Through the lens of Aïcha Macky: 8billion’s NIger ambassador

Written by: Lucia Roggero

Filmmaker ambassadors are integral pillars of 8billion’s grassroots storytelling movement. From mentoring trainees through their climate storytelling journey to facilitating local screenings that foster community dialogue and inspire collaboration, they are the movement’s on-the-ground eyes, ears and heart.

Aïcha Macky, 8billion’s Niger ambassador, not only has an impressive track record as a sociologist and filmmaker but is profoundly committed to advocating for a better future. Below she shares with Resilient a glimpse through her personal journey and unique lens. 

She delves into how she discovered her calling in filmmaking advocacy, witnessed firsthand the impact of the climate and environmental crisis on her country and was changed by 8billion’s experience amplifying key voices and stories that resonate in Niger and around the globe.

Filmmaking: a calling and a catalyst for change

For Aïcha, who was born in Zinder into a family of religious leaders, going to school was a “nice accident” that shaped her story and enabled her to arrive at the top. While studying her master's degree in sociology at Niamey University, she met a young woman living in the village where she was doing her research that would inspire a profound realisation and drive her into filmmaking.

Although upon first interactions, the woman was “jovial by nature,” Aïcha recalled an abrupt change in her demeanour: “one day I found her sad and less talkative. Later, she told me that her late father's inheritance had been divided up and that she was entitled to nothing because she was a woman and didn't deserve the land.” This drove her to change her outlook on media and reassert the importance of reaching people – turning her dissertation on land conflicts and immigration, into a film: “I not only wondered about the destination of books in a country where the majority of the population is illiterate, I also wondered how to break down these social constructs that break up families.. So I came up with an answer: to make films in the local language so that I could make myself heard and communicate with the world around me.”

Aïcha Macky

However, as Aïcha put it, “I wasn't born into an aristocracy to have a film culture.” What she did have, instead, was a home in a region that greatly valued theatre and culture as a whole. In fact, when she traced back what led her to cinema, she remembered  her start in theatre, which began in  primary school and continued all the way through to university. “The teachers were very involved and looked after (theatre) as if it were a subject in its own right.” This led her to the  African Documentary Film Forum – initiated by Inoussa Ousseini, then Niger's Ambassador to UNESCO – who, as Aïcha highlighted, “had the ingenious idea of finding grants for those who stood out and had the diploma required to enter the IFTIC master's course that had just opened.” So Aïcha moved to  Senegal, where she did her second master, this time on Creative Documentary Production in the Université Gaston Berger. She thanked the foresight of her dissertation master, Dr Amadou Oumarou, who  helped her accept the Africadoc scholarship to make films instead of a scholarship from the Belgian Tech cooperation for a DEA in geography.

“Zinder”: A short film written and directed by Aïcha

Aïcha filming

Reflecting on the role that education and vocational guidance played in her professional development as a filmmaker, she said: “Today, I have a powerful tool in my possession that enables me to put words to the ills and lift the veils that deserve to be lifted. This tool allows me to make myself heard and to make other voices heard, those that are heard less or not at all. I use it to serve my community, to enable dialogue on issues that I feel are essential.” 

The injustices and heroes of a climate crisis

Aïcha contemplated on how she first became aware of climate change, sharing a childhood experience which demonstrates how Niger’s environmental issues had hit her family and community. “My father was a big landowner. He was also the state's groundnut granary. It was through this activity that he met my grandfather, a sedentary Fulani who had become a farmer, and later on married my mother. My brothers and I used to go to the fields with his workers.(...) I used to hear my father talk about the impoverishment of the land and the decline in profitability” – using the term ´Hwari´, which means “drought”, to describe how rain became scarce and its distribution worsened. She continued, “the fields turned white, the millet and sorghum looked burnt and dry. So he started using chemical fertilisers. A whole agricultural campaign was being waged around that.” Not only was this her first encounter with the environmental challenges that faced Niger, but it was also what later led her to study rural sociology, and in particular, land conflicts and immigration caused by drought and climate change.

