Blackface skit in new year gala

SHANGHAI: A skit on China’s widely-watched Lunar New Year gala on state television featuring a Chinese actress made up to appear African has provoked accusations of racism online.

The actress, Lou Naiming, appeared on stage in colourful garb with her face and arms coloured brown, carrying a fruit basket on her head, and accompanied by someone costumed as a monkey.

A black woman playing her daughter declares that she wants to study in China but is worried her mother will not agree.

Lou replies, “Why wouldn’t I agree? A Chinese volunteer medical team saved my life when I was young. Now Chinese kids are building a railroad for us... I love Chinese people. I love China!”

The Internet lit up with criticism after the show aired on Thursday night, the eve of Lunar New Year.

“The racial discrimination was so clear,” wrote one microblogger, who goes by the name Chen Fei Tutu.

“Is this our nation propagating Chinese values? When white people discriminate against us, we are strongly dissatisfied, but now we are discriminating against Africans in such high profile. How shameful.”

China’s foreign ministry did not immediately respond to a request on Friday seeking comment on the racism allegations.

On its Weibo microblog, online information platform Tutopia said, “Imagine if it was a white person in blackface saying in an exaggerated accent, ‘I love America,’ and not being blasted by the whole world.”

Others declared the sketch, aired during the “CCTV Spring Festival