Speaker 1: Two weeks ago, in the evening, twenty four year old
Speaker 1: Natan Muanza was on a bus in Melbourne, Southwest. He
Speaker 1: was allegedly approached by two other young men, followed and
Speaker 1: eventually stabbed and killed. His death has sparked an outpouring
Speaker 1: of grief from the Australian Congolese community, many of whom
Speaker 1: have fled violence in their home country. Writer historian and
Speaker 1: filmmaker Santilla Genape also felt the impact of Natan's death
Speaker 1: and set about trying to understand what had happened back
Speaker 1: It soon became a story about how we write and
Speaker 1: report on crime and how black lives are treated in
Speaker 1: the media. From Schwartz Media. I'm Ruby Jones. This is
Speaker 1: seven AM today, santillagen Garpe on the life of Natan
Speaker 1: Mwanza and how black grief is rendered invisible. It's Thursday,
Speaker 1: March sixth Santila. Natan Muanza was killed two weeks ago.
Speaker 1: You've been speaking to his family in the wake of
Speaker 1: his death. To begin with, tell me what they told
Speaker 1: you about him and.
Speaker 2: Who he was.
Speaker 3: So I spoke to his uncle Tresor, who described Natana's
Speaker 3: this gentle giant. You know he was about six foot three,
Speaker 3: the second of six siblings.
Speaker 4: Gentle Giant is someone that respect or very reserved. Obviously,
Speaker 4: if you got to know him, then you'll, you know,
Speaker 4: you get to realize the bovely.
Speaker 5: Side of him.
Speaker 3: But Natana and his family moved to Australia actually from
Speaker 3: the Democratic Republic of the Congo when he was seven,
Speaker 3: and they settled here in Melbourne, and Tresor says that,
Speaker 3: you know, when he arrived, he loved playing soccer and
Speaker 3: so he used to take him to soccer practice when
Speaker 3: he was a kid. And there was a point when
Speaker 3: Tresor thought that Natan might actually turn professional and play
Speaker 3: soccer as a career. But eventually he ended up becoming
Speaker 3: a model and quite successful. Actually he featured in campaigns
Speaker 3: for brands like Nike and Champion, and yeah, he was
Speaker 3: much loved by his family. He was regarded as someone
Speaker 3: who was quite respectful. He had a very close bond
Speaker 3: with all of his siblings and his dad as well,
Speaker 3: So yeah, he was clearly very beloved.
Speaker 4: We never heard a fly us love kids. He always
Speaker 4: loved hanging out, eye in all, playing with siblings and
Speaker 4: things like that. So just God or give his shit off.
Speaker 4: His back to give us homemone.
Speaker 1: And so what do we know about what actually happened
Speaker 1: to Natan on the day that he died.
Speaker 3: So it's a legend that Natan was taking the bus
Speaker 3: home on Wednesday, the nineteenth of February. It was around
Speaker 3: eight pm and when he was on the bus, an
Speaker 3: altercation ensued with two other people that were also on
Speaker 3: the bus. This altercation, according to the police, spilled over
Speaker 3: onto the Nature Strip when the bus stopped and Natan
Speaker 3: exited the bus. And following this altercation, the two people
Speaker 3: that were on the bus and then followed Natan out
Speaker 3: of the bus are alleged to have inflicted stab wounds
Speaker 3: on him, which ultimately led to his death. So he
Speaker 3: died from his injuries by the time paramedics arrived on
Speaker 3: the Nature Strip in Wyndham Vale that night of Wednesday,
Speaker 3: the nineteenth of February.
Speaker 1: And so, as these distressing details have filtered out about
Speaker 1: his death, how are Natan's friends and his family and
Speaker 1: the wider community around them, how are they grappling with
Speaker 1: what happened?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think you know, like any family, like any parent,
Speaker 3: I think people are very distressed. I mean, this seemed
Speaker 3: like it was a very random attack on a young
Speaker 3: person who was going about their day. You know, it's
Speaker 3: not the kind of thing that you would expect to happen.
Speaker 3: I mean, this is what his uncle said to me.
Speaker 3: I mean, you read about these sorts of things in
Speaker 3: the news and the media, and you don't think it's
Speaker 3: going to happen to a member of your family. His mum,
Speaker 3: you know, when she and a few other family members
Speaker 3: I'm told had to go and identify his body ended
Speaker 3: up being taken to hospital just because that was all
Speaker 3: quite distressing for her to experience. His dad has come
Speaker 3: out in the media and talked about just how much
Speaker 3: of an impact this has had on the family, how
Speaker 3: they want answers. They don't understand why this happened, how
Speaker 3: it could have happened. And there was also a lot
Speaker 3: of outpouring of not just support but also just shock
Speaker 3: on social media from a lot of people who identify
Speaker 3: as African Australian who just could not fathom why this
Speaker 3: would happen out of the blue.
