Mabala Noise boss says the boos aren’t justified

The ANC Youth League’s treasurer says the EFF is politicking, but he won’t say how much he spent on airtime for SMSes.

The politically connected label owner of Mabala Noise, Reggie Nkabinde, has told City Press in an interview that the reason his artists swept the Metro Awards last weekend was because of their talent and not because he’s the politically connected ANC Youth League treasurer.

They took eight awards, winning in every category in which they were nominated. When Nasty C called Nkabinde up to stage during his acceptance speech for Song of the Year, Nkabinde was booed by some in the audience.

The Mabala Noise boss admitted, however, that his employees and their families had voted for their nominees by SMS – he failed to answer a question on how much money he had given them to pay for airtime to do so.

He maintained that you “can’t buy awards or votes within that voting system”.

Nkabinde reportedly said that he was helping African artists to get a better deal than the traditional labels and that his brand “is helping South Africans”. It was “unacceptable” to him that “people come and tarnish the image of a brand that is helping South Africans”.

One of his own artists, Riky Rick, tweeted on the awards night that he also thought the awards were being bought.

“If niggaz can pay for these f***ing awards then my nigga I don’t want them…”

The EFF’s Julius Malema also alleged that Mabala Noise had “corrupted” the awards.

Nkabinde said the EFF shouldn’t confuse entertainment with politics and should stop destroying “other children’s careers for cheap politics”. He challenged them to find any evidence that he was corrupt.

He also said that Riky Rick should rather have taken the “legal route” if he, or any other artist, was unhappy with something.