Monique Phoba

Background

Monique Mbeka Phoba was born in 1962 in Brussels, the daughter of a DRC diplomat. She visited the DRC during her school holidays, but established herself in Belgium when aged sixteen after her father resigned his office.

Education

She studied at the Free University of Brussels, and obtained a degree in International Business from the Institute for Advanced Studies of Saint-Luc in Brussels.

Career

Her graduating thesis was on "Cooperation between the European and African audiovisual industries". While a student Monique Phoba gave talks on African culture on Independent radio and wrote articles in various newspapers in Brussels and Geneva. She then took an introductory course created by Jean Rouch in documentary video at the Ateliers Varan in Paris.

In 1991 Monique Mbeka Phoba made the film Revue en vrac (26 minutes) with Fred Mongu, a journalist with Zaire national television

This looked at the birth of the independent and pluralistic press in the DRC. She then made a series of documentaries about Africa including Rentrer? (1993, 52 minutes), Deux petits tours et puis s"en vont (1997) about the presidential elections in Benin, Un rêve d"indépendance (1998, 53 minutes) and Sorcière, la vie (A Bewitched Life) (2004, 52 minutes). Rentrer? discusses the problem of brain drain.

Her short film Une voix dans le Silence on 1996 tells of the struggle of Bruno Ediko, an Human Immunodeficiency Virus-positive Beninese. Her fourth documentary Deux petits tours et puis s"en vont… (Two little turns and then go ) was co-directed with Emmanuel Kolawole.

In her 1998 film Un rêve d"indépendance she portrays 35 years of independence in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

This documentary received the "Images of Women" award at the Vues d"Afrique Festival in Montreal in April 2000. In 2001 Monique Mbeka Phoba"s documentary Anna, l"Enchantée was released. Poorly prepared, Anna does not last more than three months.

Her 2006 Sorcière, la vie! shows the life of an old man who was a medical assistant under Belgian colonization, a doctor after independence, and who then agreed to become a customary judge after his retirement.

In 2007 she completed a documentary on the Zaire national team, the Leopards, which shone in the 1974 football World Cup. Entre la coupe et l"élection (Between the cup and the election) was co-directed with Guy Kabeya Muya.

Since 1995, Monique Mbeka Phoba has lived in Benin, where she has worked on production, distribution and promotion of African cinema. She created the Lagunimages television and documentary festival in 2000.

Achievements

• Her films have won a number of awards. lieutenant received the South / North prize of the European Council at Rencontres Media Nord/Sud in Geneva en 1996. Benin, the laboratory of African democracy, is the theme of this film which won second prize for television/Video documentary at FESPACO in March 1997. lieutenant tells of Anna Teko, a singer who won a scholarship to study music in France. The documentary won the "Images of Women" prize at the Vues d"Afrique Festival in Montreal in April 2002. This team was the first from sub-Saharan Africa team to participate in a Fédération internationale de football association World Cup.