Even as a child growing up, Ramiz King had an unwavering mission. In the backdrop of early 2000s Queensland, Australia, the skinny 9-year-old originally from Kabul was determined to challenge the odds stacked against him and render his fledgling dream into glittering technicolor reality.
He was going to be famous.
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“I didn’t really have significant talent. I couldn’t sing and I couldn’t act properly or anything at that age but I still used to ‘record videos’ with a hand-held mirror,” Ramiz told VICE World News.
Back then, he thought those were skills he needed to be famous. “I used to be so naive.”
Soon, Ramiz traded his basic camera for a professional one and embraced the times. Now a producer and well-known reality TV star with a glamorous lifestyle, he is even more dedicated to his mission. But he is facing an unlikely foe: the Taliban.
Ramiz has been receiving threats from the fundamentalist armed group that now runs Afghanistan for starring in a reality TV show with his model-actress sister Rohina. The show, titled West Ta East, is inspired by Keeping Up With The Kardashians and is partly filmed and set to air in Afghanistan.
“They have been saying that the futures of our production team are at risk, and if I continue to do the show, then I will be at risk too,” said Ramiz. “They are assuming that the show will be similar to the Kardashians’ in terms of sex and nudity.”
Also reminiscent of Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie’s show The Simple Life, West Ta East will feature the King siblings as they transition from their lives of luxury as socialites in Australia to working blue collar jobs in Afghanistan. The show will document the siblings’ adventures inside rural communities, while also depicting their everyday lives, controversies, relationships and challenges.
“It will show a lot of liberation in every aspect, with a female-dominated household where the women work hard and are the breadwinners,” Ramiz said.
Ramiz and the show’s production team have received phone calls from private numbers in Afghanistan from individuals identifying themselves as the Taliban. Since the show’s crew began filming its second season in the country in 2019, they have received a number of threats for promoting “Westernized values” and for the dominant role of the show’s female lead, Rohina.
“The reason they want to threaten us is because I have a voice. I am confident, and I can talk about anything in front of the camera. And that’s what they don’t like. They don’t like women expressing themselves,” Rohina told VICE World News.
“When a woman speaks up with all her heart, people are actually lifted and can feel the vibrations of that powerful feminine energy. That’s what [the Taliban] are afraid of. They don’t want me to pass on a message to the next generation of girls that they can be confident in themselves.”
The Taliban’s return to power in Afghanistan has seen a sweeping crackdown on the country’s media, entertainment and performing arts industries. A wide number of journalists, celebrities, musicians and artists have fled the country for fear of harsh repercussions. Under the current regime, the country’s media workers have been facing pervasive censorship and the risk of punitive violence.
In November, the Taliban government’s Vice and Virtue Ministry issued a directive prohibiting female actors from appearing in TV dramas. The guidelines require female journalists to wear the hijab. Films deemed as being “against Islamic or Afghan values” are banned.
“Unfortunately, it’s a very bad policy, which will negatively affect Afghanistan’s media outlook,” Zan TV president and founder Hamid Samar told VICE World News. “The ones who remain in the country are not safe and are trying to change jobs as a result.”
Rohina worries that the Taliban’s restrictive policies will ultimately stifle the country’s creative talent.
“Right now, all we have is conflict or sadness. We have a lot of talented people out there who want to create positive content for Afghanistan. We are a beautiful country. We are a beautiful people. We are talented, but we can’t [display it] right now because of the Taliban,” said Rohina.
Most of West Ta East’s production staff have left Afghanistan. As a direct result of the threats, one of the show’s last crew members still in the country recently fled to the United States.
Despite this, the show is set to air in the fall of 2022 on a music streaming offshoot of the Afghan television station TOLO TV. Ramiz hopes that it will offer hope to young Afghans seeking an escape from the harsh realities of everyday life in Afghanistan’s current social climate.
“In a way, it’s ignorant that I’m asking them to forget their sorrows for a few minutes with my show, but then I feel like it’s important for young people to see a potential future there, – if someone can watch the show and think, ‘If this guy wants to be a big star, maybe I could be, too, one day,” said Ramiz.
Follow Rimal Farrukh on Twitter.
