On wednesday 11 February 2015 it's 25 years ago Nelson Mandela was released from prison. After 27 years on Robben Island and in Victor Verster Prison. he continued his long walk to freedom. ZAM celebrates this momentuous day in history with another release: the special commemorative magazine published in January 2014 is now fully and freely accessible online (click below). Order your print copy here . Online Special Edition about Mandela
On wednesday 11 February 2015 it's 25 years ago Nelson Mandela was released from prison. After 27 years on Robben Island and in Victor Verster Prison. he...
ZAM offered 2×2 tickets to Akwasi at the Breakfast Club at BIRD , Rotterdam, the Netherlands on Sunday 22 February, 2015. Winners have been informed . Akwasi plays his own league. Only a year ago he graduated the Maastricht Theatre Academy, the first rapper to do so, and already he got his own label. His song 'Een Wedstrijd' is the first release on his label Neerlands Dope and also the first single on his new album 'Daar Ergens', which is a tribute to the Dutch artist Bram Vermeulen. On Sunday 22...
ZAM offered 2×2 tickets to Akwasi at the Breakfast Club at BIRD , Rotterdam, the Netherlands on Sunday 22 February, 2015. Winners have been informed....
ZAM is over the moon to announce that the legendary undercover journalist Anas Aremeyaw Anas (known from the documentary 'Chameleon' and award-winning 'Fair Trade' researcher Selay Kouassi (nominated for 'De Tegel' in 2013) will visit Amsterdam from 4 to 8 March on invitation of ZAM. Event on Thursday 5 March Their work visit programme will include an event on undercover journalism, organised by One World and ZAM, in Pakhuis de Zwijger on Thursday 5 March. Anas (Ghana) and Kouassi (Ivory Coast)...
ZAM is over the moon to announce that the legendary undercover journalist Anas Aremeyaw Anas (known from the documentary 'Chameleon' and award-winning...
Every now and then, Anas Aremeyaw Anas , the famous undercover journalist from Ghana, got a bit cross during his ZAM-invited visit to the Netherlands last week. “I want to ask: who made these rules,” he countered when ethical questions around ‘going undercover’ were raised during a debating evening in Amsterdam event venue De Zwijger. “We are talking about my society, Ghana. In my society we expose injustice in this way. You had your social struggles here in Holland- let us have ours.” Anas has...
Every now and then, Anas Aremeyaw Anas , the famous undercover journalist from Ghana, got a bit cross during his ZAM-invited visit to the Netherlands...
He declares that taxpayer’s money should be utilised for the good of the people, but he also passed a pension law that provides him with six cars to be replaced every three years. As Lagos State governor he boosted its internal revenue more than tenfold. With elections approaching in a country tormented by armed conflict and falling oil prices, controversial ‘Godfather’ Bola Tinubu invigorates the opposition’s hopes for change. The cheering sets in as soon as the crowd in the gallery spots the...
He declares that taxpayer’s money should be utilised for the good of the people, but he also passed a pension law that provides him with six cars to be...
New documentary ‘The Supreme Price’ portrays the Abiola family’s struggle for democracy and women’s rights in Nigeria. This documentary by Joanna Lipper (US) tells the story from the viewpoint of the young Hafsat, whose father Chief Moshood Kashimawo Olawale Abiola, -often referred to as M.K.O. Abiola-, was elected president of Nigeria in 1993. He was subsequently imprisoned by the military regime which had annulled the election results. He would die in detention five years later. Hafsat’s mother...
New documentary ‘The Supreme Price’ portrays the Abiola family’s struggle for democracy and women’s rights in Nigeria. This documentary by Joanna Lipper...
He declares that taxpayer’s money should be utilised for the good of the people, but he also passed a pension law that provides him with six cars to be replaced every three years. As Lagos State governor he boosted its internal revenue more than tenfold. He is also the 'Godfather' of Nigeria's new rulers. Bola Tinubu invigorates hopes for change in Nigeria. The cheering sets in as soon as the crowd in the gallery spots the small figure in his white kaftan strolling over the tracks of Teslim Balogun...
