#AfricaYoungAchievers: Ghanaian teen actor Abraham Atta
Ghanaian teen actor Abraham Atta gained critical acclaim for his portrayal of a child soldier in the Netflix original movie, Beasts of No Nation, including winning Best Leading Actor at the Independent Spirit Awards.
Since then it has been an upward movement for the 15-year-old who is set to be part of the ever-growing cast of the upcoming Marvel film, Spider-Man: Homecoming in an undisclosed role.
Atta hails from the GaDangme ethnic group in the Greater Accra Region.
His leading role of child soldier Agu in Beasts of No Nation catapulted the teen actor to fame and winning people’s hearts. He was awarded the Marcello Mastroianni’s Best Young Actor Award at the 72nd Venice International Film Festival. In November 2015, he joined the ensemble cast of Shane Carruth’s third film, The Modern Ocean.
Abraham has set up the Abraham Attah Foundation which is collaborating with Afri-Gold Impact to embark on a peace campaign tour dubbed “Ghana Peace Drive- Let Ghana Win”. This project is to educate the public on the importance of maintaining peace before, during and after the presidential and parliamentary elections which will be coming at the end of this year.
The team has produced a documentary that will be used for the education nationwide.
In an interview with Abraham Attah before he left for school in the United State during the weekend, he said “even though I will not be in Ghana during the election, it is important that Ghana remains peaceful before, during and after the election, because this is my home. I still have my family, friends and loved ones in Ghana”.
The team will travel to flash point communities across the country with a video van to show the documentary to public gatherings and also distribute over ten thousand T-shirts with peace inscription on them for free.