soon played in the pile of toxic waste, which was full of arsenic lead and mercury when one had to wait. it came from sweden and business. how toxic waste poison car, including me in 45 minutes on d, w. t w's crime fighters are back. that africa's most successful radio drama series continues them all episodes are available online. and of course you can share and discuss on the w africa's facebook page and other social media platforms, crime fighters, tune in now. wow. it's great to be back for another edition of your favorite magazine show. this is the 77 percent the platform for africa's you. i am eddie mike, a junior hello and welcome to the program. today show us quite special to me. it's all about black representation. let's dig

into what we have for you from black panther to, to children's folks. what's the status of black representation in the media? and on exclusive interview, kenya's boy by the south. you. so tell us what it means to truly represent and we meet a graffiti artist who is giving a fresh look to my topics. i don't know about you, but i get excited when a black actor is cast in the remake of the popular. but us is often the case, it also causes an offer when many questioning why it is even necessary to change of bashing, but many are already used to this. the production company, for example, has received criticism for planning to use a black character in its upcoming film, a little mermaid. so, why do we need a black man made? of course we need a black ma made and

a black else in flood. if fantastical features can be blue and yellow and are boiled. why draw the line at bluff? but it's not just about the color now, is it? recently, there was an uproar over the fact that american fuel company word disney studio, cast a young, brilliant, and black actress to play the role of the little mermaid. now the criticism wasn't based on the performance of the actress highly bailey. one group asked why disney had to remake the film with a black actress instead of sticking to a white wine as had been done in previous remakes. the 1st group of people is annoyed that the fantastic all film now includes black characters. and not only that, then all starved year for the film which has been produced for over 20 times now is sorely missed out. and what's worse is that fantasy and re life and not any more

different. for the 2nd group of people halliburton being the star of an age, all fantasy is not a big when they say that these leagues played faith by retailing the same all stories but still arnie because they're tickling ventless charger of people that desire to see themselves represented on screen. now, when companies do this, it's called black washing. they say that these me can invest money in telling new stories, for example, about mackenzie really one wins who thought of the europeans by dancing a very virus done called to food. and now they've also another group of people who think that this discussion is not necessary. and i can see why in the year 20, 21 january to june normally would produced over 1000 fill. yes. and then

not the only ones on the continent. if you look across different countries there, blossoming film industry is now with so many phones being produced with black actors. do we still need to have a conversation about having black actors? well, yes, we do. because hollywood is one of the biggest cultural vehicles in the world, and it is important to portray the world as it really is. and that means having black people existing in the same way other races do. now, disney shouldn't top casting brilliant actors just because they are black. no, however, they could invest in telling new stories such as the african mythology. for example, the famished fraud by been or cri on the wizard of the cro by good you are young or . but if these title sound too complex for a children's story, then i have other examples. ariella and the talking drawn by stephanie corker,

are soon away by lupita no. and no matter which can someone peaks. the fact remains that talent had work and determination is not a preserve of just one race. that means more block actors are needed on screen one to do their job. and secondly, so that people can remember that we are all equal regardless of the race i for lot, once you go for that on task stick breakdown, i think it's crazy that we have to constantly remind people about no matter their ways or color of skin. we all equal and i guess some people need a constant reminder to dive deeper into the topic. you can buy a studio guest for today. francis obama is a journalist. he was born in lagos, nigeria, but we locate that to germany in 2015. he uses photography and documentary scales to spark conversations about this ability and the connection between identity and

immigration. yes, also the author of the children's book highlight bis, let's find out more about him, the photographer, community organizer, and he's with no childrens books, especially for children of color branches, oklahoma is not during by birth, but in order to build a home away from home, he's taken on the role of organizing black community meet ups in germany, city of cologne. i've always photographs, people i've always been, i've always documented black conversations, black celebrities, like fashion weeks. so when i moved to germany, was just a natural progression into fitting into such a role. he's called today's nissan, black and white places with a focus around african art and culture. in this case, the famous been in bronze to an artist residency at cologne's rock and help us

museum frances was able to interact with the brands. and now he wanted to open the door for others have been measuring, with the been in bones of here is just natural to one to see them because you don't get the roses and niger that only here because they were new to it and having to see them here for the 1st time doing the exhibition of resist made me want to show other people this exploration. like i said, why people black white spaces, you don't really see a lot of black people in the sense of community shared experiences. but also reflecting on a shed like history is what brought people here together. and for francis, that's a good start to building a more acceptable because his generation and his kids the man you just saw is right here with me in the studio for francis. thanks for coming through . so why is this important for you to address black identity?

