NBO Film Festival: Daresha Kyi’s Documentary “Love, Joy & Power: Tools For Liberation” Reinforces Pan-African Sentiments

Daresha Kyi’s inspiring feature-length documentary, Love, Joy & Power: Tools For Liberation, spotlights the activities of Black Voters Matter (BVM), a non-profit movement championing empowerment and voter engagement in African-American communities. Founded in 2016 by LaTosha Brown and Cliff Albright, BVM is a US-based organization that promotes grassroots democracy by mobilizing Black people to engage in elections and advocate for policies that improve their socio-economic lives.

In this documentary, Kyi amplifies the development and contributions of BVM in the countdown to the 2020 United States presidential elections, through clips of activities of the movement and interviews with its key figures, Cliff and his wife  April England-Albright and LaTosha. The documentary opens at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, a time when political engagement was difficult amid a global health crisis. Yet, it pays tribute to the unwavering efforts of a small group of civil rights activists dedicated to combating political apathy among African Americans. As the featured guests in the documentary reflect on their backgrounds and personal experiences, there are references to the history of civil rights activism, voter suppression, and racism in America—which further contextualize and validate the movement’s interests.

LaTosha Brown, whose family hails from Alabama, attributes her becoming to the foundation of love and sense of power and agency provided by her parents. Her mother experienced racism as one of the only three Black people in a white-dominated high school, and her father was involved in protests against segregation in Mississippi. April, who also hails from Alabama, remembers her mother for altruism towards the homeless and her father for his strong interest in black political power as an attorney. In school, Cliff was a business major student, initially hoping to make wealth for himself in the business world, until he took a class in racism, a game-changing moment that drew him to campus activism. Both Cliff and April reference Alex Haley’s The Autobiography of Malcolm X as one of the books that shaped their thinking. The book is based on a series of conversations with Malcolm X, a prominent African-American civil rights leader and activist who advocated for Black liberation in the United States in the 1950s and 1960s.

Love, Joy & Power: Tools For Liberation was recently screened at the NBO Film Festival in Nairobi, Kenya, which took place from 16th to 26 October 2025, with its African premiere alluding to the shared racial history, discriminatory politics and liberation struggles of Africans and Black Americans. The screening resonates with the other struggles and sociopolitical upheavals that have characterized Africa’s history from the pre-colonial to postcolonial dispensation. It may be interpreted as a Pan-African manifesto, similar to what the Negritude movement stood for in the 1940s and 50s, inviting indigenous Africans to join in the global awareness for the equal, unprejudiced treatment of people of African descent.

Towards the end of Kyi’s documentary, when Joe Biden emerges as president-elect, members of the BVM are visibly pleased with the results. This victory and success story, earned without resort to belligerent action, is an important motivator for Africans, an assurance that, through cohesive campaigns aimed at effective conscientization, Africans can take back their countries from failed leaders during the polls. For much of the documentary, there is emphasis on the need for love, unquenchable zeal, and genuine care in sustaining community-driven initiatives and ideals. This is an indispensable lesson for other politically motivated Afrocentric initiatives. However, the final scene of the documentary reveals the pushbacks that often come with being involved in civil rights and political activism, most notably death threats. Even though the BVM leaders grudgingly learn to use firearms, it is important for their survival in an American society where gun violence is rife. In most African societies, where citizens are not permitted to own firearms, African patriots, activists and thought leaders have to explore other possibilities within the ambit of their respective country’s laws, to protect their own lives.

Love, Joy & Power: Tools For Liberation brings attention to contemporary civil rights activism through the prism of BVM, grounding it in a sordid history of American racial politics. It is also refreshing and empowering, with social relevance that extends to other marginalized groups worldwide. At the core of the documentary is a message of hope and optimism that reverberates, planting the seeds for an ideal world that is anchored on fairness, equality and justice.