Lionel Ngakane

Lionel Ngakane (17 July 1928 – 26 November 2003) was a South African filmmaker and actor, who lived in exile in the United Kingdom from the 1950s until 1994, when he returned to South Africa after the end of apartheid. His 1965 film Jemima and Johnny, inspired by the 1958 "race riots" in Notting Hill, London, won awards at the Venice and Rimini film festivals. In the 1960s, Ngakane was a founding member of the Pan African Federation of Filmmakers (FEPACI) and Fespaco, the Panafrican Film and Television Festival of Ouagadougou (FESPACO).

Biography Ngakane was born in Pretoria, South Africa. In 1936, his family and he moved to the Sophiatown neighbourhood of Johannesburg. His father (a teacher) set up a hostel with Alan Paton, author of the 1948 novel Cry, The Beloved Country. on television — Quatermass and the Pit (1958) and the spy series Danger Man (Deadline, 1962) with Patrick McGoohan, and on stage — in Errol John's Moon on a Rainbow Shawl, and Wole Soyinka's play The Lion and the Jewel at the Royal Court Theatre in 1966.

Ngakane returned to South Africa after the end of apartheid in 1994.

He is best remembered for his short film Jemima and Johnny (1965), inspired by the 1958 "race riots" in Notting Hill, London. It won awards at the Venice and Rimini film festivals. He also directed documentaries on apartheid and African development. He was honorary president of the Pan African Federation of Filmmakers (FEPACI), which organization he had originated in 1967 as a lobbying group for the support of African filmmakers.

In 2020, Ngakane was honoured at the RapidLion South African International Film Festival.