The Money Order: A Film for Discussing Legal Identity with Students
Reading time 5 minutes
An invitation from the Films Femmes Afrique association
The Films Femmes Afrique association, founded in 2003 and based in Senegal, is committed to promoting African cinema created by women. Through its biennial festival and travelling screenings across the country, it promotes films made by Africans, all while creating spaces for debate and raising awareness about women’s rights, gender equality, and related issues. This commitment helps to strengthen the visibility and voice of women in the African film industry.
At the end of the 2025 academic year, ATD Fourth World Senegal was invited by the Films Femmes Afrique association to attend the screening of Ousmane Sembène’s 1968 film Mandabi (The Money Order) at Ameth Dansokho High School in Ouakam, Senegal. The ATD Fourth World team was also invited to facilitate a discussion with the high school students following the screening, with the goal of creating a space for dialogue on poverty and social justice issues.
The team and Ndack Diallo, a young ATD Fourth World Volunteer Corps member trainee who is actively involved in issues related to legal identity among families, provided his expertise by animating the debate that followed the screening, inviting participants to ask questions and interact freely.
The partnership fostered a dynamic exchange between students about the film and their real-life experiences, deepening discussions on the structural causes of poverty and possible avenues for collective action. It was ultimately a valuable opportunity to bring together the perspectives of cinema, people living in precarious situations, and students, in order to transform perceptions of poverty and promote constructive dialogue.
The Money Order: a reflection of past and present injustices
The absence of legal identity, in the film as in reality, is a form of invisibilisation.
In the film, the main character — Ibrahima Dieng — receives a money order from France intended to help him feed his children and pay off his debts. However, he cannot withdraw the money as he does not have any proof of identity. From then on, he embarks on a humiliating journey between counters, absurd demands, and constant referrals. What director Ousmane Sembène powerfully demonstrates is that without papers, individuals do not exist in the eyes of the authorities.
The film depicts how the lack of legal identity marginalises Ibrahima Dieng. He is suspected, mocked, and exploited. His efforts are in vain, and he ends up humiliated, without having obtained justice. This is still a reality today, over fifty years later, and ATD Fourth World frequently encounters it in its work with families living in extreme poverty.
Without a birth certificate, it is impossible to work legally, send your children to school, access healthcare, or simply assert your rights. This creates a vicious circle of exclusion and invisibilisation, one that ATD Fourth World is working to combat.
Responses to The Money Order at Ameth Dansokho High School
The Money Order is both touching and deeply insightful, and paints a stark picture of everyday life in Senegal. It depicts a society marked by poverty, embezzlement1, committed in the course of public office, administrative abuse, and corruption. Following the screening, a discussion was held with the students on the issue of legal identity, focusing particularly on the obstacles people living in poverty face when trying to obtain a birth certificate.
A student in his final year of high school shared his own experience of not having a birth certificate. Although he was born in Senegal, his parents are Guinean, and as a result, the school’s administration was asking him for a certificate of nationality document that he could not provide.
The student’s testimony illustrated the complexity and harshness of issues related to legal identity. Young people feel the impact of not having a civil status deeply, as it often places them in situations of exclusion and misunderstanding. During the discussions, several students asked what support was available to those affected by this issue, and ATD Fourth World Senegal explained their role in raising awareness of the administrative and social obstacles people face in securing legal identities.
The team also spoke with the high school librarian, who drew attention to the troubling reality that many students, both in elementary and high school, lack civil status. A school official also told the team about a book club, which could serve as an opportunity to collaborate in raising awareness about the issue among young people.
A political and social critique that remains highly relevant,
Ousmane Sembène uses cinema as a tool for raising awareness. Through The Money Order, he denounces a dehumanising postcolonial administration that perpetuates a logic of exclusion inherited from the past. More than fifty years after its release, this film continues to resonate because the mechanisms of injustice it highlights remain in effect. Like ATD Fourth World, Sembène asserts that social justice is impossible without legal recognition of every human being. Having an identity means having a social existence and being able to act, defend oneself, and hope.
The Money Order is not just a film about poverty. It is a cry of revolt against a silent injustice — a deaf but very real exclusion — that strikes those who are denied the right to exist. Here, the philosophies of both Ousmane Sembène and ATD Fourth World converge: the right to exist begins with the right to be recognised.
Ultimately, the film screening and rich exchanges with students and staff at Ameth Dansokho High School reinforced for ATD Fourth World the urgent need to continue engaging young people on these issues. Book clubs and other educational initiatives are not only tools for learning, but also spaces where solidarity and awareness can grow. By encouraging dialogue and critical thinking, these efforts can help shape a generation committed to justice and inclusion.
Only by ensuring that everyone has access to legal identity documents can we begin to build a society that truly recognises the dignity and rights of all.