The Life of the Super-Rich in Central Africa
Gambia, Please Open The Doors to Your Family Vol. 2 Issue 35, 23th – 29th April 2021
Daniel
Kaluuya “
Everything Comes Back Around If It’s Not Put To Rest
”
in conjunction with
Credit: code.likeagirl.io
Editor’s desk The Emperor’s New Clothes - fairytale, allegorical Collective ignorance of an obvious fact, or deception, despite undeniable evidence.
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ustice mustn’t be just done, but it must be seen to be done, the operative word being seen. In the recent Derek Chauvin trial for the murder of George Floyd, the presence of the TV cameras made sure that everyone worldwide could watch what was happening live. It also meant that the news media could not selectively decide what it tells the public. Secondly, whatever one might say about smartphones and social media, if Danella had not filmed and broadcast live what was happening at the time, vital evidence, which cannot be tampered with, would not have been available to the prosecution. And thirdly, like the child in Hans Christian Anderson’s fairytale the story of
The UK commemorated Stephen Lawrence Day on April 22. How much has policing changed since Stephen’s Murder?
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t does not matter your opinion about British Royalty; The loss of a husband after 73 years of marriage is both a tremendous achievement and bitterly painful. To lose him during a pandemic is a double whammy that thousands of people across the world have had to endure. Paul says, I now realise how true it is that God does not show favouritism. Acts 10.34 NIV
Credit: The Fairytaler – Hans Christian Anderson
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the Emperors’ new clothes where he innocently states the obvious, “he has no clothes on”. A nineyear-old witness said she heard paramedics say, “Get off of him.”
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ll eyes are on justice now for Duante Wright, a 20-yearold AfricanAmerican man, who fatally shot by police officer Kimberly Ann Potter during a traffic stop. Police said that Potter meant to use her Taser but accidentally grabbed her gun.
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From the
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Welcome to the Disruptor
To be a disruptor in business is to create a product, service, or way of doing things which displaces the existing market leaders and eventually replaces them at the helm of the sector. [`the disruptor]
Less Talk More Action
The Life of the Super-Rich
in Central Africa Credit: DW Documentary
The Democratic Republic of Congo
The Gambia! Open the Doors to your Family Together We Can Grow.
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any millionaires live in the Democratic Republic of Congo, one of the world’s poorest countries. This film depicts some of those who have made fortunes amid the chaos, including musicians, mining bosses, entrepreneurs and preachers. The DRC is rich in raw materials, but only a few profit from its natural resources. While 60% of Congo’s inhabitants live on less than $1.25 per day, business people, artists, former rebel leaders and evangelists are reaping the rewards of economic growth. In the capital, Kinshasa, these new rich live in safe and luxurious enclaves, while children toil in coltan mines in the eastern part of the country. Fally Ipupa has made his money with music. Others rely on their business acumen, like Patricia Nzolantima, who founded a taxi company and aims to give more opportunities to women. With 3,000 mine workers, Cooperamma is the largest employer in North Kivu, in the east of the DRC. Managing director Robert Seninga says his coltan mines are extremely well-run, yet safety standards are poor. Coltan, a globally coveted mineral, is used in cell phones and other devices. It’s both a blessing and a curse for the Congo. It makes some rich, but for others, it means death. The region still suffers from ethnic and factional conflicts, with money from illegal coltan smuggling financing new violence. It’s a vicious cycle. Transform your viewing...