He declares that taxpayer’s money should be utilised for the good of the people, but he also passed a pension law that provides him with six cars to be...
In the winter of 2010 ZAM published a twelve-page photo feature of Fela Kuti’s 1981 Paris concert by famous photographer-of-the-stars Anton Corbijn. Most images had not been previously published or digitized. Corbijn had found them in the archives of his studio in London and had donated to ZAM the right to publish these. Prior to this gesture a meeting, organised by one of Corbijn’s relatives, had taken place between the photographer and ZAM-editor-in-chief Bart Luirink. Told that visual artist...
In the winter of 2010 ZAM published a twelve-page photo feature of Fela Kuti’s 1981 Paris concert by famous photographer-of-the-stars Anton Corbijn. Most...
Ghana’s undercover reporters expose a local ‘mommy’ who starved orphans whilst making them clap and sing for ‘voluntourists’ “Sing! You must sing when there are visitors. You know that they bring donations but you just sit there looking reluctant. If you don’t sing loudly, and clap, I’ll whip you later, I promise!” The ‘mommy’ of Bawjiase Countryside Orphanage in Ghana, Emma Boafo, is not joking when she sternly warns the orphans in her care to perform for the many ‘voluntourists’ and supporters...
Ghana’s undercover reporters expose a local ‘mommy’ who starved orphans whilst making them clap and sing for ‘voluntourists’ “Sing! You must sing when...
"If you don’t behave, we’ll skin you and no one will know”, says one of the men dressed in suits. It is Monday 16 March, 4 PM, and I find myself surrounded after just having left a meeting in the neighbourhood of Bon Marché, one of Kinshasa’s central districts. About twelve men in neat suit-and-tie have suddenly materialized out of four black cars parked alongside the street. In a flash I am handcuffed and thrown into one of the cars. I could have expected this. I am not supposed to be in this...
"If you don’t behave, we’ll skin you and no one will know”, says one of the men dressed in suits. It is Monday 16 March, 4 PM, and I find myself...
Assassinations and thug rule underpin president’s third term bid in Burundi The people of Gitega street in Bujumbura all talk in a whisper. Violence hasn’t erupted yet in this middle class neighbourhood, but life is certainly not normal. “People disappear without trace. Guns are being distributed to civilians,” says Athanase Nirorera, a mechanic, who lives in one of the houses here. His neighbour, teacher Dieudonné Bigirimana, won’t tell me who he supports, the President or the opposition, only...
Assassinations and thug rule underpin president’s third term bid in Burundi The people of Gitega street in Bujumbura all talk in a whisper. Violence...
Images that won this years’ Contemporary African Photography Prize are full of gaps and wonder The best story a photographer can tell lies in images that still leave something to guess and stimulate the imagination. Four years ago, French photographer Romaric Tisserand (1974, Toulouse) found six rolls of negatives on a street in Lisbon. He printed one-hundred-and-sixty-six of the images. Together, fitted in colourful frames, they have become ‘Ultramar, the story of the Empire Travel Club.’ They...
Images that won this years’ Contemporary African Photography Prize are full of gaps and wonder The best story a photographer can tell lies in images that...
Behind Botswana’s happy and prosperous image lie some disconcerting truths When, in January, the website of investigative weekly Mmegi went blank for a week, editor Ntibinyane Ntibinyane didn’t hesitate before he accused the country’s Directorate of Intelligence and Security (DIS) of hacking. After all, his newspaper routinely ‘follows the money’ in diamond-rich Botswana and a number of incidents last year had made two things increasingly clear: one, that many in the ruling elite didn’t appreciate...
Behind Botswana’s happy and prosperous image lie some disconcerting truths When, in January, the website of investigative weekly Mmegi went blank for a...
{gallery}multiversepartners{/gallery} Film posters for the film Multiverse: Ghana by Juul van der Laan arrived. This film is a creative exploration of science in Ghana. A journey into ambition, unconventional methodology and determination. The world premiere will take place on Wednesday 24 june 2015 at De Balie in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. The event is co-organized by De Balie and ZAM with support by NWO-WOTRO. Find more info about the premiere on ZAM event page .
