Flippter, AKA Loay Karim, embodies the spirit of the Sudanese Revolution in his latest music video, “Hatred”. Released on Feb. 16, the video has received over 67,000 views and 400 comments in just ten days.
The aforementioned revolution refers to a series of protests that have swept across Sudan since the mid-December against the corrupt regime of President Omar Al-Bashir. Over the past two months, the Sudanese government has responded to the peaceful demonstrations with excessive force, killing over 50 citizens and injuring hundreds more. Just as in previous protests in the young nation, art has been a major tool of expression. Among the countless political cartoons, documentaries, and visual art utilised by the youth-led movement and its sympathetic diaspora, songs like “Hatred” serve as manifestos for the people.
The rapper has rising to relative fame among Sudanese listeners through his parody video, “Shafata”, and his verse on Maha AJ’s “Salimmik”; however, this video is his most popular hit yet. This popularity can be accredited in part to his growing following and in part to this pivotal time in Sudanese history where a people whose voice, and music, has been suppressed are no longer content with foreign content. There has been a result surge in Sudanese rap music and its consumption online and, this song in particular, has become widely circulated in WhatsApp group chats.
This is not the first time that Flippter has included political messages in his videos, that generally serve as social commentaries through satire. However, this track contains element of realist, blatant outrage that is new for him.
In a 2017 interview with the hip hop blog RE-VOLT.com Flippter said his aim is for his music, “to earn respect locally first, then to prove to the Middle-East Hip-Hop artists and fans that Sudanese people have bars too and also to help solve our problems by developing our own industries instead of individual businesses with or without help from other countries because we are awesome.”
The lyrics of this track call out the Sudanese government for its deceptive rhetoric and misuse of government funds to slowly destroy the nation for the financial gain of a few. He also condemns the brutal treatment of protestors. Unlike the dozens of martyrs who were stopped by a bullet, however, Flippter continues to live and fight after receiving a shot to the head towards the end of the video: a symbol that the revolution cannot die.
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