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Cover
Story
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Daniel
Kaluuya “Everything comes back around if it’s not put to rest”
W
By Bob Chaundy
hether or not Daniel Kaluuya walks away with the Best Supporting Actor prize at the Oscars next week – and there’s a good chance he will– the British actor is on the crest of a wave. His performance as the Black revolutionary socialist Fred Hampton in Judas and the Black Messiah has been described as “mesmerising” and “barnstorming”. It has already won him a BAFTA, a Golden Globe and a Screen Actor’s Guild Award. BAFTA was right when they chose him as their Rising Star winner in 2018, the only actor of colour to win anything that year. This success is not bad for a working-class kid who, as a child, spent two years in hostels before moving to a council estate in London’s Camden, which he once described as “a dark place with a drug problem”. His parents were from Uganda, and his father returned there and rarely visited the UK, leaving Daniel and his older sister to be brought up by his mother, Damalie. Daniel was, by all accounts, a loud and boisterous lad, and Damalie put him down for an after-school drama class in order to channel his energies into something positive. By the age of nine, he had written a play about two men working in McDonalds. It won a prize and was performed at Hampstead Theatre. It was a sign that further success would follow. A talent spotter at the theatre, Sally Hughes, recommended him for the Channel 4 series
Skins. His part, Posh Kenneth, was only supposed to appear in one episode, but thanks to the quality of Kaluuya’s performance, he became a permanent fixture. Before long, he was writing full hour-long episodes. He was still at school. He secured parts in lots of TV shows after that, including Dr Who, Silent Witness, and Lewis, but his next big break came again in theatre. His performance in Sucker Punch at the Royal Court Theatre won him several awards. It was lauded for his energy and bravery by the film director Steve McQueen who subsequently cast him in his movie Widows. The play concerned two young black boxers who a racist white trainer trained. He had to lose three stone to play the part. Kaluuya blamed endemic racism for his difficulties in securing mainstream roles in British TV, along with a paucity of challenging roles. Like many British black actors before him, such as Idris Elba, David Oyelowo and David Harewood, he achieved his breakthrough in America. He got parts in movies such as Kick-Ass 2 and Sicario. Transform your viewing...
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After he had appeared in an episode of Charlie Brooker’s Black Mirror series, which gained great popularity Stateside when it was featured on Netflix, Kaluuya’s charisma was spotted by director Jordan Peele. The latter cast him in his horror movie, Get Out. “Masterful” and “brilliant” were just two of the recurring descriptions of his performance here, and he was showered with Best Actor nominations from all the awards givers. The sense of injustice that Kaluuya brought to the role was borne of personal experience. In 2013, he had been pulled off a London bus by police officers on the spurious grounds that he had been acting suspiciously. He subsequently sued the Met. 6 Transform your viewing...
Get Out tackled racial issues when his character has to confront older, rich white people’s prejudices. His next role was as W’Kabi in the Marvel super-hero movie Black Panther which was the first to have a predominantly black cast and the first movie of its type to gain a Best Picture nomination. Then, in Queen and Slim, a kind of romantic road movie played opposite Jodie Turner-Smith, the plot revolves around a scene in which a policeman searches the boot of the couple’s car with no good reason other than suspected racism. When Kaluuya’s character shoots the policeman dead in self-defence, they dare not report it knowing that as people of colour, they wouldn’t be believed. In Judas and the Black Messiah, based on a true story, Kaluuya’s character, the charismatic Fred Hampton, is murdered in his bed by the FBI in 1969 at the age of 21, having been informed on by the Judas of the title played by LaKeith Stanfield. These are movies that echo current issues surrounding race in modern America, and it’s the challenging relevance that attracts Kaluuya to the parts. “If it doesn’t speak to me, I can’t do it”, he has said. Of Hampton, he says, “Him as a man speaks to my spirit.” The film has captured the zeitgeist of black feeling in America at the time of the resurgence of the Black Lives Matter movement amid the deaths of the likes of George Floyd. “Everything comes back around if it’s not put to rest”, said Kaluuya. Beyond the driven sense of anger at injustice that permeates his latest work lies a dedication to his craft. For example, in preparation for his role as Fred Hampton, he read a list of books over six weeks that the Black Panthers were required to do in order to join the movement. He spoke to ex-members and, to achieve the force of rhetoric for which Hampton was famous, employed an opera coach, held sessions singing Gospel and James Brown songs, and would stay in accent all day even when not on set. It’s a work ethic that he attributes to the influence of his mother, which has helped him navigate his way from the humble beginnings in Camden to the glitz of Hollywood.
