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ALGIERS: Beautiful, intelligent and talented, Baraka Merzaia, the young Algerian rising star is proving to be a true force of nature.
Those who don’t know her will soon find Baraka on their small screens, Arab News in French went to meet her to find out her story.
Originally from Adrar, in southern Algeria, the young artist based in Algiers collects several strings to her bow. A multifaceted artist, Merzaia is also endowed with an angelic voice. Discovered at the age of 16, she joined a choir where she learned to improve her voice.
Touch of everything and polyglot like the vast majority of young people of her generation, the young woman attracts attention across borders: in India, four years ago, when the country celebrated the 150th anniversary of the birth of Gandhi, the musician has won praise from Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi for her “memorable” rendition of “Vaishnava Jana To”, a hugely popular Hindu hymn “whose lyrics are imbued with an empathy” that Baraka wishes contagious.
Elected Miss Talent 2019, the young Sahrawi beauty multiplies modeling contracts. Just like her two sisters Ferdous and Amina, Baraka who incorporated herself into the picture a few years ago and who aspires to tread the international catwalks, seems to captivate the cameras.
Admiring the career of Somali-American model Halima Aden, who was the model to wear a hijab on the cover of Vogue and the first to wear a burkini in Sports Illustrated magazine, Baraka Merzaia, in turn, aims to break beauty stereotypes by remaining honest and faithful to his faith.
Also a student of Spanish language, the young woman, full of ambition, explains that her mother, to whom she is very close, holds a doctorate, which motivates her, in parallel with her artistic projects, to follow in her footsteps in pursuing higher education.
Of a particular beauty that does not fit into the classic criteria of the North African collective imagination, Baraka Merzaia nevertheless embodies, perhaps unconsciously, but with enormous elegance, an Algeria in need of representation.
Very attached to her faith, the young woman says she declined offers of partnerships with brands who asked her to remove her veil for a photo shoot.
“Many have considered that my veil is a fashion accessory, which is far from being the case, and I am convinced that I can carry out my projects without compromising my integrity”, explains the young woman.
Africanity and Algerianness
On the web, the singer, photo model, and recently become an actress shares with more than half a million subscribers her daily life and her artistic projects.
Far from political and racial claims, Baraka’s particularity seems to reside in the fact that she claims her Algerianness, her Africanness and her faith that she has been able to reconcile. It thus proves that far from being incompatible, these aspects of the Algerian identity complement each other.
At a time when young people sometimes tend to let themselves be impressed by everything that comes to them from abroad, the young woman demonstrates by her talent and her quiet strength that the Algerian identity, in addition to being plural and rich, ” still has a lot to offer and deserves to be discovered”.
Like many young people of his age, Baraka likes to share fragments of his daily life, but also his professional performances, especially in the field of modeling, music and art. His business is successful.
Merzaia says that one day, while visiting her hometown of Ain Salah, she decided to share moments of life specific to her region of origin, in southern Algeria.
“When I posted a video showing how we make kesra, a semolina pancake baked in sand, I was inundated with caring and curious messages from across the country asking me to share this kind of content. more frequent” marvels Baraka Merzaia.
This video, widely relayed on social networks, particularly by NWE, a media that has highlighted African culture in all its diversity, has thus avoided highlighting an often ignored facet of Algerian culture.
Currently accumulating more than 515,000 subscribers on Instagram and TikTok, the young woman explains that she sees on these platforms a way to discover the Algerian south that we do not usually see and, at the same time, breaks with the clichés concerning the inhabitants of the Sahara.
In 2006, a census estimated that the black community in Algeria made up about 5% of the national population, the lowest proportion of the Maghreb countries.
“I do not consider myself influential, nevertheless I aspire to participate in the influence of my culture, by sharing with the people who follow me, my faith and my culture, between modernism and tradition.” says Merzaia.
Outperforming and turned towards a future that looks bright, the one whose first name evokes divine blessing and beneficial influence aspires to a life worthy of her first name.