Winner of Best Documentary - British Independent Film Awards
Michael Campbell is one of a handful of white farmers still left in Zimbabwe since President Robert Mugabe began enforcing his controversial land seizure program, an initiative intended to reclaim white-owned land and redistribute it to poor black Zimbabweans.
Since 2000 formerly thriving farms that employed thousands sit derelict, while poverty and hunger are rife amongst the majority of the country's citizens. But 74-year-old Mike refuses to back down.
Set against the backdrop of the tumultuous 2008 presidential election, MUGABE AND THE WHITE AFRICAN follows Mike and son-in-law Ben Freeth's harrowing attempt to take Mugabe to an international court for racism and violation of their human rights. It is an unprecedented case, upon which rests not only Mike and his family's future, but also the future of millions of ordinary Zimbabweans who continue to suffer at the hands of one of the world’s most infamous tyrants.
Much of this film was shot covertly. To have been caught filming would have meant imprisonment.
MUGABE AND THE WHITE AFRICAN will be released in the UK by Dogwoof on 8 January 2010.
