Lola Kenya Screen

Nairobi, Kenya, July 2, 2007.

Information and Communications Permanent Secretary, Dr Bitange Ndemo, is set to preside over the launch of the second Lola Kenya Screen film festival for children and youth at Goethe-Institut, Nairobi, on Tuesday, July 3, 2007 at 3.00 PM.

Lola Kenya Screen is eastern Africa (nay, Africa)'s first and only annual international audiovisual media festival, production workshop and market exclusively designed for children and youth. Its motto is “Keeping Films for Children and Youth in Focus” and its 2007 theme “Promoting Democracy, Human Rights, Gender Equity and Literacy through Film.”

First held in August 2006, Lola Kenya Screen has earned Kenya and Africa a place on the world map of nations that specialise in media and children. This earned Lola Kenya Screen the Grand Prize at Kids for Kids Africa/ 5th World Summit on Media for Children in South Africa in March 2007.

Lola Kenya Screen has received more than 250 films from 45 nations for the festival that runs at Goethe-Institut, August 6-11, 2007; representatives of these countries—Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda, Taiwan, Thailand, Israel, India, Pakistan, England, Scotland, USA, Sweden, Czech Republic, Turkey, Canada, Romania, The Netherlands, Greece, Belgium, Palestine, Norway, Serbia, Croatia, Russia, Ukraine, Brazil, Australia, Denmark, Germany, France, Spain, Philippines, Cyprus, Poland, Finland, Japan, Mexico, Latvia, Lithuania, Northern Ireland, Ireland, Bulgaria, Slovenia, and Mongolia—will attend the function.

Besides unveiling its film line up, Lola Kenya Screen 2007 will also present its vision and introduce its partners to members of the diplomatic corps, learning institutions, children's homes and orphanages, mass media and governmental, inter-governmental and non-governmental organisations at the launch.

"Lola Kenya Screen may be just two years old, but no festival in eastern Africa has exhibited as many films from as many nations as we. Our age notwithstanding, Lola Kenya Screen has not only made films and marketed them across the world but has also beaten some leading film nations in Africa to the Grand Prize," says Lola Kenya Screen founding director Ogova Ondego.

Ondego adds, “Lola Kenya Screen shall once again seek to place audiovisual media tools in the hands of children and youth for the advancement of literacy, gender equity, self expression, and democracy; we shall equip young people to make films, appreciate and judge films, present the programme and report on the festival in our commitment to entrenching quality creativity in the socio-cultural milieu of Kenya and eastern Africa.”

“We salute our 2007 host and sponsor Goethe-Institut in Kenya. We also acknowledge the Danish Film Institute, Prix Jeunesse International, DW-Akademie, Berlinale, Mike Auret, and our other numerous friends across the world without whose support Lola Kenya Screen cannot be.”

Lola Kenya Screen, a member of International Centre of Film for Children and Young People, (CIFEJ), an organisation founded in 1955 under the auspices of UNESCO and UNICEF to promote excellence in cinema for children and young people, is presented by ComMattersKenya in conjunction with Goethe-Institut in Kenya.