It took about four calls before someone finally told me what Sithengi means. It was research officer Joy Lekgau, who presumed the word had Nguni roots, meaning ”market”. Uncharacteristic of the glamour the movie industry courts, Africa’s fastest growing film gathering has an ordinary name. If it were happening in the Arab world it would simply be ”Souk”.
In case anyone doesn’t know — Sithengi is South Africa’s official film and television market. This annual gathering, this year from November 12 to 19, is different from other world markets in that the size of our fledgling industry dictates that a single event covers the trade and the showing of feature films, documentaries and television.
”Sithengi, under the leadership of CEO Michael Auret, has introduced
a number of firsts to the African continent,” marketplace director Seanne Kube’s message reads on their website. ”The first documentary co-production forum; the first feature film co-production forum and the first Sithengi Talent Campus … ”
Auret is an LLB, political studies and English graduate from the University of Cape Town. In his own words, ”I was a lawyer in Zimbabwe. I set up four production companies and the first private radio station, called Capital Radio. I did a lot of work for the Movement for Democratic Change. When the station was shut down by the police I moved down here.” If you Google him you get to a site in which Robert Mugabe calls Auret a ”terrorist”.
Auret is hardly militant — he talks of film as his ”passion”. The past four years has ”been a learning process”. When he took up office at Sithengi he had little experience of running an events organisation. Today he does the maximum with a staff of 10, eight of whom are black women.
One often wonders what it means when white men boast that they are the boss of many women of colour. ”I find that women are able to run events more efficiently,” Auret generalises. ”Apart from that we are making a statement that we are employing people from the Western Cape, from disadvantaged backgrounds. Here, if you try to get into the industry you face a wall of white production companies that do commercials that are not inclined to take people from minorities. Not enough, let’s put it that way.”
Auret boasts that his staff is under 35 and that previous employees have moved on to good jobs in the film industry ”because of the networks and contacts they get exposed to”.
The picture Auret paints, of committed office workers turning out an event of international ambition, is somewhat contradicted by the public’s Hollywood-style image of high-flying movie personalities. ”We’ve done comparisons and our staff gets a normal wage, me as well. We don’t want to lose staff so we make sure that we’re competitive.” Travel is a bonus, as Auret and colleagues visit international markets and festivals to strike up working relations with industry counterparts.
Over the years Sithengi has forged links with the German, Italian, Canadian, Swedish, and now Nigerian film industries. Treaties have been signed — most of them consolidated at the annual market that happens in Cape Town in November.
At the same time, industry players, such as buyers, are flown in and milked for their experience. Once the doyens arrive they are put on panel discussions and made to participate in workshops. Somewhere along the line they are shuttled off to the winelands. If they have fun there, it’s almost certain they will return on vacation.
”Our little marketplace is just a mirror of the South African market,” says Auret. ”If the SABC, M-Net and e.tv are buying 70% of their content from Europe and the United States then that will happen at Sithengi as well. Our market can’t change the economic conditions, it can only stimulate.”
Sithengi is a Section 21 company with funding from official sources: the National Film and Video Foundation, the Department of Arts and Culture, the Department of Communications, the National Lottery Fund, SABC, the city and the province. In future one can expect a branding rush from big corporates on its special events.
To encourage the youth to attend the Cape Town World Cinema Festival, happening simultaneously, Sithengi and advertising agency City Gate have branded this year’s event with four characters who are ”’ethnic-less’. They are young — they represent the future of the country.” The design is done by graphic artist Michael Deicont.
It’s an attempt to incorporate all echelons of the society, Auret says about Sithengi’s mission. ”In the township, we’re showing films for R10 and mixing that with the red carpet experience.”