Cabinet Secretary for Youth Affairs, the Arts and Sports Ababu Namwamba has met cash-strapped artiste Colonel Mustafa.
In a statement, the Ministry of Youth Affairs, Arts and Sports said that the CS has promised Mustafa the Ministry's intervention to get him back on track.
The legendary Genge artist slipped into a financial crisis owing to his mother's cancer diagnosis, which drained his finances to the point that he took menial jobs to sustain her chemo treatment.
"We have heard your challenges, and as a ministry, I want to assure you that we are here to walk with you through this challenging phase. We have put together a package for you that will ensure that you are back on your feet, making music, and entertaining us," Namwamba said.
"We want to see you making more music, inspiring the younger generation of artists and nurturing them to stardom. The move you took to ensure that your mother receives proper health care is one to admire, and for that, we shall stand with you."
Mustafa's fall
The rapper, who had been off the grid for a while, suddenly started making headlines after a video of him doing hard labour went viral on social media.
The rapper revealed he had been working as a construction worker for some time and that he was hiding the fact that he had fallen from grace to grass.
Mustafa revealed that he was forced to work as a construction worker because his mother was diagnosed with cancer and her treatment is very expensive.
During the meeting, Namwamba said that Colonel Mustafa's music and the royalties that accrue from his intellectual property should be something he can rely on as a sustainable source of income.
"This is what we intend to achieve through our TalantaHela initiative. We want to ensure that our artists' intellectual property rights are guaranteed to enable them to continue to live well, earning from their creativity upon exiting the active stage," Namwamba said.
