A film that immortalized the 2015 Mandera bus attack in Kenya’s north eastern region has won an Oscar.
The film, Watu Wote: All of us, which was produced in 2016 as the graduation film for the Hamburg Media School master class program has since become the first film shot in the country to win an Oscar award.
Katja Benrath from the media school who won the narrative category for the short film stated that it was a tribute to the 28 people killed by Al-Shabab militants who attacked the bus.
The film depicts events that unfolded on that fateful day when suspected Al-Shabab militants waylaid and attacked a Nairobi-bound bus.
The militants demanded that the Muslim passengers on the bus separate themselves and identify Christians amongst them.
Muslims in the bus shielded Christians from the attackers by offering them their Islamic attire to disguise themselves.
According to the film’s producers, the film was used to indicate that terrorism is not about religion but individuals with ill motives.
Here is the trailer:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0NMc4BvwzUE
The Mandera bus attack on December 21, 2015 left two people dead and several others injured. The only Christian lady in the bus was given Islamic attire by Muslim ladies to disguise herself.
There was a primary school teacher in the bus who was injured while fighting for the Christians. He later succumbed to bullet injuries while undergoing treatment in the country’s capital of Nairobi.
The Student Oscar winners were revealed in Los Angeles Wednesday. The jury had received more than 1,500 entries from 356 international and US colleges and universities, the Academy said in the press release.
Watu Wote can be submitted to the main Oscars for next year.
The winners of the Student Oscars will receive their prizes during a ceremony in Los Angeles on October 12.