Freedom
Is Mine
By FAYIDA JAILLER
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Denmark
he population of Denmark is almost six million, of which reportedly less than 2% are black. That’s less than 120,000 people. Denmark was the seventh-largest trading nation during the Transatlantic Slave Trade. Denmark had three colonial territories in the Caribbean which were the islands of St Croix, St John and St Thomas. These islands were occupied by Europeans from 1666 to 1917, when Denmark sold them to the United States and they became known as the US Virgin Islands. During the slavery era Denmark trafficked over 100,000 enslaved Africans to those islands, which at the time were referred to as the Danish West Indies. This came to an end in 1848 when Denmark abolished slavery. One of the most famous Afro-Danish figures from history is Hans Jonathon. He was born in 1784 on the Caribbean island of St Croix. When Hans Jonathan was seven, his masters took him to Copenhagen where he fought with the Danish navy. When his masters tried to reclaim him and take him back to St Croix, Hans Jonathan took his masters to court. Sadly, the court ruled against him and ordered him to return to St Croix. Instead he fled to Iceland where he settled in the small village of Djupivogur, married a local woman, had children, and lived as a free man until his death in 1827. Victor Cornelins was born on the island of Saint Croix in 1898. Along with a little girl, Alberta Roberts, Victor was transported to Denmark in 1905, when he was seven years old and Alberta was just four, to participate in a colonial exhibition in Copenhagen.
Victor Cornelins and Alberta Roberts by BT
Black Lives Matter Denmark Protest by Thomas Birkekaer
After the exhibition, the children were sent to a school for orphans. Albert sadly died of tuberculosis in 1917. Victor remained in Denmark and went on to embark on an illustrious 55-year career as a music teacher. In 2018 Denmark the unveiled the first statue in the country to commemorate a black woman. The statue is called ‘I am Queen Mary’ and honours Mary Thomas, who, in the 19th century, led the largest labour revolt in Danish colonial history on the island of St Croix. The sculpture was created by the Danish artist Jeannette Ehlers and Virgin Islander La d’s Painting of Otto Marstran Vaughn Belle. Mary’s pose y, nn na daughters and their was inspired by the 1967 Justina 1857. photograph of Huey P Newton, by Wilhelm Marstrand the founder of the Black Panther Party. Black Live Matter Denmark was founded in 2016 by activist Bwalya Sørensen. The movement gained traction in 2020 following the murder of AfricanAmerican George Floyd which sparked protests worldwide. The largest protest was held on June 7th in the capital Copenhagen, which drew a crowd of 15,000 people.
I am Queen Mary by Tripadvisor
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Cinema/Video
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n o s ’ t a h
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Them
A Black family moves to an all-white Los Angeles neighbourhood where malevolent forces, next door and otherworldly, threaten to taunt, ravage and destroy them. Drama, Horror, thriller. Credit: Amazon Prime
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The Immense Weight of Playing Jesus
We haven’t shown any “behind the scenes” footage or interviews with Jonathan Roumie, the actor who plays Jesus in The Chosen. We wanted to protect from distraction the experience of watching Jesus in the show, and we recognize it’s a delicate issue for many viewers. But recently our director Dallas sat down with Jonathan for an exclusive conversation that digs deep into the experience and pressure of portraying Jesus for a worldwide show.
The Chosen – Part 2
Haven’t seen The Chosen? Don’t watch this trailer! We encourage you to catch up on Season One fast, because we can’t promise the millions who will watch Season Two won’t reveal spoilers. So stop what you’re doing and go “binge Jesus,” as we like to say. Credit: The Chosen 10 Transform your viewing...
MVP Animation Short Film Inspired by Kobe Bryant
The basketball champ is fighting with his most terrible enemy, with himself. MVP Animation is a short movie about overcoming our weaknesses and fighting against the barriers we usually face ourselves. We decide to use 28 number because it’s just an inspiration. For us, everyone can be a black mamba. It’s not just a name or number, it’s how you choose to live, and how you became your best version of yourself. Credit: Fumi Studio Transform your viewing...
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Like Mike
Credit: Movieclips Classic Trailers
Blue Chips
Championship winning coach Pete Bell (Nick Nolte) runs the cleanest program in collegiate basketball. However, when he finds himself on the brink of his first losing season, Bell decides he must make risky trades to protect his job. Credit: ATSC TV 12 Transform your viewing...