first of all, i think i'm black and is also very important that people like me are well represented in media. and i like to speak in the german context since i live here. can hardly see black represented in media. i mean, you see a few, but you hardly see it way should be and i and i took the responsibility of documents and such that space and also being visibility to the community days. mostly i want to say not saying what exists. oh yeah. fair enough. i mean, when you look at the current state of black representation, what, what are your thoughts? are we heading in the right direction? i would, i would say we're headed in the right direction. i mean, you could look at the last couple of the last 3. the last 3 years, a lot of a lot of things as change in germany in particular. i mean, says the george floyd conversation a lot of people now aware of the i don't see the i will the i did is they know what

they looked like, but now they take it more seriously. and yeah, i would say it's going to the right direction and more media houses i taking cognizance of the fact that black people as part of the story, tell it. yeah, i mean, it sounds when we had seen the black people have some positive storytelling because of course we should write that pretty straightforward. that should be the no morality, i would actually be the normal situation, but we leave suddenly in a while that is not always what we wish for that we get. but i believe that like you asked previously, it's important that we go in the right step. lot of things i haven't been done properly in the past, but i think people are now taking that recursion the doing the right things. now, as i leave them that i had said, i mean you mentioned earlier, you live in, in germany and not all the things that you've been, you've been here for a couple of years now. how has living in germany impacted the work that you do? ok. oh ok, used to live in south africa. i lived there for 8 years and i've been in germany

now for the last 8 years. and originally, i'm sure you know, i'm major and so i have that johnny ahead of me. and i would say germany has also impacted in how i told my stories, because initially in south africa was all about the lifestyle type of work. but since i moved, yeah, i mean, you know, you're confronted daily which what you call the micro aggression sometimes, or you're confronted with lack of disability and that has also made me aware that i need it's just one thing. so that has actually impacted my work deeply. i would say, yeah, i'm really looking forward to, you know, one of the secretions that have come up from your account that you would have book and hair like this. right? yeah, we're going to get into that too. so that leaves us to talk about representation in books, lack of representation can actually be life threatening. yes, a simple example. some rashes look totally different with white skin compared to black skin. a disease symptoms in most medical books around a world,

a based on white people, will show you an idea and illustrious, who got famous by coming up with the obvious solution. we problem that nobody seemed to tackle or decades. that's have a look. ah chileya barry e b d, illustration of a black seat. so when people are around the world, realize we had never seen the fields where presented his picture turned into much more than the truly like a voice. speaking out for the black community, been a hard to understand, i destroy was more than just a medical official and it was a message of hope to do to the black community. and then i said for me, knowing these drugs are no longer a passion when the pep was for me, generations of doctors, nurses, all kinds of medical studies here. and this is one of the books that they use. it's

found that textbook used right off today's all around the world. and if you sort of a page is very easy to see that most of the illustrations here are just white. skin is almost a black people, goes how ratios are don't have babies and 4, yet one really challenge them a little efficient housing means there's no because disney lack of representation, medical control, for example, some skin conditional represent differently on the black in he's on eye cities on, on the white skin, most of the clint oncology shows, we see in textbooks, a dreadful white people raise up with the rushes you talked about in what was really pink. so then if i go to the hospital, if i stop my clinicals, oh my be looking for pink roch's. why is not thinking black people, so i feel this and many more medical conditions related to blood watch. i the only reason the medical cookies dsl in africa. yes. africa. yes, melanie. so once you start using our black people was we see this kind of thing was

the reason is will don't be like em differences between what's really not as group our to us in our group and at them we love to actually have posted like on the on the bit that you be speech or went viral. he says several publishers have commissioned him to draw more block medical illustration. he says he plans to publish his own textbook on skin conditions in black people and wants to set up a training school for other african medical illustrated have only one word to describe what i just saw. amazing. i guess francis is still here with me on this. you're francis. i mean, we all watch this. kim, what are your thoughts on what your friend nigerian is interesting? first of all, i must say is dorian is, is he is doing what is very important to the future of how media should be sin.