{gallery}multiversepartners{/gallery} Film posters for the film Multiverse: Ghana by Juul van der Laan arrived. This film is a creative exploration of...
This is a summarised and edited version of a (highly recommended) full long-read, first published on ‘The Big Round Table’. Read it HERE . In the early 2000’s, two serial killers roamed Swaziland. Only one of them was human. In mid-March of 2001, twenty-six-year-old Samantha Kgasi-Ngobese disappeared. She had planned to travel to Mbabane, the capital of Swaziland, to apply for a job at the High Court. Samantha had a law degree from the University of Swaziland and was hoping to use it. But at the...
This is a summarised and edited version of a (highly recommended) full long-read, first published on ‘The Big Round Table’. Read it HERE . In the early...
The French anti-jihadist forces’ new romance with Touareg rebels in the north is making Mali’s government very unhappy. When French President François Hollande visited Timbuktu in 2013 after Operation Serval, -in which a French-led western force liberated the northern Mali region from a repressive jihadist regime-, he was applauded and cheered in the streets. At a festive ceremony in the city’s main square the grateful Malian people also presented him with a lavishly dressed camel. But that...
The French anti-jihadist forces’ new romance with Touareg rebels in the north is making Mali’s government very unhappy. When French President François...
ZAM starts seven African-European transnational investigations Whether it's diamonds or development aid, human trafficking or voluntary migration, billion-dollar arms deals or terrorism, Africa and Europe increasingly deal with the same global issues. Media reports, views, observations and data used for international decision making, however, have been traditionally skewed towards more 'European' than African input. Seven transnational investigations by teams of African and European investigative...
ZAM starts seven African-European transnational investigations Whether it's diamonds or development aid, human trafficking or voluntary migration,...
Brothers in photography, Hasan and Husain Essop, unveil the shadows of Cape Town’s past and present {gallery}HasanHusainEssop{/gallery} Muslims in South Africa’s Cape province, descendants from the dissenters and slaves trafficked there from the Indian Ocean Islands by the Dutch East India Company, are often labelled as Cape Town’s picturesque others. Not in the pictures of Hasan and Husain Essop (1985, Cape Town). The Essop brothers move beyond the expected and play with fixed notions of place and...
Brothers in photography, Hasan and Husain Essop, unveil the shadows of Cape Town’s past and present {gallery}HasanHusainEssop{/gallery} Muslims in South...
An exploration of power, the fear it generates and love in all its magical, addictive forms. Exclusive excerpt. William Mawolo is sent to a small remote Liberian border town with a clandestine agenda: to investigate the mysterious disappearance of the paramount chief Tetese. The townspeople however are far from happy about his presence, and matters are complicated by Mawolo’s attachment to the missing chief’s daughter Makemeh; who is unconcerned about her missing father. Presented as ‘crime...
An exploration of power, the fear it generates and love in all its magical, addictive forms. Exclusive excerpt. William Mawolo is sent to a small remote...
Celebrating his achievements, continuing his struggle On Saturday 18 July people worldwide will join in Mandela Day activities. They volunteer in social movements and participate in good causes for at least 67 minutes. This number is based on the years Mandela spent on activism, freedom struggle and statesmanship. International Mandela Day was launched five years ago with the support of the United Nations. For the first time, the celebration of Mandela Day will now be held in The Netherlands and...
Celebrating his achievements, continuing his struggle On Saturday 18 July people worldwide will join in Mandela Day activities. They volunteer in social...
We were there: an evening with Ogutu Muraya, a Kenyan writer, theatre maker and storyteller. On Thursday the 9th of July, 2015, Muraya gave a performance at the Prince Claus Fund for Culture and Development in Amsterdam, as part of its ‘Cultural Defiance’ event series. Most of his stories are based on true events driven by the past, living memories about cultural, social and political events in Kenya and the region. Muraya shared three stories with the audience. In ‘Nobody Knows My Name’ he recalls...
We were there: an evening with Ogutu Muraya, a Kenyan writer, theatre maker and storyteller. On Thursday the 9th of July, 2015, Muraya gave a performance...
