Mick Csáky, who has died of complications from leukaemia aged 77, was one of the documentary-makers outside the established television system who fought during the 1970s to get their independently made productions on screen.
The arrival of Channel 4, conceived as a commissioner of programmes rather than a producer, gave him his chance. He seized it firmly with Africa (1984), an eight-part examination of the continent and its society, from the civilisations of the Nile valley and east Africa’s links with Arabia and the east to slavery, decolonisation and South Africa.