first of all, i think it, that's how he should be. i mean, people want to see themselves in, in characters. people want to see themselves even in medical books, because a, i mean i, for the 1st time, i'm also thinking about it. i've never, i just realised that in most of the babies. oh do the features that you see is always yeah. we is. we don't even recognize that i'm we are, we are used to seeing how we are. yeah. and it hits you, it really hits you when you go like, wow, for, for decades, for centuries, that's just not been the case. and if you actually question yourself sometimes, doesn't it like, or is there something wrong with me? you know, for me, i have never question myself, but i, but obviously i know that there's something wrong somewhere. and which is one of the reasons why i took it upon myself to change the step of narrative because being a father too, and having to show your kids what they don't look like all the time is also confusing. yeah, and i would say that what the,

what the other person is doing that is the feature of how even medical you can even take it beyond that. i'm even in labs we don't see how it is the color lab. yeah. so about really showing that black representation, you know, it's part of the human race as simple as that. you hold in the book. i see we talk about getting into this big head like this. what motivates had you to dig into a book like this? i must be honest with you, i would say, 1st of all, i would say a personal reasons for my son. i mean, i'm a for the boys and they have this type of hair. and it was a struggle having to explain why the head is different. and secondly, i took part in i, i did a documentation with almost 80 black people in germany. and i found that that had the composition on has a, is v for then we know it's also a mix up basically the all existence and i,

and for me was very important to reach out to different age groups. and i thought, since i also have kids, it's important that i reach out to that audience, and that's what made me go into this. i'm happy about the book because i don't have kids yet. if i do have kids in the future, i'll definitely have to show them the type of plan why it's okay to have any type of entity. yeah. so let's, let's, let's talk about the audience your targets. and with that book like this one, i would say everybody, i mean ever the thing about kids book is that you do not only reach out to the kids . you also reach out to the parents. you see it's a kind of interesting story. i would tell you most of the people that have uh, let me see the people that booked this book and i'm not just black kids are kids of color yellow. so a lot of white parents that bite such a book, a book like this. so they could, they able to synthesize the,

since i said the kids to let them know that this, this power diversity is power been different and the book also encompasses different character. it's not just, it's not just about the head nozzles about what makes the hair. i see, i wish we had all the time to so many questions i was, but i think let's wrap up with this. i mean, for model, you said you definitely have a kind of future that you wish to see. what is that future of the future is, is what i'm, what i'm doing now. what people like me doing now, which is more represent a representation in the media. and i just media also having to do also having to lead. and i think that would be it's, we already making those most and our kids would leave that dream that we do leave to the reality of our dreams as to for the future generation. thank you very much. thank you very much, francis for your time francisco. go, but the good news is that francis is not alone. he's got salty, sol, kenya's,

most famous boy, about what i had is in music, movies or literature black representation. my test was salty, so the ban does not only support young african musicians. they also inspire african kits to story, tell it, hello, what's up everybody. we are a day. oh and then a. busy watching listening wherever you are, 277, then ah saudi. so these 4 guys from kenya rock africa, famous for their gigantic acoustic performances. the boy group found a 2005, and i robi consists of vocalist gen shimano. so vara and eaters, for the car, the band, spent the years of the club, 19 pandemic, partially apart from each other, to grow individually. and that includes the following your own art and embracing,

who you are. at the end of last year, singer shimano had his coming out as gate a step that inspired him to his solo album heavy as the crowd. it's always been an open secret. it's just, i guess, like people waiting for you to say like, okay, i'm gay, gay, you know, ha, i said again, you know, like it's, it's 2022. i shouldn't be this center topic really. but then for me, it's some being, being able to say that tend to and to fully live my, my, my life and my end to fully be myself enables me to be creative. now to flee in, in my, in my own self and actually finding out who it is that i actually am as an individual artist. and while the band keeps nurturing the next generation of artist through their own record label, sulky salt has also embarked on a new journey to educate children through their new book collaboration called sol kits for polycarp, it's a hard project. what which is to do is to create content that is by africa for

africans and wanted like, keeps coming, leads to, especially kids are coming from where we come from was isn't much wanted them. i being a father of 12 mom, think the only father in the van. he's young. he's 2, he's almost 3 with. and it's something that was really some of those really. whether you, you know, when, when i'm thinking about the near future and what kind of contents i want to see do what values on to still in him. and then, ah, yeah, then on a look out there, these and much that she presents us. you know, you rarely ever get an african perspective on what the experience of growing up we presentation matters to. so to, so whether it is in the music industry or in education and literature. so whether you are from west east, south or north africa, no matter what your background is, the guys from so it is all have a message for every young african, undeclared,

