the 77 percent the platform with, you know, with this, i know we are not afraid to happen delicate because population is growing. and young people clearly have the solution, the future with the 77 percent every weekend on d w. 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 books. what's the status of black representation in the media? and an exclusive interview. kenya's boy, by the south you saw, tells us what it means can truly represent. and we meet a graffiti artist who has given a fresh look to my task. i don't know about you, but i get excited when a black actor is cast in the remake of the popular will. but us is often the case. it also causes anaphora with many questioning why it is even necessary to change it bash, and that many already used to do the production company, for example, has received criticism for planning to use a black character in its upcoming film, the 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 our ball . 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 film company words disney studio, cast a young, brilliant, and black actress to play the role of the little mermaid. now the criticism wasn't raised 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 fantastical form now includes black characters. and not only that, then all style of g for the fill, which has been produced for over 20 times now, is solely 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 disney is playing a fav by retailing the same old stories. but still arnie, because they're tickling that last charger of people that desire to see themselves represented on screen. now when companies do this, it's called black washing. they sell that leaves me can invest money in telling new stories. for example, about mac, actually one windsor who fought off the european by dancing a very, very gross dance 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 and they're not the only ones on the

continent. if you look across different countries, they're blossoming, film industry is now with so many film 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 talk 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 bin or cri on the wizard of the cro. bye good, you are young. but if these title found too complex for 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 a 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 thought once you go for that fantastic 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 at the dive deeper into the topic is invited a studio guest for today. francis obama is a journalist. he was born in lagos, nigeria. i relocated to germany in 2015. he uses photography and documentary skills to spot the stations 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 children, 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 clone. 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 rotten shop york

museum frances was able to interact with the bronzes. and now he wanted to open the door for others in measuring would have been in bones of here. it's just natural to one to see them because you don't get to the roses and dangerous that only here because they were looted 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 wiping 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 ship like history is what brought people here together. and for francis, that's a good start to building a more accepting world. what was his generation? and his kid the man you just saw is right here with me in the studio. hello, francis. thanks for coming to y. so important for you to address black identity.

first of all, i say i'm black and is also very important that people like me. i will represent the media and i like to speak in the german context. since i leave here. you hardly see black represented in media. i mean, you see if you but you hardly see its way should be and i, i managed to bear responsibility of documents in such that space and also being visibility to the community. that is mostly, i want to say not seen what exists. fair enough. i mean, when you look at the current state of black representation, what are your thoughts? are we heading in the right direction? i was, i was, so 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 11 things that changed in, in germany in particular. i mean it's, is the george floyd conversation in lot of people now a more aware of the, i don't want to deal with the identity. they know what they looked like,

but now the ticket more seriously and yeah, i would say it's going in the right direction and more media houses. i taken cognizance of this fact that black people as part of the storytelling. yeah, i mean, it sounds, again we had seen 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 almost to asian, but we live suddenly in a world that is not always what we wish for that we get, but i believe that like you act 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, said, i mean, you mentioned earlier, you live in, in germany and looking at all the things that you've been, you've been here for a couple of years now. how has living in germany impacted the way that you do? okay. oh, okay, 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 in. so they have that johnny. i had 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, you are confronted daily with 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 different thing so that i 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 the 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 on 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 you of your solution. we problem that nobody seemed to tackle a decades. that's have a look ah, chilly berry e b, d b, illustration of a black feet. so when people are around the world, realize we had never seen them were presented. that picture turned into much more of i'm actually more like a voice. speaking out for the black community than a hard to understand i destroy was more than just medical official and what it was a message of hope to do to the black community. and then i said for me, known these drugs are no longer a passion when the pep was for me, generation of cause save all kinds of medical studies here. and this is one of the books that they use. it's a stand that text book, you're right,

fashioned off today's all around the world. and if you fits 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 the baby and for yeah, one really challenge them a little efficient housing means there's no because disney lack of representation, medical literature, for example, some skin conditional represent differently on the black in the he's on i cities on, on the white skin, most of the quote unquote dishes we see in textbooks, a gentle white people raise up with the rushes you talked about in white 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 pink ink black people. so i feel this and many more medical conditions related to blood to watch. i the only way medical cooking is bestselling africa. yes. africa. yes, melanie. so once we start using our black people was we see this kind of thing was

the reason is will, you will be like a difference between what you read not as will our to us in our grows and at them we love to, to actually have posted like on the sunday bit that you be speech all 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, it black people and wants to set up a training school for all that 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, you all watch this kidney. what are your thoughts on what your friend nigerian is do? interesting, 1st of all, i would 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 cuz 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 are doing the features that you see is always yeah. we is, we don't even recognize that i'm we're, we, we are used to seeing how we are. yeah. and it hits you, it really hits you when you go like, wow how for, for decades, for centuries, that's just not being the case. and if you actually question yourself something doesn't like, or is there something wrong with me? you know, for me, i've never questioned my 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 this type of marriage. because being a father too, and having to show your kids what they don't look like all the time is also

