Tunisian film wins Golden Horse Consensus at Ouagadougou Festival

Apolline Traore won the Silver Horse Award. AFP

Tunisian director Youssef Chebbi won the "Golden Horse of Yininga" award at the 28th Pan-African Film and Television Festival (FESPACO) in Ouagadougou for his film "Forms".

The young filmmaker, born in Tunisia in 1984, was absent from the ceremony awarded by Burkina Faso's interim president, Ibrahim Traoré.

The president of the Tunisian jury, Dorra Bouchoucha, praised the "work out of the ordinary" and stressed that the golden horse was awarded to Chebbi unanimously.

"Ashkal" takes place in the Carthage Gardens neighborhood, which was halted after the fall of President Ben Ali's regime in 2011, and its protagonists are a policeman and a policewoman investigating incidents of people being burned to death in a mysterious way.

The Tunisian director beat Burkinabe Abulin Traoré, whose film "Sera" won the "Silver Horse" award, and Kenya's Angela Wamai, whose film "Shimoni" won the "Bronze Horse" award. Since its inception in 1969, no woman has won the first prize of this major African film festival.

A total of 170 works in different categories were screened at the last edition of the festival, which focused on the theme "African cinema and cultures of peace".

Tunisia received not only one award, but two awards for best performance by an actor and an actress to Under the Tree, directed by Areej Sehiri.

The best screenplay award went to Moroccan director Meriem Touzani's "Blue Kaftan".

A total of 15 feature films competed for the €30,<> Yinenga Golden Horse Award.