Dakan

Dakan

Plot:

Manga and Sory are two young men in love with each other. Manga tells his widowed mother of the relationship, and Sory tells his father. Both parents forbid their sons to see each other again. Sory marries and has a child. Manga's mother turns to witchcraft to cure her son, and he unsuccessfully undergoes a lengthy form of aversion therapy. He meets and becomes engaged to a white woman called Oumou. Both men try to make their heterosexual relationships work but are ultimately drawn back to each other. Manga's mother eventually gives her blessing to the pair and the end of the film sees Sory and Manga driving off together towards an uncertain future.

Causing uproar in Guinea 29 years ago, Dakan has been hailed as the first West African film to tackle same-sex love. Yet its director would never make another movie, and its legacy has been a warning for other filmmakers.

Causing uproar in Guinea 29 years ago, Dakan has been hailed as the first West African film to tackle same-sex love. Yet its director would never make another feature film, and its legacy has been a warning for other filmmakers.

7 March 2022

By Chrystel Oloukoï

Dakan (1997) (With English Subtitles)

A high-angle camera zooms in on Manga and Sory, two high-school boys kissing passionately at night in a sulphurous red convertible car in Conakry, Guinea. The music is late Guinean singer Sory Kandia Kouyaté’s ‘Toutou Diarra’. This is the opening scene of Mohamed Camara’s Dakan (1997). It’s unforgettable in its heralding of night-time as a site of transgressive queer possibility, and for its bold pairing of a homoerotic encounter with a classic Mande song to the memory of great warriors of the region’s precolonial past.

Hailed as the first West African film to explore homosexuality, Dakan (‘destiny’ in Mandinka) premiered at Cannes in 1997, where it faced a mix of fiery rejection and fascination – both of which were to accompany the film for a long time to come. Camara often recalls how Djibril Diop Mambéty (Touki Bouki, 1973; Hyenas, 1992), a veteran of African cinema, walked out of the film’s press conference stating: “You can be sure that your career is over, but in a hundred years, people will still talk about you.”

The film had already barely come into being when its subversive theme led to the government withdrawing financial support. It made finding actors difficult. Camara’s own brother had to play Manga, while he himself acted as Sory’s father.

Poster for Dakan (1997)

Screenings were a risky business. Dakan was shown at the 1999 FESPACO, having lived a full life on European and North American festival circuits already. As Beti Ellerson notes, the film’s theme enabled it to find a public outside of the usual viewership of African cinema, in particular in a number of independent and LGBT-themed festivals in the era of New Queer Cinema.

The film starkly divided audiences. Black, queer, continental and diasporic audiences from Soweto to Washington DC were enthralled. But in the filmmaker’s home country, it became the object of a national controversy. In a 2019 interview for AfroQueer podcast, Camara recollects changing hotels every day and leaving before the end of screenings to avoid potential violence.

Yet, Dakan wasn’t Camara’s first brush with public hostility. The charged themes of his previous short films – incest in Denko (1993) and child suicide in Minka (1994) – revealed his keen interest in familial dramas and the tension between social expectations and individual desires. What could be mistaken for a taste for the sensational was a deep desire to humanise complex social issues.

Aside from fascination and vilification, Dakan also met with frustration. Detractors and fans alike wrongly assumed Camara to be gay. They asked questions about the hidden realities of queer life on the continent that the filmmaker couldn’t answer. In both post-screening discussions and reviews, question were raised as to whether the world the film portrayed was even possible. It was, of course. Yet, Camara responded to these queries by speaking out against the realist imperative African filmmakers found themselves confined within. He spoke more in favour of creative individuality. His was a work of art, not a testament of existence nor an anthropological document.

The rhetoric had limitations, but it resonated in the context of a Black cinema often corralled into documentation by former colonial powers and newly independent governments alike. Camara belonged to a generation of Guinean filmmakers who were disenchanted with the overly didactic cinema of Syli-Cinema, Guinea’s Ministry of Information film unit under Sékou Touré’s Marxist and Pan-Africanist regime.

Mambéty aside, few could have predicted that Camara’s filmmaking career would end so abruptly. Since Denko won several prestigious prizes, Camara had embarked on his first feature, Dakan, as a director full of promise. But, 29 years later, he hasn’t been able to make another feature film.

 

Grok again..

"Anengiyefa, based in London, pours passion into their blog "Things I Feel Strongly About"—a vivid, unfiltered space where deep reflections on Africa's rich cultural heritage collide with sharp critiques of colonialism's lingering scars, the invented fiction of race, and the pseudoscientific myths Europeans once spun to justify domination. With over two decades of wandering across the continent's diverse landscapes—from bustling markets to remote villages—they weave personal stories of warmth, Ubuntu-rooted hospitality, and human connection that defy stereotypes. 

