Prince Charles Guest Edits Black UK Newspaper ‘The Voice’
Prince Charles has edited a British African-Caribbean newspaper, called The Voice, to commemorate the publication’s 40th anniversary.
According to the Associated Press, the Prince of Wales said he “was so touched” to have the opportunity. The edition will feature interviews with Idris Elba and Baroness Doreen Lawrence. The Baroness is the mother of Stephen Lawrence, who was murdered in 1993 by a gang of racists who beat him to death as he waited for a bus in South London. The killing led to an inquiry which concluded the Metropolitan Police was institutionally racist, as the investigation was plagued by allegations that the police looked to discret Lawrence and put forth a lackluster effort in the investigation of the attack.
Elba told The Voice for the article that a grant from Charles’ youth charity, The Prince’s Trust, “opened doors that changed my life” when he was 16 years old.
Baroness Lawrence describes in the edition a new partnership between the Stephen Lawrence Day Foundation and The Prince’s Foundation to provide applied arts scholarships for young people from diverse backgrounds affected by social and economic inequality, the AP reports.
“Over the last four decades, with all the enormous changes that they have witnessed, Britain’s only surviving black newspaper has become an institution and a crucial part of the fabric of our society,” Prince Charles said about being a guest editor. “This is why I was so touched to be invited to edit this special edition.”
Lester Holloway, The Voice’s editor, said of the edition: “Our readers may be surprised at the parallels between the issues which The Voice has campaigned on for four decades and the work the Prince of Wales has been involved in over the same period, often behind the scenes.”
He added, according to The Guardian: “In past decades these causes were once scorned and ridiculed, but today they are widely acknowledged.”