Moroccan critic, director and screenwriter Ameur Cherqui won the Africa Film Critics Award for the year 2020, organized by the Pan-African Cultural Engineering Agency. This distinction will be awarded to him at an official ceremony on March 18 in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso.
The African Film Critic’s Prize for the year 2020, a distinction won by Moroccan critic, director and screenwriter Ameur Cherqui, is the last stage of the African film critic competition in which Cherqui participated and where he was the head of the list of finalists. In this regard, the Pan-African Cultural Engineering Agency, headquartered in Burkina Faso, declared that “the jury of the competition selected the critic Cherqui as the first qualified for this continental prize for his article“ Un air de kora … the power of fragile borders ””.
Her article addressed, in a very subtle way, the short film by Senegalese director Angèle Diabang (2019), which tells the story of Salma, the young Muslim woman who dreams of playing the traditional instrument the kora. This instrument which is usually reserved for men. So she tries to do it secretly. A true message of hope for all those who have a dream in life. Remember that this short fiction film was awarded twice at the Pan-African Film and Television Festival of Ouagadougou (Fespaco) in Burkina Faso.
Remember that this competition, organized in preparation for the first edition of the Week of African Art Criticism in partnership with “Africa.org” and the African Federation of Film Critics, saw the participation of critics from Morocco, Tunisia, Mauritania, Senegal, Cameroon, Angola, Madagascar and Côte d’Ivoire.
It should also be noted that Ameur Cherqui is a graduate professor of the Regional Center for Trades, Education and Training of the Drâa-Tafilalet region. Member of the Laboratory for Studies and Research on Literature, Language, Arts and Cultural Representations of Sultan Moulay Slimane University in Béni Mellal, Ameur Cherqui is also founder and former director of the Rachidia University Film Festival, director , screenwriter and film critic. Throughout his career, Ameur has been a member of many national and international juries, as he is the author of several research, articles and collective books.