Speaker 1: And for many people who've come from the Democratic Republic
Speaker 1: of Congo, they've come to Australia to escape violence, and
Speaker 1: they're here because it's supposed to be a safer place.
Speaker 1: So when something like this happens, the shock and the
Speaker 1: trauma must be overwhelming. What did people say to you
Speaker 1: about that?
Speaker 3: That's right, you know, to put into context for listeners,
Speaker 3: the Democratic Republic of Congo has been experiencing civil unrest
Speaker 3: since nineteen eighty six, and that civil unrest has led
Speaker 3: to more than six million people being killed and millions
Speaker 3: more displaced.
Speaker 2: Can you tell me.
Speaker 5: Your full name and your time is Dougie Gongwa And
Speaker 5: I spoke to the chair of the Victorian Congolese Community,
Speaker 5: Doogie Bonga, who expressed just how distressing and traumatizing it
Speaker 5: was and is for the Congolese community, in particular.
Speaker 3: Because of the trauma from you know, having lived and
Speaker 3: survived the ongoing conflict there.
Speaker 6: It's a very sad news when we heard it, as
Speaker 6: Congolese people, we're traumatized. Really, we don't know what to
Speaker 6: say since that day and we are asking ourselves.
Speaker 5: What to do.
Speaker 6: You know, now, back home, wars are going on, people
Speaker 6: are being killed and they hear again it's the same.
Speaker 3: And so you can imagine managing to flee that environment
Speaker 3: and then arriving in Australia where you assume that there
Speaker 3: would be relative safety, where you'd be able to move
Speaker 3: around without fear of losing your life, and for this
Speaker 3: to then happen to a member of your community brings
Speaker 3: up a lot of that trauma where you sort of think,
Speaker 3: you know, is there anywhere that's safe?
Speaker 1: And can you tell me any more about the visuals
Speaker 1: and memorials that have been held in recent days.
Speaker 3: On the weekend, just days after Naton's death, I started
Speaker 3: to see a lot of friends who identify as African
Speaker 3: Australian posting about it on social media and talking about
Speaker 3: how triggering.
Speaker 2: It was for them.
Speaker 3: You know, a lot of young people post videos on
Speaker 3: TikTok where they tried to remember and honor Natan.
Speaker 5: I am very saddened if you look properly, to my
Speaker 5: eyes have just been crying listening to the stories of
Speaker 5: the family sharing about Nathan.
Speaker 6: It hurts seeing a young life being taken very tragically
Speaker 6: like this.
Speaker 3: Young African Australians are dying daily and nobody wants to
Speaker 3: speak about it.
Speaker 2: Just as for Nathan.
Speaker 3: The family held the vigil near where he was murdered,
Speaker 3: and I think what was interesting about it was here's
Speaker 3: a community that.
Speaker 1: Is used to.
Speaker 3: Being marginalized, and seeing the community find ways to hold
Speaker 3: each other, to find ways to mourn Natan, to honor
Speaker 3: his life and to remember his legacy. It was almost
Speaker 3: as though if you know so, the space won't be made.
Speaker 3: The community will find space.
Speaker 1: After the break the way black lives are treated in
Speaker 1: the media.
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Speaker 1: You say this is a community that is used to
Speaker 1: being marginalized, and I think that media narratives really play
Speaker 1: into that. And since Natan's death, there's been a lot
Speaker 1: of reporting about no related crime in Melbourne, particularly among
Speaker 1: young people. There was a recent Daily Mail article that
Speaker 1: calls Melbourne a city that has become accustomed to rampant
Speaker 1: mindless violence, for example, and it comes in this bigger
Speaker 1: context of a lot of references in the media to
Speaker 1: gang on gang violence. So tell me what you've thought
Speaker 1: as you've seen the story of Natan's death reported in
Speaker 1: that context.
Speaker 3: Look, it's been very interesting and it made me think
Speaker 3: about how do we report about crime, and how do
Speaker 3: we report about victims of crime and how we report
Speaker 3: on them really matters. And in this instance, it's a
Speaker 3: black victim of crime, and black victims of crime generally
Speaker 3: aren't given the space to be memorialized, despite the fact
Speaker 3: that black victims are disproportionately victims of violent crime. And
Speaker 3: then there's also the aspect of offenses that are regarded
Speaker 3: as knife crimes and this narrative that knife crime is increasing,
Speaker 3: But when I started to look at the data, there
Speaker 3: hasn't actually been an increase. I think, if anything, overall
Speaker 3: crime and austral seems to be going down. But what
Speaker 3: is interesting is how the media reports on it. And
Speaker 3: because we've seen very high profile cases that have led
Speaker 3: parts of the media to speculate on rates and incidence
Speaker 3: of crime which really do not mirror the data, and
Speaker 3: that then feeds into fear and anxiety in the community.