2 of the youth, a beer and 2 other young people who are there. please lead with love, with everything you do, the reflection or positivity, good vibes, good energy and love b. b. you do, you live, you live for yourself. put yourself as your 1st priority. and this is something very radical a little bit. if you're, if you're an african queued out there and you only speak your african language, speak if you don't have to conform to english. yeah. just speak it. you'll be known, we just learn english to be understood won't. why? but just ah, i that ended on one of my favorite cell too, so sauls, nowhere is like africa. no,

it's like, oh, i have a good voice. it's a good job. i was also good is to be transported from one place to another in a sheep i'll call looking vehicle. in kenya, they call them my tattoos. they are many buses that are sometimes equipped with lcd color t. v. 's and huge boxes. the vehicles come in unique designs and graffiti artist mohammed katara, aka what graphics is the musta of my talk to design. ah, my food limit, his mom had got that normally people called mammography because of the job i've been doing since sad than 19 ninety's. so my work, his graffiti body shop and everything about cars and mortal bikes. when i started a started on canvas, doing cameras was not giving me that pleasure. which,

you know, i, every time i used to do a convers, i always wanted people to see what of them. but most of the time, you do conversely, ticket to some one, maybe 2 or 3 people see it. that's really good. they deal. should they play this on cause because cars are moving canvas, so that's when i started just doing his hands on matter to small designs. the fast m a saturday said it with stickers and said matter to them, they said they bring the graffiti on the outside. but of small things, because at that time to pull di, nor distinguish normally how we start, the glands comes with the vehicle. we assess it. if there's any body work, we do it. there's somebody, some customers there, very crazy customers. know you have to differentiate, get a crazy customer. he tells you, okay, do what you want. even did like

a via p logins on guy. that's when people are in knowing this. i just graffiti upset think because normally at that time if you did something, someone could not lead though a leg. this had demonic things and maybe you're cussing something ah, doesn't entitled to bill that it was the 1st image to view them at 1st they did it on my car. i had a small dr. levine at put it into an inch on the dashboard. people are shocked at that time. it does look like that you see like today, and matter to can have you been like 30 says to 15 sets to liens. and i think that's how he started every they wanted grid, something different thing, maybe the board, the improving may be fits the kind of colors i'm doing, maybe the kind of graffiti i'm doing. so every day i wanted to do something different, even if i'm not doing them as much as i used to do before. but i created of a trend in people every did say and do set innovative new kind of things.

with steve, i was seated in forbes magazine. i think that was the biggest assessment. people look up to me, it have given people the morale that doesn't matter who which, which j b. o, where you come from. you can do anything. i go, every people know me, i've been good for that and been determined that one day i would make it wow, that's what i call strain inspiration. the key message for me is that it does not matter who you are or where you're from. you can do anything, mock my where it's one day you will make it now and that note of inspiration. it's a rap on this edition of the $0.77. i hope you enjoyed that as much as i did always love to hear from you. so next,

what else across all our social media platforms that's play you out with a song from iter and artist johnny drill. titled, how are you my friend? i'm good and hope you are to. eddie micah junior, is my name banks were sharing your time with me. i've been out ah, putting all this to me ever since that you well, i a ah! with

who ah because of the extreme this is for you on her. she true her last breath. ah, she breathed mamma and at that moment i lost her children,

played in the pile of toxic waste, which was full of arsenic lead, and mercury went out of the way. it came from sweden dusky business. how toxic waste poison's include in 15 minutes on d. w. what making the headlines and what's behind them. dw news africa, the show that was the issues in the continent. life is slowly getting back to normally on the streets to give you in the report on the inside our correspond that was on the ground reporting from and all the friends on my talk to you in the 90 minutes on d w. oh. i see she when i arrived here, i slept with 6 people in

a room and i think it was hard. i wish bare i even got white hair. is that with fleming, but german language help. yeah. a lot this kids to me and create opportunity to interact with you want to know their story, migrant verified and reliable information for migrant. hello. can they get all the harvesters or immigrants? dolock is that everything you enjoy eating at home with your family, was harvested by people who are being exploited. it's done, i guess, for free, and we're going to need to, uh huh. we can keep doing what we're doing. and that's why your green revolution is absolutely necessary. europe revealed the future is being determined. now, our documentary theory will show you how people, companies and countries are rethinking everything,

and making make changes with europe revealed this week on d. w. ah ah ah, this is deedee of new news live from berlin, a class action challenge by twitter workers after the new boss last plays off nearly half the workforce. he says it's to make the platform profitable. twitter workers reply to see you in court. and.