Following screenings at Sheffield DocFest and Durban International Film Festival, Hope Is a Word screened at the Quramo Festival of Words 2026, themed “Pieces of Us.”
Written and directed by Maria Galliani Dyrvik, the feature documentary has Femi Odugbemi as executive producer and Allen Onyige as impact producer and cinematographer. It tells the story of environmental injustice in the Niger Delta through poet and activist Nnimmo Bassey and the voices of young people, including Ukpono Bassey, Odudu-Abasi Asuquo and Barinedum Cecilia Mbee.
Films like Black November have explored the devastating consequences of oil exploration on the people and environment of the Niger Delta. Yet Hope Is a Word revisits the subject from a different perspective, using art and culture to drive change.
Hope Is a Word doesn’t bring ammunition or violence; it brings a weapon of its own: the pen. It aims at the heart of the government through the hearts of the people, using poetry to do so.
“Poetry speaks to the heart, and change originates from the heart,” Bassey says in the film.
That belief runs through the documentary: even if a poet dies, his words do not. They stay in our hearts.
The documentary highlights the damage caused by oil spills in the Niger Delta, showing polluted land and waterways alongside accounts of illness, loss and displacement. For the people whose lives depend on that land, environmental destruction reaches beyond the landscape and into their homes.
Hope Is a Word encourages these communities not to lose their voices in the face of adversity. Through poetry, Bassey invites young people to put their experiences and feelings into words, finding a voice that can carry their struggle forward.
The documentary also draws on the legacy of writer, television producer and activist Ken Saro-Wiwa, whose belief in culture as a means of freedom and liberation strongly influenced Bassey. Executed in 1995, Saro-Wiwa remains part of the history that the film seeks to preserve.
Indeed, hope is a word. A word can be a silent instrument that demands change. It doesn’t have to scream to have a voice, nor does it need a microphone to be heard.
Speaking at the Quramo Festival of Words 2026, Odugbemi described Hope Is a Word as a historical record rather than a political film. For him, the documentary preserves the experiences of the people of the Niger Delta and ensures that those who fought relentlessly are remembered.
Images Courtesy of Smau Media / Hope Is a Word
