NAVIGATING THE CHALLENGES FACING AFRICAN SCRIPTWRITERS
Issues voiced by participants in ICAPA Trust's Equal Voices Story and Script Development Workshop reveal difficulties that beset emerging African screenwriters.
For many African writers the journey to becoming a competitive scriptwriter is marked by structural, creative, and resource-based struggles. In response to these persistent challenges, the Equal Voices Story and Script Development Workshop (EVW) was launched by ICAPA Trust in 2017, beginning with an intensive two-week training in Dakar, Senegal. With editions in 2023 in Lagos and in 2024 in Harare, and a 2025 session to be held in Nairobi later this year, the EVW continues to provide an invaluable mentorship opportunity for budding African filmmakers. Facilitated by seasoned professionals like Donat Keusch, Gabriele Sindler, of dfk*script services and ICAPA Trust Director Tsitsi Dangarembga, the workshop aims to nurture African filmmakers in an industry marked by limited support and resources.
The EVW transfers competitive storytelling for the screen skills by breaking the process down into the successive tasks of writing a compelling story, structuring this story to maintain and increase tension, and then adapting this tightly crafted story to the screen. The training emphasises collaboration through teamwork by requiring applications from teams of two, one of whom must be an African woman. The workshop also emphasises the need for a level of personal discipline that enables participants to continue writing after the end of the workshop.
In a session to assess progress after the workshop, participants pointed out that few countries offer grants or financial support for writers. This leaves most to juggle multiple jobs to sustain themselves, making writing into a passion that takes a backseat to earning a living. Attention is divided, writing time limited - circumstances that point to the importance of training models such as the EVW which was created to produce quality under the prevailing continental conditions.
Sometimes the other job is another film. “I was also working on another project while trying to keep up with consultations,” said Zimbabwean writer Olivia Jembere. “My laptop was being used for that, and I had to borrow one for this project. It meant I had to grasp everything quickly and work under pressure.” Olivia commends the EVW for keeping her focused by responding with in-depth notes, peer support, and expert consultations. Olivia explains, “Once I regained access to my own laptop, I managed to reflect on the suggestions and revisit my script with the insights I had gathered.”
With the goal of the EVW being to ensure that African scriptwriting can meet international benchmarks, the expectations of the workshop are high, with the standard often above what emerging scriptwriters have previously experienced. In an environment in which high level professional skills are rare, constructive criticism is correspondingly scarce. “Letting go of concepts we were attached to was tough,” said Kenyan participant Agnes Kola, who, together with her partner Elisha Otieno, is working on an anti-superhero story based on a Kenyan legend. Meanwhile, Otieno admitted, “Being new to this space, it was difficult at first to accept and apply constructive criticism." Otieno has since embraced the EVW's framing of critique as a core part of professional growth. “We have already reached milestones I had not thought possible,” he added. “Donat, Gabriele and Tsitsi helped shape our stories without overpowering them,” said Agnes.
For UK participant Derica Shields, who is adapting a Ugandan short story with her Ugandan-Rwandan co-writer, the struggle was not just finishing a draft but finishing well. “Writing a complete story, actually getting to the end of it, was a major challenge, and it is easy to settle for solutions that serve us as writers, but not our characters,” she observed. “Having readers challenge us to see the story through has been a huge help,” she said. With mentorship explaining how deepening character arcs contributes to the power of the story, Shields is now able to move from convenient storytelling to meaningful resolution, an essential leap for any writer aiming to craft stories that hold up in the global arena.
The EVW is a programme of ICAPA Trust's Creative Africa Storytelling for the Screen Incubator (CASSI), which aims to open up access to international level film-making skills to African women. Market ready scripts from the EVW are expected to go into production through the CASSI vehicle. CASSI will breed a new generation of filmmakers equipped to produce world-class content, with the EVW anchoring this content in powerful storytelling.
