Protest music

A band that calls itself 99 is spreading awareness through music.

The four-member band says they are the voice of 99 percent of people in the country. Since everything in Afghanistan from politics to social issues

A band that calls itself 99 is spreading awareness through music.

The four-member band says they are the voice of 99 percent of people in the country. Since everything in Afghanistan from politics to social issues is controlled by one percent of the population, their mission, they explain, is to empower the majority. Their songs are about protest and raising awareness to educate and inspire people to solve their own problems and to live in happiness.

The first time the band played in public was at a meeting in March to remember Farkhunda on her first death anniversary. The young woman who had been lynched by a group of men near a shrine by the Kabul River has become a rallying point for people from varied backgrounds, particularly the young.

99’s band members are all under 18. Sixteen-year-old Arsan says the group’s goal is to eliminate violence like what happened to Farkhunda by raising levels of awareness in society. “Our main goal is to inform people about freedom, the rights of women and children, sensitive social issues and the dangerous fallout of clashes between people and communities,” he says.

Arsan has great faith in music’s capacity to educate and heal old wounds.

Qudratullah is the group’s trumpeter. He feels people do not respect the rights of women in society. If they paid attention to rights of women, they would not face “so many problems”. “We give awareness regarding rights of women. We show people that a woman is a sister, mother and lady. If there were no women, remember we too would not exist,” he says. Meanwhile, Mohsen plays the clarinet, an instrument that is unfamiliar to lovers of traditional Afghan music, while Najib plays a wooden instrument called kakhann, which originated in prisons in Africa.

The four band members are students at the Afghanistan National Institute of Music, an institute of classical music for young people, both girls and boys. It has a symphony orchestra that has played at some of the world’s most important venues like the Kennedy Centre in Washington and Royal Festival Hall in London.

99 intends to travel with their music to all Afghan provinces, and one day even abroad.