A rapper calls for violence against police officers, an activist posts: "Every cop is a pig". Both were working for an educational project to teach Berlin schoolchildren about migration history. Funding from the federal government: half a million euros.
Ilhan44 wears a black cap with a curved visor, he has his eyes wide open, gesticulates wildly. The footage of the young man is repeatedly interrupted by scenes showing riots between demonstrators and police officers.
Ilhan44 raps, “Fuck a cop, hit him on the head, Dikka and then run, Lure him into the blocks, Trap him all with the gang, Throw the Molotovs, Give the little piggy a present, Look he ain’t no god, What use is the armour when he’s on fire?”
The music video for the anti-police song “Gaijin” has around 10,000 views on Youtube. Anyone who sees the sombre clip will find it hard to imagine that Ilhan44 was a team member of an educational project in real life – and worked with children and young people in Berlin schools, funded by the German government.
“Kiez:Story” is the name of the project, which has received more than 530,000 euros from the “Demokratie Leben” programme of the Federal Ministry for Family Affairs over the past three years. The aim of the model project is “to motivate young people to deal with the stories of their families and with the traces of migration in their social space”, it says on the website of “Demokratie Leben” about “Kiez:Story”. The project is supported by the Berlin-based association Ufuq.
Ilhan44, whose real name is Ilhan H., worked here as a “teamer”. He is still listed on the website of “Kiez:Story”. It is not known when he started working there. Only this much can be found out: An archived version of the website from May 2021 does not yet show Ilhan H. as a staff member. From this we can conclude: He was active for the project even after the release of the song “Gaijin” in March 2021. His attitude towards the executive could therefore have been known to those responsible.
According to information on the website, H. worked at the Walter Gropius School in Neukölln, and his “speciality” was rap.
When asked, Ufuq co-manager Canan Korucu explained that H. was no longer working for the project. In any case, all the “young team members” are not employed by the organisation, but work as freelancers on a fee basis. “We find the statements quoted by you disturbing and worrying,” Korucu said. They contradict the self-image of the association as well as the demands on political education. And they are not compatible with the educational goals and standards of the project.
The rapper himself has spoken out about his controversial song in the past. He told the rap magazine “Mzee” that his lyrics were not meant literally. The line “Hit him on the head” is more like the saying “hit him on the head”. Nevertheless, Ilhan H. said he found “violence towards the executive justified”. After all, “every interaction” with the police is “somehow unpleasant”. “Even if the officers are nice and try to behave themselves.
Violence against the police is for Ilhan44 a recurring motif. The cover of his EP “110”, released last October, features a skull drawn on a sword. Maggots crawl in the eye sockets of the skull. The skeleton is wearing a police cap.
Another former team member of “Kiez:Story” has attracted attention in recent days with hate speech against the police. The activist, who belongs to the left-wing alliance Migrantifa in Berlin and calls herself a freelance journalist, wrote on Instagram about police violence: “ACAB means every cop is a pig because Germany is a pig. Abolitionism means take off the uniform and kill the cop in your head before you want to talk about justice and being human. (…) Fuck this state and its henchmen.” She is still listed as a team member on the “Kiez:Story” website.
The activist is also no longer working for “Kiez:Story”, Korucu affirms. Statements like the ones quoted were never made in the context of the project – “neither during the pedagogical work with young people nor in the course of the qualification”. An evaluation accompanying the project guarantees compliance with pedagogical standards.
In response to a question, the Federal Ministry for Family Affairs initially only stated that the rapper Ilhan H. and the activist were “not employed within the framework of the project “Kiez:Story”, which is funded by the federal programme ” Live Democracy! ” For the rest, the following applies to all initiatives funded with federal money: “All funding recipients support the free democratic basic order.
After a request for reconsideration, it says: Both had been employed on a fee basis in the project at least in 2021 and/or 2020. It was the responsibility of the grant recipient to ensure that its employees were committed to the democratic constitutional order.