We need constitution, not production code! - Akim Macualey, CFI Constitutional Committee head

The head of the Constitutional Committee of the Cameroon Film Industry (CFI), has said the organization should and will go by the name “constitution” and not the “production code”. Production code which was initiated as a set of film industry moral censorship guidelines should exists, but must be embedded within a constitution – the latter here being a body of fundamental principles or established precedents according to which an organization is acknowledged to be law.

Akim Macaulay was reacting to the recent confusion that is hovering around the document that should govern CFI. Speaking to Afrikka Radio’s African Cocktail with Ernest Kanjo, the USA-based filmmaker insisted that the constitution is an encompassing document and a production code could only appear as a clause or section in it.

In a well researched explanation, Akim who doubles as diaspora representative of CFI told the mid-week radio show that the production code dates back to the 1930s when one of Hollywood’s chief censor Will H. Hays propounded it. The code had governed the world’s number one film outfit till the 60s when it was abandoned. It may sound strange to contemporary filmmakers, but Akim recalled that Cameroon had used the production code as a guideline document for filmmaking activities. The said production code was even found in the penal code. However, it cannot be equated to a constitution, the filmmaker made it clear.

But, if CFI wants to call it a production code with aspects of both documents in it, the filmmaker told us, the organization could go ahead and do that. “Is that however going to please everyone?” he questioned. And even when the name “constitution” is finally adopted, it is neither everyone who will be satisfied. To an extent, he said, “we are only playing with words and making something out of nothing.” To Akim, there is no reason why any argument on the constitution and a production code should even prop up. But from definitions and background knowledge, the CFI stalwart saw much more reason in insisting that a constitution was the right nomenclature for the organization.

As we write, there are two guideline documents which are supposed to be under scrutiny – a constitution and a production code. The former was drafted in the days of the CFI interim bureau led by Wa’a Nkeng Musi. When a new Board of Directors (BOD) was voted to office in March 2013, it was handed to an Akim Macaulay-led Constitutional Committee for revision. 22 months on, the feedback is still expected. Meanwhile, Yibain Emile-Aime Chah aka Ancestor, one of the members of the BOD, out of personal initiative, has been voluntarily crafting a production code for CFI. He has severally expressed dismay why the organization is feet-dragging on the code.

Recently, members of CFI including the head of the Constitutional Committee have taken interest in Yibain’s production code and expressed their willingness to read it and see how it could be conveniently merged with the constitution.

According to Yibain who has been a custodian of the production code, the taking into consideration of this document would go a long way to address some of the issues that have been recurrently clipping the progress of the industry. Even more serious is the fact that CFI has never had an officially adopted constitutional since the organization was created in June 2008.

The pressing need for a constitutional amendment and an official adoption comes at a time a new controversy is rocking the smooth running of CFI – the change of name to CFI Inc. with the recommendation of the government through the Ministry of Culture. Whose constitution or production code is it going to be – CFI or CFI Inc., is a question that will only be answered as time unfolds.