She illustrated how Niger’s challenges stem from environmental (in)justice : “The world is going in the wrong direction. Those who pollute the least, or not at all, are those who suffer the effects of climate change. (...) Starting in Niger, with zero industry, climate change is being felt right down to our plates.” Similar to her father’s experience, farmers who used to have perfect control over the agricultural calendar, were now being forced to use chemical fertilisers to combat the poor rainfall distribution – which “has a considerable impact on the quality of produce and food.” Moreover, the increase in temperature, “reaching 45 degrees in the shade” has been linked to flooding, “which sweeps away entire districts and even villages.” This has not only had negative implications for Nigers’ economy and natural resources, but for its communities wellbeing and quality of life. As depicted in one of the upcoming 8billon films, families have been forced to displace as a consequence of the floods. So much so that “from the last ten years, almost 2 years out of 3, the start of the school year has been postponed to allow the government to find sites for flood victims taking refuge in classrooms.”

WFP/Richard Mbouet

For Aïcha, “climate justice will begin the day when the most industrialised countries in the world, i.e. those that pollute the most, stop meeting and asking African populations not to move towards industrialisation so that they can be economically stable. It is also when there is a deduction from the income of a farmer who uses a polluting machine in the West to compensate a small farmer in the depths of Niger or elsewhere, where farmers are respectful of the climate.” She emphasised, “ it's not about the headlines in the big newspapers announcing the funding received by governments. It's about the real impact on the lives of small farmers whose hands feed humanity.”

Nonetheless, as she pointed out, there is still hope to be found in the climate resilience and innovation of local communities: “Fortunately, alongside these disasters, there are also men and women who are fighting to mitigate these disasters from Niger, for Niger, and for the world.” She used the example of the researchers and farmers working with IMAN RECHEARCH and MOORIBEN, whose activities include “growing improved seeds adapted to climate change; training farmers in innovative, environmentally-friendly farming techniques such as agroecology; and providing support and advice.” She additionally highlighted JVE Niger and Sani Ayouba’s recent work using “rice husk stoves, a type of improved fireplace in the river areas,” and not only raising awareness but training women (mostly rice growers) in the use of the technique “to put an end to the abusive use of wood, which leads to deforestation and drought.”

Photo by USAID / Mercy Corps

“The artists are not to be outdone either,” she pointed out as she alluded to the characters in the 8billion Niger films, “Abdoul Karim (alias RimKa), an artist who trains and raises awareness among young people about life-saving techniques, and Dr BODO Bachirou, (...) who trains the younger generation to pay particular attention to tree planting, and hence the fight against desertification.”

One in 8billion experience: from scepticism to hope for the next generations

For Aïcha, 8billion aligns with  a fundamental principle of hers and something she has been doing for over 10 years: “training young people and sharing knowledge”. Yet, contrary to her past experiences, “for the first time, we have tackled a new theme – the climate issue – with young people who are complete novices. We invited people who are committed to the climate to talk to us about their experiences.” She explained how it was a learning experience, not only for the trainees but also for her as a filmmaking  ambassador. Through the subjects of the films – found and chosen by the trainees – they were able to explore the following question: “what environmental legacy are we leaving to the younger generation of Niger and the world?”  

Aïcha and her trainees in a 8billion creative storytelling workshop

She admitted, however, that at first, she was sceptical: “not only because of the bad experiences I'd had with certain partners, but above all because of the lack of motivation of some young people who, instead of seeing the value of learning, (saw) training as a chance to line their own pockets with a per diem.” In fact, she had started to become more disillusioned from these types of projects, as she felt that people for whom she was “voluntarily fighting for” did not understand the “priceless” value of the opportunity.  

8billion, however, turned that around. Although the experience for Aïcha had its fair share of difficulties (including a military coup mid-production), the results were so satisfying that she was glad of her involvement. "8billion will not only enable the voices of the children of Niger to be heard,” which as Aïcha explained, were not commonly invited to be part of the conversation regarding climate – even when they have lots of valuable things to say and learn – “but also, and above all, to do so in a different way, i.e. through films that will constitute a memory not just for Niger but for the whole world.” Moreover, “the characters in our films are incredible and unique because they tell us about personal experiences and stories that are the stories of other people, somewhere in the world.” 

Aïcha and local kids from Niger in one of the 8billion Niger shoots

Aïcha’s interview is testament of the impact of mentorship, environmental justice, climate innovation and grassroots storytelling – all of which lie at the essence of 8billion. Stay tuned for the launch of 2 new grassroots films on January 30th, as we show Niger’s lens on the global issue that is climate change.

In memory of Elhadj Macky Alkali Malam Kidy, Aïcha Macky’s father