Kenyan actor, media personality and playwright John Sibi-Okumu was recently awarded with the Carthage Theatre Festival’s Lifetime Achievement Award. Sibi-Okumu was honoured for his services to theatre over the years.
Hosted by the government of Tunisia every two years since 1983, the Carthage Theatre award celebrates the world of stage acting. Over 100 theatrical performances were presented at the 22nd edition of the festival in late December, 2021.
More recently he plays a lawyer in the TV show Crime and Justice, a Showmax Original Series after an 8 year hiatus. He has over 50 years’ experience in the theatre and film industry in Kenya. Earlier on in his career, he landed his first major role in the Academy Award and Golden Globe winner Born Free. Later, he would rub shoulders with Academy winner Rachel Weisz (The Favourite) and Oscar nominee Ralph Fiennes (Schindler’s List) in the critically-acclaimed drama, The Constant Gardener, where he played a corrupt minister.
In 2007, he played UN special envoy Booh-Booh in the war drama Shake Hands with the Devil about the events leading to the 1994 Rwandan genocide. And in 2010, he appeared in The First Grader, the biographical film about Kenya’s Kimani Maruge, the world’s oldest pupil, alongside Oscar nominee Naomi Harris (Moonlight).
The Awards also recognized Ugandan-born author Beatrice Akello Hofmann, who was announced winner of the Eyelands Book Awards last month. The award is for her historical fiction memoir Drudgeries for Feat: Identifying and Leveraging Opportunities in a Foreign country.