‘The River’, ‘The Republic’ and ‘Fiela se Kind’ lead as 14th Annual SAFTAs’ nominees announced

Popular 1Magic telenovela The River has cemented itself as a strong contender for this year’s South African Film and Television Awards (SAFTAs) after it scored 15 nominations across numerous categories, including Best Achievement in Directing, Scriptwriting, Original Music/Score, Editing, Sound, Cinematography, Wardrobe, Make-Up and Hairstyling, and Art Directing.

The telenovela’s stars Sindi Dlathu and Presley Chweneyagae secured nominations in the Best Actress and Best Actor categories respectively and seem to be crowd favourites in each category.

These and other nominees were announced at an early morning event and simultaneous live broadcast on the Expresso Morning Show hosted at Midrand’s Mall of Africa on Friday morning.

Hosted under the custodianship of the National Film and Video Foundation (NFVF) the awards seek to honour and celebrate South Africa’s local film and television talent, under the theme #LoveSATalent.

Productions such as Isibaya, Lockdown and Fiela se Kind were all hot on the heels of The River having scored 11 nominations each, while the drama series The Republic rounded things off with 10 nominations.

“The love for SA Talent is certainly in the air and I would like to congratulate all our SAFTAs14 nominees for telling authentic stories that resonate and connect with the people of South Africa. As the NFVF we couldn’t be prouder of the immense contribution that these women and men make to the local film and television industry, not forgetting the broadcasters that provide the platforms for these stories to come alive,” commented NFVF CEO Makhosazana Khanyile.

The awards’ organisers also preceded the event by explaining the changes they have implemented since having numerous public fallouts with industry insiders about their internal processes.

In order to implement these changes, the NFVF joined forces with 205 industry experts from across the country to form a judging committee that spent over two months deliberating and rounding off the final nominees of the 70 categories, which were all then later audited by Nexia SAB&T.

“A key priority for us this year was to bring credibility back to the SAFTAs judging process. It is no secret that many production companies have voiced their frustration with our appraisal system, some going as far as to boycott the SAFTAs altogether. Having taken thisfeedback to heart, we’ve taken every measure possible to ensure that the judging process is fair, transparent and without bias. Today I’m proud to announce that as a result of these efforts we’ve received over 300 entries for the SAFTAs,” announced Khanyile.

One SAFTAs feature that has stood the test of time, however, is the use of the public vote to decide who wins the Best TV Presenter and the Most Popular Soap/Telenovela award.

To vote for their favourite in these two categories, South African audiences will need to dial *120*45884# and follow the prompts on their screens. One lucky voting viewer will stand a chance to win fuel to the value of R4,000 a month for 12 months powered by Total SA.

The codes will be advertised on SAFTAs social media pages and other media platforms and the voting lines go live in the week of 17 February and close on 28 March 2020.

The 14th South African Film and Television Awards will be hosted at Johannesburg’s Sandton Convention Centre over two-nights: Craft Awards on Friday, 27 March 2020 and Main Awards on Saturday, 28 March 2020 – with the Saturday show broadcast live on television.

Take a look at some of the nominees below:

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