Rachel Mwanza, star of critically acclaimed Canadian film Rebelle, will be the only representation of Africa at the 58th Annual Academy Awards. The Academy Awards, known to most as The Oscars, is an annual award ceremony dedicated to honoring excellent cinematic achievements. Rachel, who plays the role of a war witch named Komona, was chosen after producers saw her performance on a documentary about street kids in Kinshasa. Being abandoned by her parents at an early age, the 16-year old actress spent many years living in the streets.

When Rebelle Director, Kim Nguyen and Producers Pierre Even and Marie-Claude Poulin first came into contact with Rachel she was unable to read or write. Together they agreed to pay for her education and provide her with housing until she turns eighteen. In 2012, the Congolese actress received awards from the Berlin Film Festival, the Tribeca Film Festival, the Vancouver Film Critics Circle, and was nominated for Best Actress at the 2013 Canadian Screen Awards.

With Rebelle being nominated for Best Foreign Film at the 58th Annual Academy Awards, last month producers were scrambling to obtain a U.S visa that will allow the young star to attend the ceremony. There is no confirmation a visa was granted. The 58th Annual Academy Award is scheduled to air on Sunday February 24th 2013.

Update:
According to several news sources, Congolese actress Rachel Mwanza was awarded a US Visa in order to attend the Oscars in Los Angeles, California.

Source: http://afri-culture.com/?p=3370

I WISH HER BEST OF LUCK.

Good news for her country men and women.

Who

Who is she?
Why no my mother Genevnnaji!!!
Are these guys insane?

Wish her luck. Naija movie industry has gone to sleep

Where those our nigerian mushroom local champion celebrity actresses and actors? I know some of them go, go do wake pass for there.

How can one person represent an entire continent?

Wats all this comment. Mods are gettin lenient. See how these teletubbies are spoiling the thread.

victorazy: Who is she?
Why no my mother Genevnnaji!!!
Are these guys insane?

Another crazy genny fan...sharrap jare! Is it her birthright?

lyk ceeri0usly ?

I'm not surprised wen tonto dike go wear bikini wen presumin to be playin a role in the 30's. Our films seem not to surpass africa.

Congrats to the Congolese actress.
But Mercy Aigbe, Tonto Dikeh and Chika Ike should have been invited too.

What the west see as Africa is that traditional and humble story.It's funny how the Omotolas and Nse Nke Etims of this world are not invited.

This might be unrelated to the thread, there is a documentary on BBC that airs everyday for some weeks now titled AFRICA.I was surprised to see the whole content of the documentary to be elephants, shallow rivers, snakes, insects, valleys etc. while it's not bad to show the world the great safaris and game reserves in Africa, it seems to me that the story that sells with as an Africa sourced story cannot look like shinny Hollywood but rather look like plantations(just a description).This also makes me to ask why the popular writers from Africa wrote about wars,political corruption majorly and pure fiction writers are not ceremoniusly celebrated worldwide.

Africa is big and blessed enough to patronise itself and the world will come searching and asking.Ask China,South Korea, UAE, Singapore etc.

Just a thought.

Afam4eva: What happened to the third largest movie industry in the world?

ask goggle or ur grand pa dey r in a beta position 2 ans dat question

wow, that's great news for Africa, go on and represent us well, bless you!

I hope that Rukky Sanda, Halima Abubakar, Iya Rainbow, Sugar Aseogwu, Oge Okoye, Omoni Oboli, Funke Akindele and Patience Ozokwor will be invited for next year's Oscar Awards, as these women are also African movie superstars.

hmn....