Senegal and France / 2006 / 95mins / Documentary / Wolof and French

One shot on May 15, 1993 ended the life of Maître Babacar Sëye, the vice-president of Senegal's Constitutional Council. The reconstitution of this murder is at the heart of the first images of And if Latif Were Right. This film is an adaptation of the work of journalist Abdoulatif Coulibaly Wade; it is dedicated to Maître Babacar Sëye and the victims of the Joola shipwreck.

Joseph Gaï Ramaka

Joseph Gaï Ramaka was born in 1952 in St. Louis, Senegal. After completing studies in visual anthropology at the Paris School of Social Sciences and film studies at the IDHEC, Ramaka created the French production and distribution company, Les Ateliers de l’Arche, in 1990. The Senegalese branch of this company opened the Bell’Arte space in Senegal in 1999, a Dolby stereo-equipped screening facility. This in turn jump-started the creative work of the Arche Studios, West and Central Africa’s first 15,000 square meter sound stage with computerized lighting. Some of Ramaka's films include And What If Latif Was Right winner of Best Documentary Film Award at the Vues d'Afrique Festival - Montreal 2006, Karmen Geï (2000, Sundance and Toronto Film Festivals), Ainsi soit-il (1997, Short Film Prize at Vues d’Afrique), Nitt...N’doxx / Les Faiseurs de Pluie (1988), and Baaw-Naan / Rites de Pluie (1985). He established the New Orleans Afrikan Film Festival in 2007 and in 2013, he created Gorée Island Cinema, a space for encounters and cinematographic creations, which has presented the Gorée Cinema Festival since 2015.

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