confusing. and i would say that what the, what the other person is doing is the feature of how even medical you can even take it beyond that. i mean, even in labs there, we don't see how it was the coloring lab. yeah. so about really showing that black representation, you know, a spot of the human race as simple as that. you hold on a book. i see we talked about getting into this hair like this. what want to be had you to, to dig into a book like this. i must be honest to you. i would say 1st of all, our personal reasons, my son, i mean 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 deeper than 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 ok to have any type of entity. yeah. so let's, let's, let's talk about the audience you're targeting with that book like this. ok, well, 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, it's a kind of interesting story. i would tell you, most of the people that have that have put the book this book and not just black kids are kids of color. they also a lot of white parents that bites such a book, a book like this. so they could, they able to synthesize it since i said the kids to let them know that this,

this power diversity is power in been different on the book also encompasses different and character this not just, it's not just about the head nozzles about what makes the hair, i see, i wish we had all the time the 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 or 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 leave to the reality of our dreams, just do it for the future generation. thank you very much. thank you very much, francis for your time. francis obama. but the good news is that francis is not alone. he's got salty,

soul can yes. most famous boy about what i had is in music movies or literature black representation. my test to salty. so the band does not only support young african musicians. they also inspire african kits through story. tell it. hello, what's up? everybody? we are south. he's so good day. oh, and it's a good day. your watching, listening wherever you are. 277 then ah, saudi sold these 4 guys from kenya, rock africa, famous for their gigantic acoustic performances. the boy group found a 2005 in nairobi consists of vocalists b, n g mano. so vara and e tourist 20 are the band, spent the years of the, quote, 19 pandemic, partially apart from each other, to grow individually. and that includes 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. it's 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, as i, i, 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 um 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 embark on a new journey to educate children through their new book collaboration called sol kits for polycarp, it's a hard project. what which you to do is to create content that is by africa for

africans and content that keeps coming leads to, especially kids are coming from where we come from was is it's much wanted them to . i've been a father of 2 year old mom being the only father in the van asia through he's almost 3 with and it's something that was really something that was really bothering me. you know, when, when i'm thinking about the near future and what kind of contents i want to see the, what values on to still in him. and then, ah, yeah, then on a look out, there isn't much that she presents us. you know, you rarely ever get an applicant perspective on what the experience of growing up in my presentation matters to south you. 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 on the continent, door, the youth, other and to all the young people who are there. please lead with love that everything you do, the reflection or positivity, good vibes, good, an indian love b. b, you do, you live, you live for yourself, put yourself as your 1st priority. kind of has something very radical a little bit. if you're, if you're an african kid out there and you only speak your african language, speak if you don't have to conform to english yet, just speak it. you'll be known, we just learn english to be understood won't. why? but just ah,

that ended on one of my favorite se, so sauls, nowhere is like africa. no, it's like, oh, i have a good voice. it's a good job. was also good. is to be transported from one place to another in a super cool looking vehicle. in kenya, they call them my tattoos. they are many buses that are sometimes a crypt where l e d, khaled t, v 's, and huge boxes. the vehicles, how many unique designs and graffiti artist mohammed katara, aka, why graphics is the master of my talk to design. ah, my full name is muhammad could cat. normally people call mammography because of the job i've been doing, says, sad the 19 ninety's. so my work, his graffiti body shop and everything about cars and mortal bikes. when i started, i 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 someone, maybe 2 or 3 people see if that's really good. they deal. should they play this on cars? because cars are moving canvas. so that's when i started just doing his hands on matter to small designs. the foster may study, they 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, they are very crazy customers. no, 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 said in knowing this, i just graffiti upset think because normally at that time if you did something, someone could not sleep. there are like 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 thought i live in at put it into an inch on the dashboard. people are shocked at that time. it doesn't look like that you see like today. and matter to can have you been like 30 says to 15 such twins. and that time this house started every they wanted grid, something differently. 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 innovating new kind of things

with steve i was featured in forbes magazine. i think that was the biggest such movement. people look up to me. it has given people the morale that it doesn't matter who, which, which i blue oh, where you come from, you can do anything. i go everywhere. people know me. i've been good for that and being determined that one day i would make it wow, that's what i call spring inspiration. the key message for me is that it does not matter who you are or where you're from. you can do anything, mark 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. what i always love to hear from you,

so when i taught us 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. thanks for sharing your time with me. i've been out ah, putting all this to me ever since. that you well, i a ah, with

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out to be big life effect check global freedom. in 30 minutes on d. w. green energy from germany made in the media. some of the worlds on shore wind. we know is this is rudy. i will call 3. so this is where a gemini company wants to launch a massive energy project that uses wind power to generate hydrogen. what does everyone profit from clean energy made in germany? in 90 minutes on d. w and i benevolence, share my welcome to my podcast. love the matter that i and by the lever teeth influences and experts to talk about all playing loud effect from day to day. nothing less of all these things and more and then you'll see the plot can

make sure to to and then wherever you get your path and join the conversation because you know, it love matters ah, ah, ah, a light of contrasts of ambitions of the, the quality ah, 75 years ago, mahatma gandhi peacefully led the country to independence full of ideals with what has remained of his vision with what's the status of human rights and social justice in what's called the world more just democracy. where is india headed with? this is the moment to unleash on violet pass and re

imagine these teachings for relevance to us. gandhi's legacy starts january 20th on d, w. ah ah, oh. this is dw news life from berlin. germany is reportedly giving the green light to send battle tanks to ukraine. the u. s. is reportedly planning to do the same by sending its tanks to ukraine as well. also coming up, nominees for the oscars are out, will look at which films have the best.