Afghan Star: 'X Factor' on a knife-edge
The big finale of Afghanistan’s answer to The X Factor is live on Tolo TV right now. It’s the Noruz New Year weekend there and thanks to an electricity deal a couple of months ago with neighbouring Uzbekistan, there should be enough juice to beat last year’s viewing record of 11-million Afghans.
The final 10 (out of 2,000) contestants in Afghan Star – the vast, vast majority of whom are men – are voted in by a panel of judges. Then it’s down to mobile phones and democracy in action. This year’s host is an airline flight attendant called Omid Nezami – a contestant in last year’s controversial show.
The 2008 show drew the opprobrium of the mullahs after one finalist, a young woman from Herat, dared to dance as she sang her final song. The Islamic Council has since convinced the Afghan government to prohibit all dancing on TV.
The controversy didn’t end there though. A British-made film, also called Afghan Star, which documented last year’s show, won two awards at the Sundance Film Festival two months ago.
The host of the actual show, former Taliban-era undercover TV repairman Daoud Siddiqi, was invited to receive the gongs. He shared the stage with the film’s director, Havana Marking, whom I’ve just interviewed.
After the Sundance celebrations ended, each went their own way, and Havana bade Daoud farewell, before he caught his plane to Kabul. Only thing is, Daoud – by now the most famous Afghan – never caught his plane home. He disappeared in Salt Lake City and we’re expecting him to pop up some time soon, seeking political asylum in America.
Havana’s take on this is that it’s all a pretty sad indictment of just how bad things have got now in Afghanistan.
There’d been such hope vested in this programme, hope of national unity, hope that people could once again have fun in a land where the Talibs not so long ago banned music.
“It shows how vulnerable the country is,” she told me. “Afghanistan is on a knife-edge.” If you catch my report tonight, or better still, the documentary, just enjoy it for the feel-good film it is, depicting Afghanistan the country, not the war.
– This year’s Afghan Star finalists in action:
– UPDATE: the Channel 4 News video report on Afghan Star is here.
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