswana, Tebelelo Seretse, in Washington D.C. She was photographed with US president Barack Obama… I could never have imagined that my clothes would reach the White House.”
Then in 2012, came a chance of a lifetime. Dambe won a national competition and got the opportunity to design the uniforms for the Botswana Olympic team.
Although Dambe would like to make a name for herself on the international scene, such as some of her favorite designers Stephane Rolland, Victoria Beckham and Ralph Lauren, she would also like to conquer Africa.
“I want my business to branch out into the African market. This is where I was born… it would really mean a lot to me if my clothes are appreciated here at home, be it South Africa, Zambia, Zimbabwe or Botswana, I would be very happy.”
For now, Dambe is happy and back working in Botswana. With her sketchpad in hand she hopes her clothes will fly off the shelves faster than Usain Bolt flies off the starting block.   FL

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A Dream, A Sewing Machine  And The Botswana Team

Legend has it that heavyweight champion Muhammad Ali was flying into the newly independent Ghana in the 1960s, when he went into the cockpit and saw two black pilots.
“What did you do with the real pilots?” asked Ali.
“We are the real pilots,” one of them replied.
“Back home in Louisville, Kentucky, they don’t let black people drive a bus,” quipped Ali.
When Ernest Kekana was a young boy in South Africa, fascinated with flying, this picture hadn’t changed much.
“I didn’t necessarily want to be a career pilot but wanted to fly airplanes, and the type of airplanes I wanted to fly was obviously anything I could get my hands on, the bigger the better. In order to fly the bigger airplanes, I knew that I would have to pursue a career in aviation as a pilot,” he says.
Kekana saved up the money he made from working at Edgars, a South African clothing retail chain, to attend a flight school in Lanseria Airport. But he quickly learned that if he wanted to succeed he would have to fly more often. He gave up his part-time managerial position at Edgars for a weekend job at the flight school for a tenth of the money.
“This was my opportunity to get my foot in the door in aviation… It’s one of those close-knit industries, and unless you have your foot in somewhere, it’s going to be difficult to actually break into it.”
When one of the operation controllers from the flight school’s charter division took leave, they needed someone to fill in and Kekana grabbed the controls with both hands.
“It was supposed to be a three-month contract but after the first month they offered me a permanent position,” he says.
At the time, Kekana had his private pilot’s license but could no longer afford to continue his training. He remained working at the flight school on weekends and went to work on charter during the week. He flew charter flights and occasionally sat in as co-pilot to build up his flying hours.
After two years in the charter business he was promoted to senior flight operations controller.
One of the managers at the flight school applied to the Aviation Training and Development Foundation to sponsor Kekana in the final phase of his training. Although Kekana had almost finished paying his way through flight school, the non-profit organization was adamant that he join them. They were looking for a role model to promote aviation among black people.
Kekana then worked for SA Express for two years and then South African Airways for five years, where his dream for his future took shape.
“I [had] arrived in terms of what you can achieve as a career pilot for an international carrier. My first conversion was onto a Boeing 747 as the inflight relief pilot so I was already flying 360-seater airplanes on long-range international flights… From there you just move in the ranks but the airplane and the routes and the types of flying you do will not change for the next 30 to 40 years… I thought, ‘We’re here,’ there must be more that I can do or give back.”
This led to the birth of Kekana’s luxury charter service, K5 Aviation. It is one of the only South African aviation companies with international and domestic licenses for all categories of aircraft and helicopters.
Starting an aviation company wasn’t easy. Kekana chuckles as he tells the story of how he got his service license.
Kekana had approached the international and domestic air services in South Africa to apply for his license. His international license was approved but the domestic air service license was rejected. He says the domestic air service wanted to see more money in the bank and more financial security. K5 then approached the Umsobomvu Youth Fund, now known as the National Youth Development Agency, which offered the funding. After that, the air domestic council approved the license.
“The domestic and international councils are independent bodies. The perceived more stringent council had approved my application and given us the license and the domestic hadn’t, it was a bit of a surprise,” says Kekana.
After they got their finances in order, K5 Aviation took off in 2006, and within the first six months they were making a profit.
“After 12 months we were showing a loss,” says Kekana.
Their worst financial period came during the 2010/11 recession. The company went from having weekly flights to receiving no phone calls. The team had to negotiate with their debtors and creditors.
“We’re still standing. We’ve made money, we’ve lost money but we’ve managed to stick it out through the recession and our doors are still open.”
Despite the difficulties—other airlines suffer too—Kekana is confident about the future of the K5 team. He says they would like to fly larger groups of people more regularly.
The advice Kekana gives to emerging entrepreneurs is the same advice he takes.
“Everything is achievable, if you really want something and you work hard towards it you will get it […] If one day, this all shuts down, if I can come on a weekend and take a little flight school airplane and go for a flight around the city, I’ll be happy because I’ll still be in an airplane.”   FL