Speaker 3: So it does lead to the illusion that things are
Speaker 3: worse than they actually are.
Speaker 1: And within this reporting you do also sometimes see a
Speaker 1: version of this phrase, you know, the person who's killed
Speaker 1: was not known to police, which I think goes to
Speaker 1: this implicit idea that a victim, particularly a young black man,
Speaker 1: might have been involved in a gang or done something
Speaker 1: wrong in this context. Is this something that you were
Speaker 1: noticing when you were working in newsrooms? Do you have
Speaker 1: any other thoughts on I suppose how these media reports
Speaker 1: come about and the effect that they have. Yeah.
Speaker 3: I mean when I started reporting on the story, my
Speaker 3: journalistic instincts were to, you know, look at the data
Speaker 3: and use the data to kind of somehow make sense
Speaker 3: of what happened. And I think what was interesting for
Speaker 3: me was looking at studies overseas, particularly in the US
Speaker 3: and the UK, that have looked at how the media
Speaker 3: reports on victims of violent crime who aren't white, And
Speaker 3: from those studies, what becomes very clear is that, you know,
Speaker 3: black people are disproportionately victims of violent crime, and yet
Speaker 3: the way that they're reported on by the media does
Speaker 3: not humanize them, and if anything, contributes to narratives that
Speaker 3: seem to suggest that criminality and race are linked. When
Speaker 3: we know that that's obviously not true. Those are very
Speaker 3: much racist tropes. And so the more these narratives are sensationalized,
Speaker 3: and when black victims aren't humanized, it feeds into these
Speaker 3: ideas of who perpetrators are likely to be of crime.
Speaker 3: So it challenged me as well, because I hadn't thought
Speaker 3: about these things until I started working on and looking
Speaker 3: at research. And like I said, it's very rare that
Speaker 3: black victims of crime are memorialized. I mean, if Natalant
Speaker 3: was a young white person, I'm pretty sure his death
Speaker 3: would have seen a lot of media coverage. I think
Speaker 3: he probably would have ended up on the front page
Speaker 3: of quite a few newspapers. But he didn't get that
Speaker 3: kind of memorialization, and I thought it was very important
Speaker 3: that at the very least there was space to humanize him.
Speaker 3: And so I'm hoping that by sharing Natan's story and
Speaker 3: writing it in the way that I did, it forces
Speaker 3: many of my peers to kind of reflect on how
Speaker 3: they also report on crime.
Speaker 1: And so to come back to Natan then to how
Speaker 1: he lived. What do his family want people to know
Speaker 1: about their son with a nephew.
Speaker 3: I think they want they want people to know that
Speaker 3: he was loved Ruby. I mean, it's pretty much as
Speaker 3: simple as that he was loved.
Speaker 2: He's life mattered.
Speaker 3: You know. He came from a beer and very tight
Speaker 3: knit family.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 3: One of his siblings spoke at the vigil and talked
Speaker 3: about how he thought that his big brother was going
Speaker 3: to be there for his wedding, you know, and he
Speaker 3: can't fathom the fact that he's not going to be
Speaker 3: there and he's not going to be able to witness
Speaker 3: this big life event. But yeah, it really just comes
Speaker 3: down to the fact that he meant a lot to
Speaker 3: a lot of people, and he will be very much
Speaker 3: missed by those who knew him and those who loved him.
Speaker 1: Santy, thank you for your time today.
Speaker 2: Thanks you too.
Speaker 1: Also in the news today, evacuation centers have been established
Speaker 1: on the goal Old Coast in anticipation of Cyclone Alfred,
Speaker 1: which is expected to make a land fall some time
Speaker 1: today or Friday morning. The region, along with Brisbane and
Speaker 1: the Queensland hinterland, is expected to face the worst of
Speaker 1: the strong winds from the category to storm and Western
Speaker 1: Australian police have charged a sixteen year old boy over
Speaker 1: an alleged online threat to a mosque in Southwest Sydney.
Speaker 1: The teen allegedly threatened to christ.
Speaker 2: Church two point zero.
Speaker 1: This joint in an apparent reference to the twenty nineteen
Speaker 1: terror attack in which an Australian man killed fifty one
Speaker 1: people at a mosque in New Zealand. I'm Ruby Jones.
Speaker 1: This is seven am. See tomorrow