By Kumba Leigh
Weltfilme, together with German Ministry Development Cooperation in collaboration with the University of The Gambia in collaboration with the Weltfilme organization from Germany have recently trained twelve youths from across the country on documentary film making.
The event took place at World Evangelist Crusade in Kanifing and funded by the German Federal Ministry of Development Cooperation.
Prince Bubacarr Aminata Sankanu, Deputy Government Spokesperson who doubles as the Lead Trainer for capacity building programme, highlighted that the Weltfilme is a German organization that works in partnership with the University of The Gambia (UTG) School of Journalism and Digital Media (SJDM) to promote film education and other digital related skills among the youth in The Gambia.
“It was the German Organization that approached us for partnership as part of the development cooperation. With the change of government in 2016, Gambia was embraced by the International Committee, and Germany has decided to include Gambia as part of its developmental partner countries. This policy shift made it easier for organizations like Weltfilme to initiate this training project for young people in the area of audio-visual, digital media with UTG SJDM as national partner’’ he explained.
He said the project has been ongoing since 2018, but due to some difficulties during the COVID-19 pandemic and in observance of the social distancing, it has been suspended for a while but has now resumed.
Mr. Sankanu emphasized the significance of the training, adding that the project is designed in two phases in order to engage Gambian youths in understanding the value of film making as well as be able to make professional quality films that meet international standards.
Training facilitator, David Noah said it is important for young people in the country to learn the skills involved in documentary filming. He however noted that he is confident the participants will make best use of what they are being taught, noting that they are cooperating and participating.
Mamadou Salieu Jallow, a film maker who was one of the six Gambians who were trained in Ghana on documentary filming said the participants are being exposed to editing and learning software for such processes. He stressed that the challenges with documentary most of the time is time constraints ‘’because it has lots of processes and the lack of some equipment like dolly, gim crane, jimble, amongst others becomes a huge problem’’.
