Vanessa Obioha
Organisers of the Lights, Camera, AFRICA (LCA) Film Festival recently unveiled the theme of its eight edition scheduled to host this month.
The provocative theme ‘Who Do You Think You Are?’ seeks to facilitate interrogations of self and more reflective perspectives of our shared humanity. It will focus on the politics of ethnicity and identity as well as protest and resistance.
The festival Director, Ugoma Adegoke captures it more succinctly in a statement: “The festival will focus on growing trends which threaten the ideal of the modern state today – fragmenting communities and putting up walls. It is our view that this is a result of a poor understanding of what has gone before and our connections to that.”
According to her, the modern African continent was built on a cause that transcended individual identities.
The new continent developed a common identity and values against the enemy of colonialism and later, apartheid. These were encapsulated in the spirit of Pan-Africanism which gave vent to ideals crafted in protest and resistance – alliance and alignment with other African peoples and causes reflecting a common history and destiny on the continent and throughout the Black Diaspora.
“The heroes to whom we owe today and the struggles they fought are forgotten. In the years that have followed, it appears as though
those histories and identities collapsed. With this year’s eighth edition, the festival focuses on a core aspect of its message – to
connect with issues that are rooted in the African experience,” she concluded.
This year’s festival will run from September 28 to 30, 2018 at the MUSON Centre, Onikan, Lagos. It will screen the best of cinema from Africa and the black Diaspora that aptly portrays the theme of the festival.