418-211

Young, Gifted  And Soaring

When the battle against the Portuguese ended, Samora Machel was aware of the importance of image. The first Mozambican president saw strategic power in film and how it helped him promote national unity. His government established the National Institution of Audiovisual and Cinema (INAC), one of its first cultural initiatives, in 1976. It produced more than 300 documentaries the following decade, in an initiative dubbed Kuxa Kanema, which showed how the newborn nation took its first steps. With Machel’s death in 1986, and Mozambique’s turn towards the West, the small industry almost became extinct.
“It is true that there was a decline, especially when the country opened up to the market economy with the arrival of the IMF,” says Djalma Lourenço, director of INAC.
Producers began to emerge in Maputo due to private initiatives. The production of documentaries and advertisements for the innumerable NGOs that work in the country are their bread and butter. While short films are emerging, nobody dares speak of a Mozambican film industry.
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-31175" src="http://www.forbesafrica.com/app/uploads/2017/05/cine_africa_20121016_9-300x200.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="200" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/cine_africa_20121016_9-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/cine_africa_20121016_9-600x399.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/cine_africa_20121016_9-768x511.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/cine_africa_20121016_9.jpg 1024w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />
“An industry presupposes a value chain, that we yet to have in Mozambique,” says João Ribeiro, director of The Last Flight of the Flamingo, which premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in 2010.
Cinematic legislation forces international producers to establish partnerships with local producers, who are often unable to survive on their artistic ambitions.
“The fundamental structure of a Mozambican producer is to produce institutional documentaries and advertisements in order to fundraise to be able to produce their own work,” says Renato Chagas, a Portuguese director, who moved to Mozambique six years ago during the country’s boom years due to American and European investments.
In April 2006, Maputo was brought to a standstill with the filming of Blood Diamond, directed by Edward Zwick. The film, which starred Leonardo DiCaprio, had an estimated budget of $100 million, according to IMDb.
“In four months, eight million dollars was spent in Mozambique in hard cash. Just downtown, in the capital, a million was spent on renting out stores and closing down streets,” says Ribeiro, who worked as executive director on the film.
Yet, the millions Hollywood brought to Mozambique had a perverse effect. The costs of production elevated exponentially once local authorities, such as the Maputo municipality, grossly increased the prices of road rental. Mozambican producers are also all too familiar with excessive bureaucracy as a result.
“Filming in Mozambique is a headache. Before we begin filming, we have to fulfill a series of requirements with the different organizations, like INAC or the Ministry of Interior,” says producer Mickey Fonseca.
“Mozambique is not film friendly,” added his colleague Pipas Forjaz.
The two men, who have won numerous international awards for their documentaries, established a production company, Mahla Filmes, in 2009. Both were recently involved in the production of Caught in a Flight, by Oliver Hirschbiegel. Due to Mozambique’s appeal to cinematographers, the biographical film, which cost $32 million, lends its landscapes to Angola to tell the story of Princess Diana’s final years.
“We have a unique reality: architecture from the ’50s and ’60s that, still today, is hard to find in other cities. Furthermore, we have virgin landscapes and social stability,” says Ribeiro.
The Mozambican Law of Cinema, which will be voted on this year, continues to lack consensus. According to INAC, Mozambique produces around 25 works, either documentaries or films, annually. Finding a way to bring long-term sustainability to these productions is the key to creating a Mozambican film industry. But, how to achieve it?
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-31174" src="http://www.forbesafrica.com/app/uploads/2017/05/joao_ribeiro-44-300x200.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="200" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/joao_ribeiro-44-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/joao_ribeiro-44-600x399.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/joao_ribeiro-44-768x511.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/joao_ribeiro-44.jpg 1024w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />
Mônica Monteiro of Cinevideo, a Brazilian production company with an annual profit of nearly $23 million, says that Mozambique is a commercial bridge for the rest of Africa because it caters for the Lusophone market, which has close to 250 million speakers. Cinevideo’s aims are to produce films that allow consumers to identify with Mozambican productions. She believes that financing should be sought in Europe.
“The Old World consumes lots of Africa, as a result of their historic relationship.”
A taste of the money available from Europe is the program ACP Cultures+, which is destined to cultural sectors in countries in Africa, the Caribbean and the Pacific, to the value of €30 million ($40 million). Funds are available until 2013, but with the current financial crisis in the Old World, it is at the brink of extinction, unless someone puts in some legwork, and quick, the diamond could lose its luster.   FL

