The change may look really cheap (and really doesn't do anything more than bring attention to it), however the reason it was changed was because it is "blackface".
4Kids did this same exact thing with a crewmember of Buggy's in One Piece. They actually changed him from black to white.
I'm really not sure why the manga authors even design characters like this in the first place. The Japanese Mr. Popo is actually a very insulting stereotype. FUNimation's dub, believe it or not, actually made Mr. Popo speak normally.
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