‘MINERS’ STRIKES GOLD ON TV
While SABC waited for answers, e.tv went ahead
FOR the director of Miners Shot Down, Rehad Desai, having hundreds, if not thousands, of people watch and tweet during his documentary’s first free-to-air screening was a fascinating experience.
“This is shifting television from being a passive medium,” Desai told The Star yesterday, as he spoke of the deluge of tweets and Facebook messages he and his team would have to sift through after the Emmy-winning documentary screened on e.tv on Monday night.
The insightful work focuses on the killings in August 2012 of 44 people during a miner’s strike at Marikana, but while it was aired once on DSTV last year, it was unavailable to view for most South Africans.
As shown on eTV, it tells the story of three strike leaders by using police footage, material from television archives and interviews with lawyers representing the miners at the commission of inquiry investigating the incident.
By yesterday morning the hashtag #MinersShotDown was trending on Twitter, with numerous emotional responses from those who had watched it.
“It’s been an incredible response… it started a highly political conversation,” said Desai.
For the director, having his audience use Twitter to ask the questions raised by his documentary was a wonder to behold.
“People find it hard to believe the reality of it… Leading black political figures are at the centre of what’s going on,” he said, hoping that the discussions surrounding the tragedy would continue.
Last year, the SABC’s officials denied claims they had decided not to air the documentary for political reasons, saying they had decided to wait for the conclusion of a commission of inquiry into the massacre before considering airing it.
Desai said, however, that after allowing e.tv to screen the documentary, the SABC had sent him correspondence to say they no longer would.
But he said this won’t stop him from continuing his campaign to have it aired on SABC, and repeated on e.tv.
Meanwhile, Desai told The Star he is working on two other projects, one titled Julius Malema vs The ANC, which he described as a documentary on the ANC’s fall from grace and the party’s loss of legitimacy. He said he hoped to release this film by June, in time for the Durban International Film Festival.
He is also working on another documentary film examining the #FeesMustFall movement, which he hopes to release by the end of the year.