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Lights,  Camera,  Mozambique

A cold, gusty wind whistles through the branches of hundreds of thousands of dust-weary and bone-dry four-inch high scrub. This is the Karoo, South Africa’s desert, which has changed little in 250 million years. The valley creaks to its own song, carried on the wind through rusted windmills and crags of prehistoric rock.
This new tune is fracking. A thousand kilometers away, big business rubs its hands at the prospect of drawing R1 trillion ($100 billion) revenue, over 30 years, out of this land. On the other side, 3,000 landowners are pledging millions to stop them.
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="size-medium wp-image-31164 alignleft" src="http://www.forbesafrica.com/app/uploads/2017/05/IMG_0455-300x200.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="200" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/IMG_0455-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/IMG_0455-600x400.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/IMG_0455-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/IMG_0455.jpg 1024w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />
They call it hydraulic fracturing. The process requires horizontal drilling to create fissures deep within the earth. Pressurized water, sand and fracking fluids are then forced into the well to release the gas buried in porous rock. Extracting shale gas requires a high-volume hydraulic pressure, which uses around 20 million liters of water per fracking incident.
An estimated 485 trillion cubic feet of shale gas could be buried 4.5km below the Karoo, according to Econometrix, South Africa’s largest independent macro-economic consulting firm. The only way to get at it is via an invasive mining method, which has been used for no more than 15 years. Farmers in the Karoo say this will destroy their livelihood.
Derek Light is a small-town lawyer from Graaff-Reinet who sees himself as a defender of his birthplace. When Light first took on the court battle in 2008, he represented one farmer. Five years later, he represents thousands, including Johann Rupert, the second richest man in Africa, who lives on a farm nearby.
“It’s not a debate just in the Karoo. It’s a worldwide debate about a new method targeting unconventional resources in an unconventional way. It’s moving as quickly as the oil and gas companies are allowed to move. And we’ve said no. We didn’t make the same mistake that the United States made. They allowed it to happen and then tried to regulate it,” he says.
Most people in the cities do not understand the impact this will have on the countryside.
“I remember around two years ago, of all the people interviewed in the urban areas, 50% knew about fracking and of them, 15% knew what fracking really was. So ,I think it’s a question of if it doesn’t affect you, nobody cares.”
According to Light, fracking will change the face of the country. It will leave huge well pads every 5km connected by a patchwork of roads.
“The mining industry in the country has a shocking track record. There is a lack of observance of the laws as they are. There is inadequate financial provision made for rehabilitation. Inevitably for this country, the taxpayer has cleaned up the mess. The mining companies will spend money on what earns them money. They are not inclined to spend money on something that doesn’t generate income… No one can really give an answer as to whether we need this resource and if that cost is justified,” he says.
Born in Aberdeen, 50km south-west of Graaff-Reinet, Marlin De-Jager grew up in a colored township under apartheid.
He was raised by a single parent after his father abandoned him at the age of three. After a brawl at a rugby game, while in grade eight, he decided to skip town. He found himself struggling in the Western Cape province digging a train tunnel along the Hex River.
