THE AFRICAN COURIER. Reporting Africa and its Diaspora! The African Courier is an international magazine published in Germany to report on Africa and the Diaspora African experience. The first issue of the bimonthly magazine appeared on the newsstands on 15 February 1998. The African Courier is a communication forum for European-African political, economic and cultural exchanges, and a voice for Africa in Europe.
Ein Niederbayer im Senegal. Mein Leben zwischen zwei Welten (A Lower Bavarian in Senegal. My life between two worlds) is the story of Germany’s first TV star of African descendant and former member of the federal parliament, from his childhood in a village in Lower Bavaria to national prominence.
Charles Mohamed Huber, renowned for having been the first Black actor in a German TV-series, “Der Alte”, where he played the German-speaking inspector Henry Johnson, is a prominent citizen of this country.
When he was born (3 December 1956), Charles Huber’s mother named him Karl-Heinz. He spent his childhood in a village in Lower Bavaria with his grandmother. He later moved in with his mother to a suburban area of Munich.
Charles Huber left home at fifteen. Intelligent as he was, he did not find much success in the adverse environment. His career took a downward trend from high school to middle school, to an eventual dropout, and finally, to an apprenticeship without a diploma.
As a youth, he started off in the Hippie-movement in Bavaria’s capital. In his journey to his inner self, he variously dabbled into the drug scene and Eastern mythology, and changed his name to Charles, later adding Mohamed, to mark his then rather imagined links to his Senegalese background.
His father, Jean-Pierre Faye, a nephew of the first post-independent president of Senegal, Léopold Sédar Senghor, was a Senegalese who formerly worked as a diplomat but also starred in a German film. He was absent during Charles’ childhood and teenage years.
When Charles first went to Senegal at the age of 25, he was rather disappointed at first to discover another Paris in Dakar, and to see the Senegalese behave as if they were French.
Only much later did Charles Huber cross the bridge from the age of an angry, disoriented young Black man to an adult with an understanding for both sides, and with an unreserved view on different impressions of Africa, Senegal and other countries, which make up an intricate puzzle.
He finally came to identify with his Senegalese heritage, nurtured good contact with his Senegalese family and married a European African lady, who, thanks to her upbringing, has always been in touch with her African background and heritage.
Charles Mohamed Huber has made it. Now in his late sixties, he is at peace with himself and at peace with society.
Eleonore Wiedenroth-Coulibaly
- Title: Ein Niederbayer im Senegal. Mein Leben zwischen zwei Welten.
- Author: Charles M. Huber
- Publisher: Scherz-Verlag 04/2004
*** Charles Huber served as a member of the federal parliament from 2013 to 2017. His experience in German politics is however not covered in the book, which was published in 2004.
