Rungano Nyoni 'outstanding debut' Bafta for I Am Not A Witch Published duration 18 February 2018 Related Topics Bafta Awards

media caption Rungano Nyoni and Emily Morgan thanked Ffilm Cymru for their support

A film about an African witch camp by a Welsh-Zambian director has won a Bafta for outstanding debut.

Rungano Nyoni's feature I Am Not A Witch tells the story of an eight-year-old Zambian girl accused of being a witch.

The director, who was brought up in Cardiff from the age of eight, accepted the prize alongside producer Emily Morgan.

She appeared to be shocked to have won, saying: "We're not prepared."

After thanking her husband, mother and niece, she said: "I'm now pulling things from the air. Erm, who else? Oh, and the cast and the crew, thank you."

Nyoni spent a month at a witch camp in Ghana to research the film.

For the film, she decided the idea of introducing a little girl accused of being a witch into the group of old women in her story, would see them re-thinking their lives.

The low-budget feature was made with funding from organisations including Ffilm Cymru and the BFI, and it was the first Zambian film to be shown at the Cannes film festival.