Last year, after 20 years of saving, he bought his own farm—a 3,000 hectare plot—for R4.2 million ($420,000).
“As an emerging farmer, I want to become a commercial farmer. One day, I want to see my son and his children also becoming commercial farmers,” he says.
“I’m only a drop in the ocean. I am trying to convince the colored community about my concerns with fracking. Our people are mostly small farmers. I sat and asked them about fracking. They said ‘we haven’t got land so why must we worry?’ That is their view. I don’t think they understand what will happen,” he laments.
Jean and John Watermeyer were children playing in the dirt of Graaff-Reinet when World War II was declared. Since then they have lived to see their children and grandchildren farm in the Karoo.
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“I have been here all my life, it’s a wonderful part of the world to live in. From an agriculture point of view, from a stock point of view, it’s a magnificent resource. You can breed you own stock, you don’t have to go and buy. It’s the perfect environment for farming,” says John.
“We depend entirely upon rain, and we don’t get much of it. If we have a five- or six-year drought after they leave it will be disastrous… If something comes to disturb all the growth, it’s going to break the spirit of an awful lot of farmers… If it’s just going to be used in another country, then why are we destroying this country to support them,” Jean protests.
Doug Stern’s family has lived on their farm, Rietpoort, since 1948. The third-generation famer, who is also chairman of AGRI East Cape, represents 3,000 farmers in the Karoo. Stern has seen the damage of fracking in Pennsylvania, United States.
“You are not only dealing with a water-scarce country, but a particularly water-scarce area. The Karoo is dependent on boreholes for our very existence. If you are going to contaminate the water it’s going to be devastating to our communities. You can do without gas, you can do without electricity but you cannot do without water. It’s the stuff of life,” he says
Stern believes that 20 million liters of water is needed to bore one hole for fracking. One well can drill up to 32 holes, he says.
“The industry to date has not revealed where they are going to access this water. They keep telling us they are going to use sea water, they keep telling us they are going to drill for gas well below the water’s surface. I don’t trust them.”
“I was rather surprised about the lack of knowledge in the cities, such as Johannesburg. What shocked me the most was when people from the corporate world didn’t even know where the Karoo was. That’s a fact. I was horrified. Most of the businessmen I talked to asked why they should care. They were told the value of getting this energy game-breaker was far more important than the value of the Karoo,” claims Stern.
“The amount of energy and effort that has to go into this particular resource, given the estimated lifespan, is disproportionate… we’ve already used up the gold reserves in this country. To take something that has spent millions of years to form and then to extract it in the space of 15-20 years, with no guarantee of leaving the environment in a decent state, is an uneconomical gamble,” says farmer Jeremy Harper. He worked for six years as an exploration geophysicist before moving back to his mother’s farm, SandKraal, 30 years ago.
“One of the aspects in mineral exploration that I was glad to leave behind was the sense that, while one is involved, you are party to the pillaging of the planet. My sense of reality says it ultimately will happen. It would be a sad day and the people in authority of this country should be indicted if they enable it to happen before there are cast iron guarantees,” he declares.
Sandkraal is within the explorative fracking zone targeted by Shell.
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Not fracking down

