Girls aloud, parents proud
TO many, words uttered by cherubic celebrity Mika Safiya can be encouraging and even life-saving, as attested by her father, Muhammad Danial Faris Khairul Anuar.
“There is this video we made, about her saying ‘Don’t be stressful, life is full of bad things, you need to smile and move forward’, something like that.
“And one of the comments we received was from a person who had apparently attempted to take his or her own life but stopped after watching that particular video. This person thanked us.
“I realised then that Mika’s videos are impactful and is contributing to society,” says the 34-year-old videographer.
Mika is among the many popular child influencers in this country making waves online. The six-year-old is known for her short videos dishing out motivational quotes, much to the amazement of her followers who comprise adults, teenagers and children.
However, Mika’s mother, Nur Nabila Ismail, 33, concedes that with the popularity, comes a risk that could threaten her daughter’s safety and privacy. She says, for instance, the family in not big on produc“if ing videos about Mika’s daily lifestyle routine or livestreaming.
“We don’t really produce videos on her daily lifestyle routine. We don’t livestream or update people on her current location.
“There are people who ask in the comments where Mika is or say they want to meet her, and so forth. Some of her fans really want to follow her [life updates].”
A fan got a little too close for comfort once, says Nabila, after a trip to Legoland.
“Once after a trip to Legoland, a fan, who thought she was still there, wanted to know how long she would be around, her accommodation and so forth. we do go out,
we will only post about the trip in the next two or three days. No live updates.
“She is a child and we want to keep her safe,” says Nabila.
Muhammad Danial says Mika also knows how to keep her boundaries when approached by strangers in public.
“She is a really friendly child. But Mika will always ask us for permission before talking to other people.”
And while Mika is popular for her delivery of motivational quotes, another “kidfluencer” has moved on to become a teenage singer – Alyssa Dezek is making the rounds collaborating with big name celebrities, including Azwan Ali.
Starting her journey to stardom at the tender age of five, the singer, now 16, became one of the top earners among her peers after raking in US$100,000 (RM479,000 at today’s exchange rates) a month when she was 12.
Her meteoric rise, however, came under fire in 2020 when some critics accused her parents of milking Alyssa’s success after the girl made headlines for buying a luxury MPV.
Her mother, Suzanne Sahri Dezek, however, responded by saying that Alyssa had wanted to buy the vehicle for a comfortable ride between shoots.
She says her husband and Alyssa’s father, Hafidz Dezek, is an airline captain and does not need to rely on his daughter’s income.