Urban Zulu

Rehad Desai Resume
Following his return to South Africa from political exile in the UK Rehad worked as a health and safety/media officer for a chemical workers union and the head of a HIV prevention unit. In 1997 he completed a Masters in Social History at the University of the Witwatersrand, he then entered the TV and film industry as a freelance current affairs journalist producing documentary shorts. He soon thereafter moved on to focus his energy on historical and socio -political documentary features and drama production winning crItical acclaim in both genres.
Miners Shot Down released in 2014 won local and international critical acclaim garnering 28 awards including the Taco Keiper award for investigative journalism and an International Emmy for best documentary. Everything Must Fall his second film in the trilogy also won critical acclaim and awards at home and abroad. His last film in the trilogy How To Steal A Country was released in 2020 and is presently doing the festival circuit alongside his new feature length Time of Pandemics film which looks at the HIV and COVID pandemics, vaccine development and the tensions and symbiosis between science and politics. The last five feature length documentary films have been produced at budgets ranging from 4.5 to R6 million. The SABC Drama series he produced came in at the cost of R11 million.
He has made a significant contribution through his involvement in industry bodies. He is a founding member of and former chair of SASFED and the DFA and has chaired the IPO for two periods and was the chair for the Arterial Network of South Africa. He remains active in industry issues and bodies.
Filmography (selected work)
Capturing Water 80 and 56 min (Director/Producer) 2025
Across cultures, over borders, and throughout history, water is used as a symbol for life. Yet its relationship to human existence extends beyond our biological necessities. Water soaks deeply into our economic, social, and political realities and because of its indispensable and irreplaceable presence within civilization, water can also come to be a symbol for power. Capturing Water skillfully tells this story and exposes the violent realities of water scarcity, a direct consequence of neoliberal policies and practices, compounded by the impacts of climate change. It simultaneously centres the unwavering spirit of women and communities: from their personal struggles to their political organising work at the forefront of the fight for water justice. The film powerfully amplifies their vision to see water as part of a commons: available to all, with equitable distribution within and across populations, protected from misuse and harm to ensure its availability for future generations.
Aljazeera, DR TV, SVT, SABC,
TIME OF PANDEMICS 86 min and 52 (Director/Producer). 2022
Just as US scientist, Anthony Fauci, and his South African counterpart, Glenda Gray, are about to announce a breakthrough in a 40 year search for an HIV vaccine, Covid-19 arrives and Gray and Fauci find themselves advising their respective governments on managing a new life threatening pandemic. The resulting conflict between science, politics and economics takes filmmaker Rehad Desai on a journey that raises questions around market driven health provision that is locked into our global system with few exceptions and at huge cost. How can this protect us against existential threats, where nobody is safe until everybody is safe?
Aljazeera, DR TV, SABC,
International Premiere Movies That Matter April 2022
HOW TO STEAL A COUNTRY 93 and 58 min. (Director/Producer). 2020
The #GuptaLeaks, a trove of over 300,000 emails and documents that lands on the desk of a South African team of investigative journalists, is akin to the Panama Papers. The data leak lays bare the modus operandi of the Guptas family, and their associates, more dangerous than anyone could have imagined. Then there’s a flurry of fake news, dodgy intelligence reports and attacks on journalists, in defence of ‘radical economic transformation’. Taking us from one family, to a president, to a captured state, to the central role of unscrupulous multinationals, the escalating layers of this story unfold like a Shakespearean tragedy that will hold up a mirror to many countries facing similar circumstances today.
DRTV, SVT, ZDF/Arte, YLE, RBT, MNET, TRT International, Deutche Welle, DTI
Four SAFTAs 2021 Screened at 21 Festivals
EVERYTHING MUST FALL 84 and 58 min. (Director/Producer). 2018
DRTV, SVT, SABC, Bertha Foundation, NFVF, DTI
THE GIANT IS FALLING 48, 58 and 77 min (Director/Producer). 2016
A sweeping look at the big political events of recent years that signify the end of an era in South Africa. With declining popularity at the polls and the real possibility of losing the comfortable majority the party has enjoyed for two decades, the big debate in South Africa is whether or not the party can recover its reputation as the most respected liberation movement in the world?
SABC, Al Jazeera, ZDF/Arte, NRK, IKON Docs, DTI
Best South African Film, Johannesburg International Film Festival 2016
MINERS SHOT DOWN 86 and 52 min (Director/Producer). 2014
In August 2012, mineworkers in one of South Africa’s biggest platinum mines began a wildcat strike for better wages. Six days later, the police used live ammunition to brutally suppress the strike, killing 34 and injuring many more. Using the POV of the Marikana miners, Miners Shot Down, follows the strike from day one, showing the courageous but isolated fight waged by a group of low paid workers against the combined forces of the mining company, Lonmin, the ANC government and their allies in the National Union of Mineworkers. What emerges is collusion at the top, spiralling violence and the country’s first post-apartheid massacre. South Africa will never be the same again.
NFVF, Ford Foundation, Bertha Foundation, 9 international public broadcasters, and Al Jazeera English and North America. To date shown at over 75 festivals, won 28 festival prizes/awards including an International Emmy in 2015 Http://vimeo.com/89012287