The gap between rich and poor is growing in the Premier Soccer League (PSL), Africa’s most expensive league. In the modern game of 2013, it’s the corporate box that rules soccer. Any club that hopes to stand a chance of competing needs cash, as much as a fleet-footed striker.
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In South Africa’s PSL, top dogs Kaizer Chiefs has a squad worth R138 million ($13.8 million). In contrast, newcomers Mpumalanga Black Aces has less than half of that with R62 million ($6.2 million). Striker Mabhuti Khenyeza, Black Aces’ most expensive player, is valued at R5.4 million ($540,000). Chiefs’ most expensive player is South African international, Bernard Parker, worth R14 million ($1.4 million).
The way Black Aces started this season is a sign of desperate times. Until halfway through August, they didn’t have a home stadium. In their first match of the season, when they squared off against Kaizer Chiefs, Black Aces had to rent out the Mbombela Stadium in Nelspruit.
Chiefs, who are awash with cash from sponsors and the sale of thousands of shirts, don’t need to think twice about filling a stadium.
The PSL is no place for sissies. The action may be in the corporate boxes, but this is unmistakably an African night. The smoke from the open fires in the township outside reflects light for miles; the waves of yellow and blue shirts undulate as shots flash past the goalpost; the faint echo of taxi hooters floats in from the parking lot. The loudest noise comes when Parker scores the winning goal in the sixth minute. Black Aces fans dream of the day, when they too can swarm into a stadium with thousands of vuvuzelas.
But so goes the story of a few aces among a pack of chiefs. Success is a dream and an expensive one at that.
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-31163" src="http://www.forbesafrica.com/app/uploads/2017/05/IMG_7831-300x200.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="200" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/IMG_7831-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/IMG_7831-600x400.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/IMG_7831-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/IMG_7831.jpg 1024w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />
A tattered flag bearing a blue ace has seen better days. Holding the flag stubbornly is Njabula Simelane, a die-hard Black Aces fan. Simelane is Mandlesive High School’s art teacher and was so desperate to see his side he brought exam papers with him. He marked them in his seat, shoving them in his backpack just before kick-off.
“I would not have missed this game for anything. Aces playing Chiefs, I’ve waited two years for this,” says an excited Simelane.
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The Money Game

The foot soldiers in the war against rhino poaching risk their lives every night. Preventing poachers from wiping the rhino off the face of Africa is a job for unsung heroes. Often, all they have are blisters to show for it.
They face questions from loved ones over the risky lives they lead. Last year, a lion dragged a sleeping anti-poaching officer from his bed under the stars and killed him.
It costs R20,000 ($1,900) a month for one unit, working as a two-man team.
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They have to be quick. All it takes for a poacher to kill a rhino is an hour. In five hours, the horn can be over the border and on a plane. Anti-poaching officers are on high alert 24/7. All have military training. This is a taste of their hard lives, as private money comes into the game.
Sergeant Tumi Morema
It’s 2AM at the Thorny Bush Game Lodge. The off-road vehicle’s yellow headlights pierce the landscape. Sergeant Thumi Morema is at the wheel looking for poachers. The 33 year old comes from the community in the area surrounding the private big game farms. He remembers the day he made his first arrest.
“We were searching for an old man who was hunting with dogs. If we find poaching dogs we shoot them. We found his snares and set an ambush… we saw his dogs approaching under a tree we were sitting in. The old man stopped beneath us and started fixing the snares. I jumped out of the tree, went around and came up behind him. I touched him on the shoulder, he got such a fright. We tied him and his dogs up. This man had been hunting all his life and had never been caught. I’ve been hunting before. I called it hunting, you called it poaching. I call it poaching now,” he says.
Since then, he has caught more than 50 would-be poachers. Thirty six of them have been sentenced in court. According to Morema, only a few can cut it. Of the 42 men who trained with him, only two made it.
He has spent his adult life supporting his 18 family members after his older brother died. He says his community has ostracized him since going over to what they call ‘the white famers’ side’.
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My family is so scared  i will be eaten by lions”

