FESTIVALS AWARDS EVENTS NEWS

SAFTAS nominees celebrated

Fri, 17 Feb 2012 10:53

Popular TV personalities Jack Devnarain and Thuli Thabethe hosted the glitzy nominees function of the 6th Annual South Africa Film & Television Awards (SAFTAS), held at The Venue, Melrose Arch, Johannesburg on 16 February.

The event was attended by many of the hundreds of industry practitioners who had entered the competition, as well as by Zamantungwa (Zama) Mkosi, the new CEO of SAFTAS custodian, the National Film and Video Foundation (NFVF). Several NFVF council members were also present.

To see the full list of nominees see Breaking News / Festival & Awards story “SAFTAS nominees announced”.

At the nominees function Devnarain spoke about why the SAFTAS are important to the local industry. “Any country wants its industry to be among the best in the world. But you first need national acknowledgement of your own industry. If the quality of the industry can by judged by the 2012 SAFTAS nominees, then we are in excellent shape.

“The entire SAFTAS process takes nine months, with the judging process accounting for four months of that period. All judging is audited by Deloitte.”

Both Devnarain and Thabethe are themselves previous SAFTAS winners.

The nominees list was read out by the overall co-chairs of the judging panels, Feizel Mamdoo and Jackie Motsepe.

Said Mamdoo: “It was an incredible honour for Jackie and myself to play the role of overall judging co-chairs for this event. Our job was to oversee the judging process – we did not participate in the judging itself. Thankfully there weren’t too many issues that needed to be resolved.

“Jackie and I would like to thank all the judges for their immense contribution to the 2012 SAFTAS.”

On 15 February stories in the media surfaced that the popular soapie 7de Laan had been excluded from the competition because it was not eligible for the Best Soapie award, which is judged soley by public vote.

SAFTAS chairperson Eddie Mbalo made a statement on this issue at the nominees function. “I would like to officially respond to the articles published yesterday that were trying to blemish the SAFTAS. These awards are our industry’s top accolade. The SAFTAS are fundamentally a competition and entry is compulsory to qualify for competition. The public vote for the Best Soapie category is part of the SAFTAS judging process. Therefore only soapies that are entered into the category before the specified deadline date can be eligible for competition. Contrary to some reports, 7de Laan was not excluded from the SAFTAS – they did not enter the competition and were therefore not eligible.”

The SAFTAS will take place on 9 and 10 March at Gallagher Estate, Midrand. SABC3 will televise the awards on 11 March.

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