Supporting Africans

Developed, written, and directed by Kenyans, The Team is a 26-part series that premiered on May 21 2009 and is broadcast nationally in Kenya on Citizen-TV. This series tells the stories of seven young Kenyan footballers from different tribes who must overcome their mutual distrust so that their team, Imani or “Faith” Football Club (F.C.) has a chance at winning a world-wide tournament. The Team dramatises cooperative ways of handling ethnic and socioeconomic divisions. According to the organisers, the Imani F.C. players and other characters represent Kenya’s diverse population: rich and poor, male and female, and urban and rural. Each player and the young coaches have a unique and troubled past, which sometimes makes it difficult to see a teammate’s point of view. However, in their quest for the cup, the team realises they must cooperate in order to score goals. Despite the difficulty that this presents, they manage to resolve the inevitable conflicts that arise and discover “that the commonalities that link them are far deeper than the differences which threaten to tear them apart.”

According to organisers, the use of dramatic television is designed to demonstrate that conflicts may be inevitable, but that everyone can respond to conflict non-violently. Additional activities designed to increase the outreach of the series will include:

• a nationally broadcast radio adaptation;
• DVDs which will be distributed to community groups, schools, religious groups, and universities;
• a viewer’s guide for discussion groups;
• mobile cinema screenings in areas where television broadcasts are limited or unavailable, which will be followed by a facilitated discussion;
• a music video, which will incorporate the theme music of the series and mirror its basic themes; and
• interactive SMS and e-mail feedback.

Conflict, Gender, Corruption, Poverty, Negative ethnicity.

The Team was produced with funding from the United Kingdom’s Department for International Development (DfID), who is also supporting productions of the series in 10 other countries in Africa and Asia, including Morocco, Côte d’Ivoire, and Nepal. Search for Common Ground (SFCG) is an international conflict prevention organisation with offices in 18 countries. SFCG’s vision is a world in which individuals, communities, governments, and societies respond to their differences in non-adversarial ways, and where those differences stimulate social progress, rather than precipitate violence. Common Ground Productions, has produced a wide range of TV and radio drama, news and features programmes, documentaries, and reality and magazine shows.

Media Focus on Africa Foundation (MFAF) is a Kenyan-Dutch organsiation based in Nairobi, working in the field of communication for development. Its activities are based on the premise that free flow of information will build better informed societies on issues like development and democratisation. MFAF's goal is to strengthen the capacity for democracy and human development within societies in Africa through information exchanges, sharing of knowledge, and facilitation of dialogue using media.