Sizo for African Crossroads Manifesto
MBABANE - Sizo Hlophe has been selected to partake in the African Crossroads Eco-Existence Manifesto slated to be held next month.
Hlophe is a Culture Manager, Antidote Music co-founder and a fellow at Digital Lab Africa. The event will take place from October 14-15, 2021, and it is all about a community of future-oriented African thinkers and doers which collaborates all year long and critically reflects on the most cutting-edge entrepreneurial, scientific, artistic, and technological developments anchored in African intellectual and technological traditions.
In a telephonic interview with this reporter, Hlophe shared that he would be a part of the curatorial team.
Theme
“This is where we will be curating the next gathering whose theme is climate justice. We hosted a climathon that is focusing on the theme of climate justice and co-existence,” he said.
Hlophe went on to add that the African Crossroads was a year-long exercise for collective intelligence and collaborative action to positively shape the future of African societies.
This initiative is funded by the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Swedish International Development
Cooperation Agency (SIDA).
Members include festival makers (directors), artists in their different forms, professors, hubs and other intermediaries in the cultural landscape of the continent.
When asked on how he came to be a part of the manifesto, Hlophe also said: “COVID-19 brought everything online, and I have been part of a number of cultural events happening in the continent, most advocating for Eswatini arts. These include Fakugesi, Digital Lab Africa to name a few. I was recommended by Tegan Bristow who is director of Fakugesi Innovation Festival. We met virtually at Digital Lab Africa. I then participated in the first gathering for African Crossroads last year.”
In May this year, they made him an official member and Nekesa
Were from AfriLabs, who is also a member, included him in her curatorial team.
“Internally we call them councils, and I was part of the Opportunities Council,” he added.
and what would be your comment on being a part of such huge initiatives being a liSwati.
Hlophe went on to add that it was important for emaSwati to reach out as far as they could as creatives and cultural actors. This he asserted was because Eswatini had been in the back seat for a very long time.
“I strongly believe we all deserve to be working at that level and encouraging more of us to start working towards putting Eswatini on a regional platform.” he said.
Attended
Having attended last year’s event, Hlophe further stated that the experience was overwhelming as he learnt a lot from other actors from across Africa and understanding how they navigate the space and how their value creation and cycle works.
He then concluded by adding, “It was really a great experience, and just getting an understanding of how others have created careers from the kind of work that we do. It really gave me hope into not just thinking artists are struggling, seeing the opportunities showed me that artists struggle because there is a lack of such information. Where the opportunities are etc.”