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ALEXANDRA MY ALEXANDRA, 6 x 48 min (Producer, Series and episode Director 1, 2 and 5). 2012
Based on the book, ‘Alexandra, A History’, by Noor Nieftagodien and Philip Bonner Wits University Press 2008), the
series charts the history of the township from 1912, to the present day over six one-hour episodes. Billed as ‘a history told from below’ a host of Alexandra residents, past and present provide the stories through which the township’s epic struggle for survival and for human dignity can be understood.
SABC, NFVF, DAC.
Episode 1
Link https://vimeo.com/75218042 Episode 2
Link https://vimeo.com/75377411 Episode 3
Link https://vimeo.com/58619540 Password 1912 (for all episodes)
An unflinching look at the #FeesMustFall student movement that burst onto the South African political landscape
in 2015 as a protest over the cost of education. The story is told by four student leaders at Wits University and
their Vice Chancellor, Adam Habib, a left-wing, former anti-apartheid student activist. When Habib’s efforts to
contain the protest fail, he brings 1000 police on to campus. There are dire consequences for the young leaders. By
blending dramatic unfolding action with a multi-protagonist narrative, much of the drama lies in the internal
struggles the activists have around the weight of leadership.
Best South African Documentary, Cape Town International Film Festival, 2018
Vaclav Havel Jury Award, One World Human Rights Film Festival 2019
Best Documentary Director, South African Film and Television Awards, 2019
Best Documentary, South African Film and Television Awards, 2019
The Mating Game Drama series, 13 x 48 min, Producer, 2010

G
race Molele (Maggie Benedict) is a 29-year-old host for a daily radio show, Ebony Vibes, and is not
afraid to speak her mind on air.
Roxanne Davids (Renate Stuurman) is a sub-editor for a women's
magazine, Women's Nation, under-utilized by her controlling boss Kefilwe (Khabonina Qubeka).
Sara van
Graan (Elma Postma) is a doctor and runs a clinic for women.
By the time these women become friends,
shifts in the social landscape have opened up possibilities for women in South Africa to compete more
equally with their male counterparts.
This new layer of women are bright, independent, sexually
liberated and frequently in conflict with the values of their more traditional parents.In their long awaited
bid for freedom, they have left most men scratching their heads, looking to the past for self-definition.
Grace, Roxanne and Sara all have different reasons to want to choose a life that's very different to that of
their mothers.
SABC,
Six Safta Drama Nominations, Two Safta Awards for Scriptwriting and Best Assemble
BATTLE FOR JOHANNESBURG 52 and 72 min (Director/Producer). 2010
The Battle for Johannesburg captures the changing face of Johannesburg as efforts to turn back the clock on more than ten years of decay are underway. It’s a tale of eager property developers vying for sections of the crumbling metropolis, of a city council determined to create a city that’s world class and ultimately of how this affects the hundreds of thousands of people who have, out of necessity, made the slums their home.
IKON, YLE, TV2, NHK, SABC, PRESS TV, NFVF.
BAMBATHA: WAR OF THE HEADS 1906, 72 min (Director/Producer) 2007
Historical drama with documentary elements. The story of the Bambatha rebellion is one of resistance, heroism and ultimately of violent colonial conquest. Unearthing the dramatic events surrounding the 1906 revolt in the colony of Natal exposes the spirits of our forefathers who faced with escalating levels of oppression at the turn of the century, organised a formidable fight back.
SABC, History Channel, DAC, NFVF.
https://vimeo.com/44469165
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BUSHMAN’S SECRET 52 and 64min (Director/Producer). 2006
A documentary that looks at the exploitation of the intellectual property rights of the San Tribe in South Africa by the multinational Unilever, the concessions gained and the consequences thereof.
YLE, TV2, IKON, ZDF-Arte, RBTF, SABC, NFVF, CWCI, EED Germany. Shown at 20 Film Festivals
Durban International Film Festival, Palmares, Brazil, Zanzibar International Film Festival
BORN INTO STRUGGLE 52 and 75min (Director/Producer):2004
Filmmaker Rehad Desai takes us on an intimate journey mapped out by the scars etched into his family’s life from having a family who were intensely involved in politics. Barney Desai was a political hero during South Africa’s struggle for freedom, yet as a father, he was damagingly absent emotionally.
Rehad spent most of his young life in exile and became politically active himself. On this intensely personal journey into his past, Rehad realises he may be following in his father’s footsteps as he reviews his relationship with his own estranged teenage son.
Produced by: Anita Khanna & Bhekisizwe Peterson
Broadcasters: YLE 2 Finland,SABC1 South Africa, SBS TV Australia, RTBF Belgium, TV Denmark
Awards: Audience Award, Best Documentary, Encounters International Documentary Festival 2004, Jury Award Best Documentary, Apollo Film Festival 2004, Jury Award Best Documentary, Cape Town World Cinema 2004
https://uhuru.digital www.uhuruproductions.co.za