TIME October 23, 2017
U.K.Dua Lipa
POP MUSIC’S BOLD NEW VOICE▼
‘GIRLS
SHOULD BE
LOOKING
AFTER
GIRLS ... NOW
MORE THAN
EVER WE
NEED THAT IN
THE WORLD.’EGYPTLINA ATTALAH
Muckraker of the Arab world
NEXT GENERATION LEADERS ▼
THERE ARE MANY REASONS WHY DUA LIPA
shouldn’t be a pop star. When she was a kid
in choir, her director told her that her voice
was too low. When she was 11 with dreams of
making it big, her parents relocated from the
U.K. to their native Kosovo, far from the scouts
who could break her career. And even after she
moved back to London alone at age 15, record-
ing dozens of YouTube covers and eventually
scoring a record deal, she still struggled to find
her sound. “There were times I had no idea
where I wanted to go,” she says. “It was scary,
it was overwhelming.”
That was then. Since releasing her first single,
“Be the One,” in 2015, Lipa has
emerged as one of pop music’s
strongest new voices, thanks
to a series of bold, stadium-
ready girl-power anthems. In
“Blow Your Mind (Mwah),”
Lipa rebukes a would-be lover
who doesn’t see her strengths
(“If you don’t like the way I talk,
then why am I on your mind?”);
in “IDGAF,” she dismisses a
cheating ex who wants her back
(“I’m too busy for your business/
Go find a girl who wants to listen”). Song by
song, she’s broadening her fan base: Lipa’s self-
titled debut album, which was released in June,
has been streamed more than 1.4 billion times;
now she’s headlining giant music festivals like
Glastonbury and opening for Bruno Mars. “It’s
so much fun—the adrenaline, the craziness,” she
says. “There’s nothing quite like it.”
Lipa is equally passionate about her activism.
She started the Sunny Hill Foundation to
support charities and arts programs in Kosovo,
in order to help kids find a path to a bigger
world stage, like she did. She also routinely uses
Twitter to advocate for issues like gun control
and women’s rights as well as to support other
rising female pop stars, like Charli XCX, Zara
Larsson and Camila Cabello. “Girls should
be looking after girls all the time,” Lipa says,
echoing the sentiment of her latest moving-
on-after-a-breakup hit, “New Rules,” which
hit No. 1 in the U.K. and is gaining traction
stateside. “I think now more than ever we need
that in the world.” —RAISA BRUNERThe regime of Egypt’s President Abdul Fattah al-Sisi is not
tolerant of a free media. Journalists can disappear on their
way home from work, a Facebook post can land a person in
prison, and over 400 websites are blocked. The country is
now the third largest jailer of journalists on earth, according
to the Committee to Protect Journalists.
As other news organizations in Egypt censor themselves
to avoid trouble, one website, Mada Masr, has carved out a
niche as one of the only truly independent newsrooms in the
country. “We’re not the ones keeping freedom of expression
alive,” says editor in chief Lina Attalah, 35. “But we’re
definitely contributing to the preservation of that margin.”
Under Attalah’s leadership, Mada Masr has earned a
reputation for being fearless, running blockbuster corruption
investigations, revelations of regime purges and coverage
of the war against ISIS in the Sinai Peninsula, which the
authorities have attempted to shield from public view.
The government blocked Mada Masr in May, but could not
shut it down. The newsroom still publishes every day, though
readers inside Egypt must read the articles on Facebook or by
accessing the site with a VPN. Working in a small newsroom
in central Cairo, the organization operates under constant
threat of retaliation from the authorities.
“I’m not going to pretend I’m the bravest person on earth,”
says Attalah. “It’s a psychological negotiation with yourself.
You try to just lock it somewhere so you’re able to produce
and do whatever it is you need to do.”—Jared Malsin PHOTOGRAPH BY CELESTE SLOMAN FOR TIMEATTALAH: DAVID DEGNER—GETTY REPORTAGE FOR TIME