Girl Nation a social impact project has equipped over 200 young women with filmmaking skills to best portray stories and advocate against issues affecting women.
An initiative of Girls Voices Nigeria, supported by the Embassy of France in Nigeria (via PISCCA), Girls Nation trained 213 female university students in technical filmmaking skills from scripting to editing, further deploying them in various roles in the filming process in the production of two short films and a short documentary.
Commenting on its choice of the tasking and uncertain path of empowering women in filmmaking, founder, Girls Voices, Carolyn Seaman, says beyond equipping women in a space dominated by men, film, a visual art form is a fluent means of bringing to the fore everyday experiences of women in Nigeria, in a way researches and reports could not.
The project, Seaman says creates in the girls’ awareness of their capacity to address issues surrounding them, provide network opportunities with civil and non-governmental organizations in the prioritization which stories to tell.
A journey spanning from 2016 to 2019, Seaman reveals the project was at one time abandoned for lack f funding. Grant and kind support from the Embassy of France contributed commensurately to the realization of the project.
Other challenges encountered during the productions were societal and cultural factors. Seaman and her students affirmed outright attempts to shut down the production causing several of the students to pull out of the project.
“Students of a particular department in UniAbuja were expressly warned by the course representative not to be seen participating in the project,” says Seaman, while several committee meetings were held in BUK to shut down the production,” adds student and Girls Nation production team member, Safiya Sale. Her father’s prediction of the backlash to follow what some viewed as venturing into a ‘male career’ prepared Sale for the tough times.
