'Rule No 1' Emerges Winner of Abuja International Film Festival

The Local Organising Committee (LOC) of the Abuja International Film Festival has declared a new film, “Rule No 1”, as winner of the 2022 festival.

The committee, chaired by actor Francis Duru, made the disclosure on Friday night at the closing of the 19th Abuja International Festival and Award Night.

The theme of the festival was “Challenges and Prospects of Digital Streaming Revolution Globally”.

Duru said that out of over 600 film entries screened by the committee, Rule No 1 was chosen as the overall winning film.

According to him, this is because the film passed on the message of hygiene and cleanliness in order to provide a safe and healthy nation.

“The second position went to the film ‘Dirty Space’, while a film known as ‘My Juju’ took the third position.

“The winner, first runner up and second runner up received N500,000, N300,000 and N200,000 respectively,” Duru said.

In his remarks, the Founder of the festival, Fidelis Duker, said that the emergence of “Rule No 1”, emphasised the need for people to practice hygiene and cleanliness.

“After COVID-19, one of the basic challenges we had was that most people stopped going back to hygiene.

“If you remember during COVID-19, you washed your hands and put on your face mask but everybody has gone back to normal life.

“The whole idea of the project is to see how people can go back to that idea of cleanliness better than what we are doing today.

“We should show the level of hygiene and environmental cleanliness,” Duker, said.

Also speaking, the Brand Manager, of Hypo Nigeria, Mr Akintayo Akinseloyin, said that his company supported the Abuja International Film Festival to spread the message of hygiene and cleanliness in the country.

“The whole message around cleanliness and hygiene is something that should be top of everybody’s list.

“A clean environment prevents illness and provides healthy people and a successful nation,” he said.

Some other films won the following awards: Experimental film award by Freetown to Flatbush; Short Film Nigeria by Smart Edikan; Feature Film Nigeria, and Enough of the Silence by Andrew Amenechi.

Short Film Foreign – That day I was 21 by China; outstanding actress by Shaffy Bello – Obsession – Nigeria.

Outstanding Actor- Sambasa Nzeribe – Enough of the Silence – Nigeria; Best Feature Film Foreign by Identical Justice, and Outstanding Music Score by Sin City – Nigeria.

Others are the Outstanding Students Film, Aminata (Spain); Once upon a perfect murder (Nigeria); Outstanding Documentary, Journey of Igbo civilisation (Nigeria); and Outstanding Animation, Larvae story (Korea).

The Outstanding Director was won by Muyiwa Ademola, Sin City; and the Audience Choice Award went to Obsession (Nigeria).

November 05, 2022