The Female Film Producers Call Out for the Enactment of the Film Policy

The Sierra Leone Film Industry including so many film professionals have been stalled for over a decade. A lot of hard work and resources have been poured into several projects, all by mainly young people but the income to cost margin has never been reached from a lot of the said film projects. Simply so because of the lack of one key thing, the film policy.

Interestingly, the government has several times promised to work for young people to reduce crime and unemployment, but it seems they have no attention for the film industry which bears a lot of young talents that keep languishing without direction; all for the lack of the film policy which has been on course for over half a decade now. With the current Julius Maada Bio Administration in charge, a lot who thought at first that there was a light for the film industry with the first lady as a veteran of the same field, are now more disappointed than ever.

Weeks in the months of March 2022, a lot of filmmakers took to social media crying out for the enactment of the film policy. Be as it may with politicians, a call was made for a meeting. Yes, the meeting took place, and the Minister of Information and Communication made a policy statement and pronouncement that they would ensure the policy is enacted.

Only for the news to be broken by the film industry leadership that the consultation meeting that would have been held, as a step for the policy to be laid to cabinet was postponed indefinitely.

The Sierra Leone Film Council chose to work with the office of the ambassador of entertainment to go ahead with the film festival which is to be held on the 1^st of April 2022. From the feedback we gathered, over half of the film family would have loved to push for the film policy rather than being part of any other activity.

Today, the 31^st of March 2022, the Sierra Leone Female Film Producers have taken on the campaign and are demanding the government do as they promised and enhance the enactment of the film policy.

On the background check, the Sierra Leone Female Film Producers is an organisation that comprises the best female film producers in Sierra Leone film industry currently. These women are not only filmmakers but from every facet of life, from academia, the medical film, the banking industry and more. So therefore, they wheel high power across the industry not because of their financial power but also because of the influence they have over some of the male counterparts, their families and the filmmakers’ communities.

As their organisation is set to protect women and girls in the film industry and as well inspire young girls, their keen focus now is to fight with whatever they have and see that the government enacts the film policy which they so dearly yearn for.

When we probed further and asked why such a bold step, ‘The Ernest Bai Koroma Government failed to do some tangible for us and we threw our support to Julious Maada Bio because we thought Fatima Bio would do something when she becomes first lady being that she was one of us and already knew everything about our struggle’’, one of them said.

A lot of them have threatened to vote not only against this administration but to campaign against this administration to see that they are out of office, and they will continue until they get that government that will see to the suffering of filmmakers. They out-rightly said they are not asking the government for money but they just need the Sierra Leone Film Policy to be enacted by the cabinet. Obviously, this is one of the most positive group of women that may stand to throw a government  out of office through their campaigns because a simple demand has not been met.

Our Questions are:

1. Is the current SLPP administration ready to lose the votes of filmmakers come 2023 general elections?
2. Can this current administration stand such a group of women who are ready to launch a fierce campaign to see that they are out of office?