OSVALDE LEWAT-HALLADE, a 29 year-old filmmaker from Cameroon, was awarded US $5,000 for her project entitled “Une affaire de nègres”. The jury underlined the courage required to make this film which seeks to shed light on a dark chapter in the history of Cameroon, and to stimulate reflection on questions of collective responsibility and the dangers inherent in trying to ensure national security at all costs

PROJECT DESCRIPTION

January 2001. Nine young people are denounced and taken from their families for “interrogation” by a Special Police Unit created by the Cameroonian government. They are never seen again. Their disappearance provokes a near-riot among the population in a country where the unit’s expeditious methods and its daily roster of victims have, for over a year, been fruitlessly denounced. Five years later (in January 2006), the director sets off in search of the nine disappeared and tries to understand how her country has come to this pass.