While most boys his age were playing sports with friends, 13-year-old Ishmael Beah was a professional killing machine, who could fire an AK-47 as though it were an extension of his arm. He was one of around 300,000 children, who are involved in more than 30 global conflicts to this day.
His dream of being an economist was devastated after his immediate family was slain by the Revolutionary United Front rebel group in the early 1990s, during the civil war, which tore through Sierra Leone.
“After almost a year of running, I—along with some friends I met along the way—arrived at an army base in the southeastern region. We thought we were now safe; little did we know what lay ahead.”
Beah was forcefully drafted into the Sierra Leone army, where he fought for three years. The combination of marijuana and ‘brown-brown’—cocaine mixed with gunpowder—made him fearless. The child soldiers repeatedly watched Rambo, which was powered by a car battery, and were initiated by shooting lined-up prisoners. The girls were sex slaves of the commanders.
<div id="attachment_31137" style="width: 310px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-31137" decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="size-medium wp-image-31137" src="http://www.forbesafrica.com/app/uploads/2017/05/20120822_SSu_4888-300x200.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="200" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/20120822_SSu_4888-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/20120822_SSu_4888-600x400.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/20120822_SSu_4888-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/20120822_SSu_4888.jpg 1024w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />Ishmael Beah, UNICEF Advocate for Children Affected by War</div>
He was placed in a rehabilitation center by UNICEF, where he underwent psycho-social therapy for eight months before being introduced to his uncle from Freetown.
In 1996, Beah visited the United Nations, following Graça Machel’s study about the impact of armed conflict on children. That was when he met Laura Simms—a Brooklyn-born, Jewish-American—who would become his adopted mother. She was the emotional support behind his book, A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier. He did not intend to publish it until his university professor encouraged it. But criticism comes with success.
“People started saying, ‘Why are you celebrating this? This is a bad thing that happened.’ And some people even called me a liar and said, ‘How can you remember any of this stuff?’… But I didn’t mind any of these things because since I came from this experience, I’ve always been chastised, whether it’s through stigma or in other ways, people sometimes split on the issue of young people, like me, who fought in a war as a child, whether you’re really a victim or a perpetrator. Some people are always trying to debate that fine line and use you as the pundit for that discussion, so I just ignore some of these things. Once I had really committed to publish the book, I knew that it was a story—even though it was my personal story—that was bigger than myself because this is a very small story about a much larger issue.”
Beah hasn’t stopped the fight for childhood. He is a UNICEF advocate for children affected by conflict, and works on policy level with the UN and governments to implement legislations. During his most-recent visit to the Central African Republic (CAR) where eight armed groups and the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) remain at large, he helped release 10 children.
The planning of a rescue mission can take up to six months. Most groups allow UNICEF to interview children and negotiate for their release. The CAR government signed a protocol, which will remove children from armed groups including the government army. When the war ends their sentences will be reduced.
Beah criticized Kony2012—a short film about Joseph Kony that went viral on YouTube in 2012—for being too simplistic, inaccurate and for presenting the situation as “The white man savior mentality”.
<div id="attachment_31138" style="width: 310px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-31138" decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="size-medium wp-image-31138" src="http://www.forbesafrica.com/app/uploads/2017/05/20120822_SSu_5653-300x200.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="200" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/20120822_SSu_5653-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/20120822_SSu_5653-600x400.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/20120822_SSu_5653-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/20120822_SSu_5653.jpg 1024w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />Ishmael Beah, UNICEF Advocate for Children Affected by War</div>
“… You left a very complex situation to the interpretation of a kid. So there’s a good guy and a bad guy, let’s get the bad guy. Really? This is how you solve the problem of a war?”
So what can we do?
“Look for an issue that you actually care about and find what it is that you can contribute to it, whether it’s financially or skills-wise […] But you can’t bury your head in the sand and expect to lift it up and for everything to be okay again.”
While Beah never became an economist, this year he will begin his PhD at Harvard in Law and Society, with a focus on how to repair collapsed societies. His foundation provides scholarships to children in Sierra Leone to dissuade them from a life of violence.
Today, you wouldn’t pick this 32-year-old—who has saved the world, for some—out of a New York crowd.   FL

Tag: October 2013

FORBES AFRICA SOCIAL MEDIA

Taking a chance on a fleeting flash

THE PAST IS THE PAST AS KENYA STANDS STRONG

Big Wahala And Dutty Shoes

The Camera Never Lies?

Chasing A THROUGH BALL TO POWER

A New Wave Of Killing

Book Reviews

Time To Shine

A Dream, A Sewing Machine And The Botswana Team

Young, Gifted And Soaring

Lights, Camera, Mozambique

Not fracking down

The Money Game

My family is so scared i will be eaten by lions”

Easing the killing machines out of the dark