Zola Maseko

Zola Maseko (born 1967) is a Swazi film director and screenwriter. He is noted for his documentary films related to xenophobia.

Early life and education Zola Maseko was born in exile in 1967 and educated in Swaziland (now Eswatini) and Tanzania.

After moving to the United Kingdom, he graduated from the National Film and Television School in Beaconsfield in 1994.

Career Maseko's first film was the documentary Dear Sunshine, released in 1992. He participated in several uMkhonto we Sizwe (MK) guerrilla campaigns.

In 1998 he directed The Life and Times of Sarah Baartman, a 53-minute documentary film about a woman named Sarah Baartman in colonial times. Set between 1810 and 1815, the documentary relates the true story of a 20-year-old woman travelling to London from Cape Town. The woman is taken to France in 1814 and from then on became a subject of scientific investigation. Maseko's cinematic techniques were employed to depict the woman as a sub-human species, emphasising the racial prejudice against black Africans in Europe during imperialist times. Critically acclaimed, it garnered many awards including Best African Documentary, 1999, at the Panafrican Film and Television Festival of Ouagadougou (FESPACO), Best Documentary at the 1999 Milan African Film Festival and an award at the 2001 African Literature Association Conference Film Festival.

Other short films by Maseko include The Return of Sarah Baartman, Children of the Revolution, and A Drink in the Passage, all released in 2002. The latter won the Special Jury Award at FESPACO. Drum was the first English-language film to win the prize since 1989.

In 2017, he directed and wrote the film adaptation of Zakes Mda's 2006 novel The Whale Caller.

Filmography

As director The Foreigner (1997) The Life and Times of Sara Baartman (1998) The Return of Sarah Baartman (2002) Children of the Revolution (2002) A Drink in the Passage (2002) Drum (2004) The Whale Caller (2017)