The East African Screen Collective (EASC) has called for a radical reform concerning the way non-African bodies handle culture funds, impart skills, and do research on the continent.
The East African Screen Collective describes itself as “a coalition of companies and organizations advocating for narrative sovereignty in the screen-based sectors (TV, film and digital) in Eastern Africa”. Its objective is “to increase the production and export of content from the region and support the sector’s stabilization and growth”.
The body is calling out extractive practices created by an unfair distribution of funds and lack of participation of the local African sectoral leaders in the decision-making process.
The body says: “Supporting African leadership, ownership, and control of the African screen sector is vital to dismantling colonial influences and fostering genuine narrative sovereignty, stability, and growth. Historically and currently, many of the funds and programs for the African screen industry are managed primarily from Europe, with limited engagement with/of African professionals.”
At the 2024 Durban Film Market, the group staged a soft launch. More recently, the South African market described the EASC’s statement as “pivotal” and has shared the group’s call for more signatures on a manifesto published on its website.
Some of the group’s recommendations are:
African Ownership of Content: Plan that African-owned companies still hold a majority stake in the content that is supported through labs, markets, and funding initiatives so that income based on intellectual property and creations remains within African entities.
African Jurors: Set up appointment committees with African jurors to evaluate the proposals in a manner similar to a peer review, and link these with African decision-making authorities and industry leaders.
African-Led Research With Fair Compensation: The research projects should be undertaken by African researchers who can communicate with local people since they speak the same language and their participants need to be paid enough in order to avoid exploitation.
Cultural Sensitivity in Research Methodology: Research must be culturally sensitive, inclusive of local norms, and conducted using methodologies that respect local customs.
Prioritizing the hiring of African mentors, script editors, trainers: This will make sure the mentoring and training are well linked to the local scene and will allow the professionals from Africa to play a more serious role in forming the industry.
For the entirety of the statement and the signatories so far, see here.
