Africa has a future that is lit by the legacy of those thinkers and revolutionaries that gave their lives away in exchange of Africa’s survival to prosperity. Other nations of the world have powerful policies that ensure institutional protection and preservation of their culture, language and identity and this is because they wrote and shared a common thesis, they understood that they needed cohesion and optimum consensus to systematically protect themselves from possible annihilation which is always latent or imposition of the outside, a threat which always looms.
FEPACI participation at the 2006 Summit and FEPACI Congress is another landmark event among many unique events that preceded the Tshwane Film Summit. We have evidence of an impressive history of declarations, manifestos, resolutions and recommendation made as a common thesis that charts a common path, why should we after all these years of debates and resolutions still find it hard to agree on a common strategy, be it operational or structural?We are again showing withdrawal symptoms. Interrogating and perhaps analyzing the state of FEPACI since its move to the southern region I havesince experienced and seen familiar features of behavior, and familiarsites of commentary where perception and interpretation of our institutions is negative.
Where there is a perpetuation of a discourse of disenchantment, where destructive criticism is more common than constructive criticism where the overwhelming expectation on action and delivery is that of failure and not success.
Because of the growing negative perception and association of failure regarding various leading institutions in Africa, many African practitioners, be they academicians, film practitioners or external observers tend to safely distance themselves from direct participation in discourse so lest they get adverselyimplicated and lose face or credibility. The passive voice of ourintellectuals hinders growth – it is a safe thing to do short term and creates a comfort zone but the long- term consequence of the passive intellectual who opts to remain neutral in the face of redundant institutions helps in making them depreciate in value to become immeasurable liabilities that stunt social growth.
FEPACI has been in the Southern Region for two years. We all have expectations about what the future of FEPACI should be. What is it that should have happened at this point already? What is the desired expectation? What measures this expectation? Who is it that has to deliver on this expectation? Who benefits from this expectation? And how is the benefit envisaged and shared?
Seipati Bulane-Hopa
Secretary General: FEPACI
Secretary General: FEPACI
