Debates about blurred divisions between Macedonian and Bulgarian ancestry have long raged in the Balkans.  A new controversy, however, involves Vangelia Goushterova, or Baba Vanga, as the famous clairvoyant was known. Her name and fame are being re-invented once more through a documentary film, which will be screened at the Ghandi Panorama Festival in India,  between October 2 and October 4, as reported by Macedonian newspaper Vreme.

The film, Like a Candle, is a biopic written and directed by Tihomir Stoyanovski. He shot most of it during a visit by theatre Skrab i Uteha (Sorrow and Consolation) to the village of Mosomishte in, what is known as, Pirin Macedonia, falling within the south west part of Bulgaria.

Stoyanovski was quoted by Vreme as saying that his film tells the life story of the prophetess, but also shows how “Macedonian citizens” live in Bulgaria while “being unrecognised by Bulgarian authorities as well.”

Born in 1911 in the village of Strumitsa in present-day Macedonia, which at the time of her birth was part of Bulgaria, Baba Vanga moved to Petrich in Bulgaria. In 1942, she moved to the Roupite area near Petrich, where she lived until her death in 1996. A museum there displays photographs, documents and her personal belongings.

Baba Vanga was known throughout the Balkans and beyond for her unique gift to predict and 'see' the past, present and future. Ironically, however, she was blind. She acted as a kind of counsellor and aid to many people, from leaders of the Communist Party through to common folk who queued in front of her house day and night.

The Bulgarian Orthodox Church contended that Vanga was possessed by demonic powers.

One of Vanga's predictions was that World War 3 would start in 2010.