Nairobi News

The promoter of the Gengetone Festival has threatened to sue Citizen tv presenter Willis Raburu and artistes who were contracted to performs at the failed event in Machakos last weekend.

Speaking exclusively to Nairobi News, the promoter Joe Mutetei claimed all the Gengetone artistes contracted for the show at Machakos People’s Park never met their end of the bargain.

According to Mutei, the artistes were contracted for the event through Sentinel Richplus Ltd.

In the contract shared with Nairobi News, each contracted artiste was expected to help in social media marketing of the event and commit to perform within the time allocated for the event.

On the part of the company, according to the said contract, each artiste was to receive a down payment with the balance due expected to be paid at the completion of the event.

However, Mutei claimed that on the eve of the event, the artistes, including Raburu who was the event emcee, ganged up and started demanding the balance before getting up on stage.

“Before booking an artist, I paid each artist 50% deposit and most of our agreement was balance due after event. They then ganged up and insisted on payment upfront. I remember during morning hours most of them had contacted me in need of transport which I sent them via Mpesa. What they did, was not fair at all,” Mutei lamented.

As the emcee and upcoming artiste, he said, Raburu was the highest paid and reportedly received a down payment of Sh65,000 with a similar amount to be paid after the concert.

Zero Sufuri reportedly received Sh40,000 upfront while Ochungulo Family received a deposit of Sh45,000, as per the contracts shared with Nairobi News, which the duo confirmed receiving.

Both Sufuri and Ochungluo were supposedly to receive a similar amount once they performed.

Raburu trended last Sunday after he took to social media disowning the event, instead blaming the organisers for not paying the artistes their full fee before their performance resulting in the event’s failure.

“I’m having my lawyers draft demand letters to artistes who received deposits and never performed as per our agreements,” Mutei added.

According to the said contracts, the promoters had up to seven days to pay the balance.