Central Park…. Credit: Apple TVB
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Passing Strange. Spike Lee
I PASSING STRANGE THE MOVIE is the Spike Lee-directed film featuring the award-winning Broadway rock musical, Passing Strange. The Broadway show won the Tony Award in 2008 for Best Book of a Musical and in total received seven Tony nominations, including Best Musical. “Passing Strange” was universally applauded for its originality, its deep emotional resonance, and its powerful, often high-octane, music. Credit:IFCFirstTake 14 Transform your viewing...
In the Heights
A Washington Heights: say it, so it doesn’t disappear. #InTheHeightsMovie - in theaters and streaming exclusively on @HBOMax* June 18. The creator of “Hamilton” and the director of “Crazy Rich Asians” invite you to a cinematic event, where the streets are made of music and little dreams become big... “In the Heights.” Lights up on Washington Heights...The scent of a cafecito caliente hangs in the air just outside of the 181st Street subway stop, where a kaleidoscope of dreams rallies this vibrant and tight-knit community. At the intersection of it all is the likeable, magnetic bodega owner Usnavi (Anthony Ramos), who saves every penny from his daily grind as he hopes, imagines and sings about a better life. “In the Heights” fuses Lin-Manuel Miranda’s kinetic music and lyrics with director Jon M. Chu’s lively and authentic eye for storytelling to capture a world very much of its place, but universal in its experience. Credit: Warner Bros. Transform your viewing...
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No Regrets – Full Romantic Comedy Movie
After 12 years with her college sweetheart (and none before him), Nina meets a divorced man at her hotel during her 36 hour layover as air-hostess and spends time with him, his daughter and his ex. **This film is under license from Vision Films Inc. All rights reserved** Credit Movie Central
Spencer Confidential
I The law has limits. They don’t. When two Boston Police officers are murdered, ex-cop Spenser (Mark Wahlberg) teams up with his no-nonsense roommate, Hawk (Winston Duke), to take down criminals in this action-comedy. Directed by Peter Berg (Lone Survivor), Spenser Confidential stars Mark Wahlberg (The Fighter), Winston Duke (Us), Alan Arkin (Argo), Iliza Shlesinger and Austin Post. Credit:Netflix 16 Transform your viewing...
Godfather of Harlem Season 1 Trailer Credit:Rotten Tomatoes TV
Forest Whitaker On Bumpy Johnson Portrayal In ‘Godfather Of Harlem’, Malcolm X Relationship + More Credit: Breakfast Club Power 105.1 FM Transform your viewing...
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Black
Arts
Jacolby Satterwhite 18 Transform your viewing...
Jacolby Satterwhite is a man of the future. By Efosa Osaghae
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he video artists we have featured thus far are conventional in their approaches to film. While video art is inherently experimental, many video artists adhere to standardised filming practices. The subversion lies in the subject matter, as seen in the works of Isaac Julien and Steve Mcqueen. Jacolby isn’t like the rest. His work completely eschews normalised methods in favour of pure experimentation and synergy between new technology and storytelling. Satterwhite’s work is at the intersection of drawing, programming, video and many more disciplines that shouldn’t work together but do. His films are inaccessible insofar as entertainment ranks quite far down on his list of priorities. At 35 years old, he’s the youngest artist to feature on this list and it shows. His work incorporates many of the new media technologies to rise in prominence within the last 20 years such as 3D animation and video game culture. This aesthetic is evidently prominent in one of his most recent works: Have No Head which is a collaboration between him. The music video features 3D dancing video girls in a completely virtual environment. Interspersed between the 3D environment are clips of real-life performers as Satterwhite creates a stage between reality and the alternate.
The 1975 - Having No Head The collaboration is a clear marker of his performative aesthetic that combines the virtual and real through theatricality. This ‘constructed theatricality’ posits the question of not only what performance is but what it can be. The landscape of media is ever-changing and artists like Satterwhite explore where new media can take us.
Satterwhite has had worked featured in the following museums Whitechapel Gallery, London (2019); the Museum of Modern Art, New York (2019); the Minneapolis Institute of Art (2019); the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago (2018); Fondation Louis Vuitton, Paris (2018); New Museum, New York (2017); Public Art Fund, New York (2017); San Francisco Museum of Art, San Francisco (2017); and the Institute of Contemporary Art, Philadelphia (2017). Transform your viewing...
