The Boy Featured In Racist H&M Advert Is Kenyan

Swedish Fashion brand, H&M attracted strong social media backlash after posing a photo which most considered racist on its website.

The photo showed two boys wearing hoodies in the H&M’s United Kingdom store website.

Whereas the white boy’s hoodie read: “Mangrove Jungle Survival Expert,”, that of the black boy was “Coolest Monkey In The Jungle.”

Kenyans.co.ke has since learnt that the African boy featured on the advert is of Kenyan descent. 

His mother, Terry Mango, lives with the boy in Sweden where according to her, the boy has been featured on several other modelling contracts. 

She has, however, come out to slam those who have aired their opinions on how racist the advert is.

While responding to people on Twitter, Ms Mango stated that she 'sees nothing wrong with the hoodie as she does not think as other Africans do."

The company has since acknowledged that the advert upset many people, apologised and pulled down the photo.

"We’d like to put on record our position in relation to the controversial image of our hoodie. Our position is simple - we’ve got this wrong and we’re deeply sorry," read a statement on Twitter.

H&M further noted that it had not only removed the image from its channels, but also the garment from its product offering.

[caption caption="The two boys who were feature on the advert"][/caption]

The boy is rumored to have received a modelling contract with popular American artist P Diddy worth 1 million dollars. This has, however, not been confirmed.