Austria said on Saturday it has asked the Tanzanian government for an explanation after filmmaker Hubert Sauper accused it of targeting people who took part in his award-winning documentary Darwin’s Nightmare, an indictment of the pitfalls of globalisation in Africa.
”We have officially asked the ambassadors of Tanzania in Berlin and Nairobi to provide information following Mr Sauper’s declarations,” foreign ministry spokesperson Georg Schnetzer said.
Tanzania has no ambassador in Vienna.
On Thursday the Austrian director, who lives in Paris, said the Tanzanian government was putting pressure ”on everyone who participated in my film”.
Tanzanian investigative journalist Richard Mgamba, who is interviewed in the film about arms trafficking in Africa, was arrested and faces being stripped of his Tanzanian nationality and expelled from the country, Sauper said.
Darwin’s Nightmare, an international co-production, is a disturbing pamphlet on the dark side of globalisation that won the award for best first film at the French Cesars this year and was nominated for an Oscar.
Set on Lake Victoria, it suggests that a booming fisheries industry is depleting vital resources, even as local people struggle in abject poverty.
Sauper has been accused by critics of taking factual short cuts, although he has defended his right to the use of artistic licence in the film.
Tanzanian President Jakaya Kiweete charged this month that the film aimed to tarnish his country’s image and damage the Lake Victoria fishing business. — Sapa-AFP