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iChurch
Society Is Judged By How It Treats Its Least Fortunate
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t a fundraising dinner for a school that serves children with learning disabilities, the father of one of the students delivered a speech. ‘When not interfered with by outside influences, everything nature does is done with perfection. Yet my son, Shay, cannot learn things as other children do. He cannot understand things as other children do. The father continued. ‘I believe that when a child like Shay, who was mentally and physically disabled, comes into the world, an opportunity to realize true human nature presents itself, and it comes in the way other people treat that child.’ Shay and I had walked past a park where some boys Shay knew were playing baseball. Shay asked, ‘Do you think they’ll let me play?’ I knew that most of the boys would not want someone like Shay on their team, but as a father, I also understood that if my son were allowed to play, it would give him a much-needed sense of belonging and confidence. I approached one of the boys on the field and asked (not expecting much) if Shay could play. The boy looked around for guidance and said, ‘We’re losing by six runs, and the game is in the eighth inning. I guess he can be on our team, and we’ll try to put him in to bat in the ninth innings.’ Shay struggled over to the team’s bench and, with a broad smile, put on a team shirt. I watched with a small tear in my eye and warmth in my heart. The boys saw my joy at my son being accepted. At the bottom of the eighth inning, Shay’s team scored a few runs but was still behind three. At the top of the ninth inning, Shay put on a glove and played in the right field. Even though no hits came his way, he was ecstatic just to be in the game and on the field, grinning from ear to ear as I waved to him from the stands. In the bottom of the ninth inning, Shay’s team scored again. With two outs and the bases loaded, the potential winning run was on base, and Shay was next at-bat. At this juncture, do they let Shay bat and give away their chance to win the game? Surprisingly, Shay was given the bat. Everyone knew that a hit was all but impossible because Shay didn’t even know how to hold the bat properly, much less connect with the ball. However, as Shay stepped up to the plate, the pitcher, recognizing that the other team was putting winning aside for this moment in Shay’s life, moved in a few steps to lob the ball in softly so Shay could at least make contact.
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The first pitch came, and Shay swung clumsily and missed. The pitcher again took a few steps forward to toss the ball softly towards Shay. Shay swung at the ball as the pitch came in and hit a slow ground ball right back to the pitcher. The game would now be over. The pitcher picked up the soft grounder and could have easily thrown the ball to the first baseman. Shay would have been out, and that would have been the end of the game. Instead, the pitcher threw the ball right over the first baseman’s head, out of reach of all teammates. Everyone from the stands and both teams started yelling, ‘Shay, run to first! Never in his life had Shay ever run that far, but he made it to first base. He scampered down the baseline, wide-eyed and startled. Everyone yelled, ‘Run to second, run to second!’ Catching his breath, Shay awkwardly ran towards second, gleaming and struggling to make it to the base. By the time Shay rounded towards second base, the right fielder had the ball. The smallest guy on their team now had his first chance to be the hero for his team. He could have thrown the ball to the secondbaseman for the tag, but he understood the pitcher’s intentions, so he, too, intentionally threw the ball high and far over the third-baseman’s head. Shay ran toward third base deliriously as the runners ahead of him circled the bases toward home. All were screaming, ‘Shay, Shay, Shay, all the Way Shay.’ Shay reached third base because the opposing shortstop ran to help him by turning him in the direction of third base and shouted, ‘Run to third! As Shay rounded third, the boys from both teams, and the spectators, were on their feet screaming, ‘Shay, run home! Run home!’ Shay ran to home, stepped on the plate, and was cheered as the hero who hit the grand slam and won the game for his team ‘That day, said the father softly with tears now rolling down his face, ‘the boys from both teams helped bring a piece of true love and humanity into this world’. Shay didn’t make it to another summer. He died that winter, having never forgotten being the hero and making me so happy, and coming home and seeing his Mother tearfully embrace her little hero of the day!
Laughter
Credit: The Star/Jamaica
The Backhand Slap!
Let’s make a car
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Last Word Woody Belfort
ASPIRE TO INSPIRE