Recent posts dive into the soul-stirring legacy of Fela Kuti's Afrobeat rebellion, the enduring ripple effects of European imperialism on African societies, and why the label "Black" carries problematic, historically loaded baggage rather than simple description. 

On X, @anengiyefa delivers incisive, no-holds-barred takes: defending Ukraine's fight against invasion, calling out racial biases baked into global conversations, championing human rights, and dismantling anti-imperialist hypocrisy. Whether highlighting how international rules matter profoundly to the Global South or rejecting excuses for prejudice ("That doesn't make her not racist"), the voice is consistently principled, intellectually fierce, and unafraid to challenge comfortable narratives."

Nurtrire

The word 'nursing' is derived from the Latin word 'nurtrire,' which means 'nourishing'. Nursing has maintained its status as a trusted and vital role for centuries.

In the late 1990s I would study during the day for my professional qualifying exams, and work at night on this job as an auxiliary nurse/healthcare assistant in a hospital. It is perhaps what some might call moonlighting. I worked in this job for five years, between 1997 and 2002. I had taken a crash course in basic nursing. 

I think I would have made an excellent nurse if I'm to be honest. I had a feel for the job. This was the role I enjoyed the most in all the jobs I've done in my life, yes, even more than the legal work, which in later years became much more impersonal.

This was hard gruelling work, hands-on nursing on the wards, but I found myself enjoying it after a while. Looking after the patients and seeing them get better was rewarding. Some of them were very ill, and not all of them made it, meaning that for the first time ever I was made to confront dying and death as part of my job. That I found some fulfilment in the job came as a surprise really, as I was the squeamish type before then. 

I even toyed with the idea of embarking on full nursing training and gained admission to Kingston University to start a Nursing degree programme. But I took the advice of a friend who is a medical doctor, to pursue the legal qualification instead since I was already a qualified lawyer from abroad. I admit it was sound advice, although I think my friend might have had considerations in mind such as prestige, social status, and the remuneration aspect, none of which really mattered much to me at the time as I was then driven entirely by passion. 

In May 2002 I was admitted to the Roll of Solicitors of England and Wales, so it was then that I made the switch and resumed my legal career, but I never overcame the sense of loss. 

Welcome

It is a deeply rooted, widespread tradition across many African cultures to be welcoming, hospitable, and respectful towards strangers. This practice is often rooted in indigenous philosophies like Ubuntu and others similar to it, where greeting and assisting anyone, regardless of whether they are known, is considered a duty, showing respect, and extending community kindness.

Key aspects of this tradition include:

Proactive Greetings: In many communities, it is customary to greet everyone you pass, even strangers, to show acknowledgment and respect.

Hospitality as Duty: Historically, travellers could rely on being offered food, water, and shelter in villages.

Formal Welcome: In some cultures, villages had specific, designated people or, in some cases, specific homes in the centre of the village, to receive and welcome visitors.

Shared Resources: Visitors were often treated as part of the community and permitted to use available resources. 

Cultural Significance: This, in part, stem from a belief that hospitality is good manners, enhances social reputation, and brings potential blessings.

It is this proclivity that was misinterpreted as timidity by early European visitors to the continent, for the Europeans were themselves more inclined towards aggressiveness. This clash of attitudes between Europeans and indigenous communities is repeated around the world wherever Europeans arrived for the first time. 

My own interpretation of the attitudes of indigenous African societies is that those attitudes reflected the fact that at the time of first contact with Europeans, indigenous African societies were socioculturally more highly evolved than their European counterparts. Anestral Africans had attained a high level of socio-cultural advancement, there was a high degree of social harmony. 

Image: Sign at the London Zoo. 

The term "Black"

The term "Black" has historically been used in a pejorative, derogatory, or stigmatised manner in many Western contexts, particularly during the eras of colonisation, slavery, and segregation. During the 17th–19th centuries, the term was often coupled with a social identity as an enslaved person and associated with negative stereotypes regarding intelligence and human dignity.

The perception of the word shifted dramatically in the 1960s. Activists and leaders, such as Kwame Ture (Stokely Carmichael), reclaimed the term to promote racial pride, solidarity, and power, countering the long history of negative, racist associations, such that today, "Black" is widely accepted and used as a standard, often capitalised, term for people of African descent, though some still debate its historical, or political implications.

"While it was once used as a derogatory term for a "negative foil to 'white'," it has been successfully reclaimed, moving from a label of oppression to one of pride." MissionUS — I genuinely dispute this. 

