Finnland-Forum

Al Jazeera looks at the Sami
Arabs want to make TV documentary about the Sami.

NRK Troms and Finnmark: By Elisabeth Brun 13.10.2006 kl. 13:50


The Arabic TV station Al Jazeera plans to make a documentary about the Sami.

The documentary will look at how the Sami have managed to live in peaceful co-existence with Norwegians, after centuries of oppression.

And now the Sami are the ones who will be setting the agenda in the Arab world.

The world’s biggest Arabic-language TV station, which became famed for broadcasting images of beheadings and of statements from Osama Bin Laden, will examine the conflict between the Sami and the Norwegians in a new documentary film.

“This is something minorities the world over can learn from,” says Leon Ferguson, head of Al Jazeera’s documentary film department in Britain, to NRK.

“We can learn from the Sami”

“Many peoples like the Kurds will be interested in and can learn from how the Sami have managed to live in peace with their oppressors,” says Ferguson.

The Kurds are also a minority who live spread across national borders and who have experienced hundreds of years of oppression and injustice.

Al Jazeera’s documentary film department in London has been established only recently and this documentary about the Sami is one of their first productions.

Delighted Sami

Ole Henrik Magga, politician and former Sami activist, is delighted at the news of the documentary.

He thinks it will be exciting to see what perspective the Arabic TV station will choose to adopt, and what they can learn from the example of the Sami.

Magga himself was on the side of peace in the fight against the Alta River hydroelectric development towards the end of the 1970s; the side that wanted to pursue a dialogue with the authorities rather than open confrontation.

However, Magga warns against comparing the Sami with people like the Kurds.

“The Kurds have gone through far worse sufferings, and in spite of everything the Norwegian authorities have been more willing to carry on a dialogue than the situation the Kurds have experienced,” he tells NRK.

“An honour for the Sami”

Johan Mikkel Sara, Vice-President of the Sami Parliament, thinks it an honour that the Sami will be held up as a good example on the Arabic TV station Al Jazeera, which plans to make a documentary about the Sami.

Sámi Radio: Edited by: Åse Pulk 13.10.2006 kl. 13:48


The Arabic TV station Al Jazeera intends to make a documentary about the Sami. It will show how the Sami minority have managed to live in peace with the Norwegian majority.

Johan Mikkel Sara, Vice-President of the Sami Parliament, thinks it is an honour that the Sami should be held up as a good example on the Arabic TV station.

Recognition

“It is recognition of the way in which we have managed to organise ourselves and will also show how things function in practice,” says Sara.

But the Sami Parliament’s Vice-President does not believe that the documentary will help bring about any change worth mentioning in the Muslim political environment.

“I do of course hope that it will, but I have little faith in it changing the political activities that go on in the Muslim environments.”

Already well known internationally

Johan Mikkel Sara feels that the Sami organisation and collaboration with the Norwegian authorities is already well known in the international environment. According to him, it is not only Al Jazeera that is aware of this.

“The Sami are already well known throughout the world in the international environment, and the model that has been adopted in the Nordic countries, that of the Sami parliament, is widely known. It is also known to be a good model and that it works in relation to its respective authorities,” comments Sara.