Diamond Platnumz, the Tanzanian Bongo sensation, has responded to recent accusations of stealing music from Nigerian artists, dismissing the claims as false and motivated by jealously over his enormous success.
The musician responded to the claims following his recent collaboration with Juma Jux, which revived debate about the similarities of some of his tracks to big Nigerian hits.
Diamond was trending earlier this week when Nigerians tweeted samples of his compositions that sound similar to popular Nigerian tunes.
Diamond responded to his critics in a statement, stating he was on his way to Canada to make money while others were wasting their time pointing fingers.
“Ukisikia mtoto anapiga kelele ujue bakora imemuingia!…maana wakifanya wengine, utaskia Magenius wanaakili wamesample, tukifanya sie tumekopi! (If you hear a child wailing, then you’ll know he has been flogged! When others do it, they are called geniuses and hailed for sampling, but when we do it, we are accused of copying.)” he said.
Diamond further took a swipe at his rival Alikiba, saying the accusations of copying were hypocritical and unfounded.
“When they ‘copy,’ you’ll hear them saying they have sampled, but when we do so, they say we have copied. If they were geniuses, they would have sung traditional songs, why are they singing Amapiano?”
Diamond concluded with a playful “Nyenyenye! Fyuuuuu!” as a sign of indifference towards the accusations.
The feud between Diamond and Alikiba has divided opinion in the Tanzanian music scene, with fans from both sides passionately defending their favorite artiste.
Alikiba had previously taken a swipe at Diamond, accusing him of plagiarism and urging musicians to uphold originality in their work.
“We are humiliating ourselves by doing plagiarism. Please work, sampling is okay but plagiarism not!” he said.
Diamond has in the past been criticized for sampling music from popular Nigerian artists like Asake, Spyro, Burna Boy and Wiz Kid.
