THE Team
Anita Khanna
Series Producer
South African based scriptwriter and producer, Anita Khanna, has writing and producing credits that include award winning documentaries, Miners Shot Down, Everything Must Fall and How to Steal a Country, plus a drama series for the South African Broadcasting Corporation, The Mating Game. In 2011 Anita drove the first live event of Good Pitch on African soil (Johannesburg 2011). Since then she has directed the Tri Continental Social Impact Film Festival, (2011 – 2018), and produced three documentary series.
She is currently collaborating with creatives and activists in Southern Africa to make Hotspot Climate Series, a six part documentary that profiles climate justice activists in five Southern African countries. Anita is also a proud award winning Impact Producer (BritDoc Impact Award 2015) for her film campaign work on Miners Shot Down.
Jacqueline van Meygaarden
Director and Producer
An accomplished producer and director, Jacqueline has 20 years of experience as a storyteller, first touring internationally with multimedia feminist visual theatre, then shifted to non-fiction filmmaking to create impactful stories reaching wider audiences. She has spent over 15 years developing documentary content about the climate crisis, environmental justice and regeneration, and has worked in southern Africa, Cambodia and Madagascar.
Jacqueline was awarded the Commonwealth Vision Award (2007) for her short film Free Energy; co-curated an international visual theatre festival, Out the Box (2008-2011); produced factual content for 50/50 for the national broadcaster (SABC), directed the short film Farm to Fork for the Food Series, and produced climate justice campaign content for 350.org in Africa. She is currently co-producing and directing on HOTSPOT and is the co-producer of Water Stories, an interactive storytelling platform that shares stories about freshwater & ocean pollution. Jacqueline is the co-chair of Mycelium Media Colab, a collaborative enterprise that uses storytelling to create awareness of African social and environmental regenerative solutions. She is based in Cape Town, South Africa and holds a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Witwatersrand.
Rehad Desai
Director and Producer
Rehad is one of Africa’s leading documentarians. Resident in Johannesburg, he has directed and produced numerous feature length documentaries, many of which have seen international broadcast, theatrical release, festival prizes and critical acclaim. His recent film, Miners Shot Down, is a synthesis of Rehad’s skills as a filmmaker and experience as an activist. The film has garnered over 25 international awards including an International EMMY for documentary (2015). Time of Pandemics follows his prior and current work, How To Steal A Country and Everything Must Fall, both of which entertainingly illuminate the myriad of challenges South Africa faces.
Prior to becoming a filmmaker, Rehad worked as a freelance journalist for Learning Nation and Weekly Mail, articles centred around modern history, current affairs and book reviews; a freelance AIDS education training and materials development for Red Cross-National Aids Programme Office various township based NGOs; and did research and writing up of profiles of South African political leaders 1960-1994 for Volume 5 -From Protest to Challenge.
Sara Gouveia
Director and Editor
Sara Gouveia is an award winning filmmaker. Sara’s first feature length documentary “The Sound of Masks” had its World Premiere at IDFA 2018. It received the award for Best Feature Documentary at the Plateau International Film Festival 2019 and the 14th SAFTA Golden Horn Award for Best Cinematography as well as SAFTA nominations for Best Feature Documentary and Best Editing in 2020. In 2021 the film won Best International Feature and Best Direction at the 7th Brasil Festival of International Cinema.
Sara has since directed the mid-length film “Mother to Mother”, which Premiered at the 2020 Encounters South African Film Festival and has received SAFTA nominations for Best Documentary Film, Best Cinematography and Best Sound Design, winning the Writer’s Guild of South Africa Muse award for Best Documentary Script 2020. Her film “Like Water” was nominated for a SAFTA for Best Documentary Short in 2021.
Julie Machin
Line Producer
Julie Machin is an experienced business accountant and registered Business Accountant in Practice with the Southern African Institute for Business Accountants. She has worked with a variety of organisations, primarily social justice NGOs and on a number of film and TV productions, including award-winning documentary films, film festivals and impact campaigns over the last eight years. She has extensive experience of working with grant-driven funding and specialises in project budgeting and cashflow. In addition, she runs her own accounting practice providing a range of accounting and financial management services to small businesses and NGOs.
Mohau Memeza
Director
Mohau Memeza is a Film Practitioner based in Johannesburg, South Africa. He has been working in the Film and Television industry in various capacities as a Production Manager, Production Coordinator and Co-director for more that fifteen years.
He holds a Bachelors of Arts degree (BA) with majors in Political Studies and African Literature from the University of the Witwatersrand. Some of his career highlights include working on the film Lamentations of Judas (2020) directed by Borris Gerrets and the 43rd International Emmy Award winning documentary Marikana: Miners Shot Down (2012), directed by Rehad Desai. Other titles he has worked in include Dying for Gold (2018), Behind the Rainbow (2008).
Mohau has also delved into the creative side as Co-directed. He co-directed an Amnesty International commissioned film with Rehad Desai – Permission to Stay (2011) and co-directed an NFVF funded film – Shouting Spirits with Maanda Ntsandeni.