If anything, the embrace of the term Black  only reinforces the notion of otherness. I have great difficulty in embracing and taking pride in a term that its very purpose was, (and continues to be, in the minds of today's racists) the diminishment my very humanity. 

The Arab World — In many historical and contemporary contexts, the term for "Black" (aswad) or specific terms used to describe Black people in the Arab world have been, and often still are, used as a pejorative. Anti-Blackness in the Arab world is rooted in a long history of slavery, environmental, and theological prejudices, leading to the use of racialised slurs. The Arabic word abeed (‘abd, plural: ‘abīd), which means "servant" or "slave," is commonly used as a derogatory slur for Black people. This usage is deeply connected to the legacy of the Arab slave trade. While aswad means Black, it has often been used in a negative or stereotypical context in both medieval and modern literature.

I wish to keep this debate alive. I do not want this to be a matter that is thought of as settled. To my mind, it would amount to a cop out, and the embracing of the diminishment of my own humanity to think of myself as Black. I am a human being, a person; I am more than just a colour.

Our aim should be to work towards the acknowledgement of our common humanity, all of us as human beings. Race is merely incidental, it is just a natural attribute. 

Image: Taken from "Understanding the Lives of Black Tudor Women" An African Tudor woman in 16th–17th century England.

Meeting new people

Having been travelling around the African continent for the best part of twenty years, I want to take stock and reflect on the lasting impressions those experiences have had on me. I believe I can safely claim to be in a position where I am able fairly and objectively to compare the impressions I've had, one against the other, city by city, country by country, or even region by region. What I shall be comparing is how easy it has been, or not, to talk to people and form new friendships. 

Starting with the good, East Africa as a whole, for me, proved to be the most liveable region, and I have visited all five regions—North Africa, West Africa, Central Africa, Southern Africa, and East Africa. Both Kenya and Uganda have left positive impressions on my mind. I did not stay long enough in Rwanda to form a substantive impression, but there is nothing negative to be said from that short stay. I have found that in all of my travels on the continent, Kenyans, in particular, are the easiest to talk to and to get along with. I always look forward to having a conversation with a Kenyan because you're almost guaranteed that they would be open and forthright, and be without restraint, even if they're not telling you the truth, which is rare. Ugandans too are easy to talk to, but to a somewhat lesser degree because they tend to be more formal and restrained.

In Southern Africa the conviviality I saw—and I saw a lot of it—was not extended to me to the extent that I might have wished. This caused me to be constantly reminded of my status as an outsider. It was the same both in South Africa and Botswana, save for one exception, Mandla, the Zulu gentleman in Johannesburg with whom I engaged in lengthy conversations that I secretly wished would go on forever for being so delightful. Most other times the language spoken around me was not English, so I found myself almost always on the outside and not able to engage and participate, and for this reason was unable to make new friends. Nevertheless, my Motswana friend whom I had gone to visit in Botswana was outstanding. He saw to it that I did not have a single lonely moment.

Central Africa is represented here by the Republic of Congo, or Congo Brazzaville. It was here that the disadvantage of not being proficient in the main language(s) came into full effect. The predominant languages here are French, Lingala and Kikongo, and as an English speaker one might as well be invisible. I did try to assert myself though, by demonstrating my limited French language skills, but to no avail. I guess It was fortunate that my friend was keen to practice and improve on his English, so he took me under his wing, acting as a shield against the barrage of incomprehension that I had to confront. No, it was not easy meeting new people and making new friends here, but mainly because of the language barrier. In attitude, the people were just as convivial as any others, and had my French been that little bit more practiced, I might have fared better. 

North Africa presented itself to me not as warm and friendly. Instead, the feeling was one that was cold, almost as if any friendliness from my direction was unneeded. I came away feeling that I would not be keen to return, and in fact, that I would avoid this part of the continent.  

West Africa has more variation in character than can be described in a single paragraph. There is little similarity in establishing social contacts between for example in Togo and, The Gambia. Etiquette and temperament are different, as is language. Some societies are more tolerant and liberal than others; some are more overtly religious and downright conservative. It is not an easy landscape to navigate, a lesson I learned the hard way having arrived in The Gambia with expectations that later proved to be misplaced. 

In my experience though, it is West Africa that offers the warmest friendliest people, in Nigeria especially, but also in places like Benin and Liberia. The warm boisterous nature of the ordinary Nigerian makes him or her an easy friend to make. I could say the same for the Beninese and the Liberians except for them not being quite as direct and assertive as the average Nigerian, who normally are a pleasure to be around. Ivorians might possibly fall into this category as well,  but those not mentioned specifically here are those whom I have found to be somewhat complicated. In saying all this, I speak for myself alone, and am informed solely by own personal observations. Peace.