http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wg1IHGKPoQg

‘A Game’ is a short fiction film from 2010 by Sudanese director Marwa Zein, based on Italian novelist Alberto Moravia’s story ‘Let’s play a game’. Zein is one of the ‘Arab Women Filmmakers’ whose work will be screened and discussed at the Cervantes Institute in Berlin (with many of the directors attending). Other (older and new) films and directors are: Forbidden (Amal Ramsis), Kingdom of Women (Dahna Abourahme), Neither Allah, Nor Master (Nadia El Fani), Letter to my Sister (Habiba Djahnine), Damascus Roof and Tales of Paradise (Soudade Kaadan) and Lemon Flowers (Pamela Ghanimeh). A great selection. The series started earlier this week and runs till March 6. Details here. Trailer for the ‘festival’ here.

Further Reading

Fuel’s errand

When Africa’s richest man announced the construction of the continent’s largest crude oil refinery, many were hopeful. But Aliko Dangote has not saved Nigeria. The Nigerian Scam returns to the Africa Is a Country Podcast to explain why.

Fragile state

Without an immediate change in approach, Somalia will remain a fragmented country populated by self-serving elites seeking foreign patrons.

Coming home

In 1991, acclaimed South African artist Helen Sebidi’s artworks were presumed stolen in Sweden. Three decades later, a caretaker at the residential college where they disappeared found them in a ceiling cupboard, still in their original packaging.

Imaginary homelands

A new biography of former apartheid homeland leader Lucas Mangope struggles to do more than arrange the actions of its subject into a neat chronology.

Business as usual?

This month, Algeria quietly held its second election since Abdelaziz Bouteflika was ousted in 2019. On the podcast, we ask what Abdelmadjid Tebboune’s second term means for the country.