By Ahmad Muto
Singer Ykee Benda, formerly the President of the Uganda Musicians Association (UMA) has finally endorsed the newly formed Uganda National Musicians Federation (UNMF) following the effort of the federation president, singer Eddy Kenzo to have him subscribe to their ideals.
In a long social media thread, the Munakampala singer detailed how he still carried trauma from his last position with UMA and never wanted to mix with the new group at any level, dodged meetings with Kenzo until he learnt that artistes of integrity were part of the leadership.
“It’s common knowledge now that I was once president of UMA a body I believed could deliver and heal the pain of musicians both in my generation and before or after but also common knowledge that we had some bad fruits within and that’s the reason I stepped down because it was abt to ruin my reputation,” he wrote.
“So I get a call from the current President UNMF @eddykenzoficial asking me to join in and we meet and talk abt the music industry, I dodged the first meetings because man I had suffered with those things so my heart couldn’t take it anymore…so they recently announced the interim leadership and I got my attention to see Eddy and @Ksheebah1 people I know to be people of integrity and then I saw @JulianaKanyomoz and it really got me reconsidering,” he continued.
Benda noted that he figured it is the team that musicians needed and, after making up his mind, he reached out to Kenzo to set up a meeting, and now the leadership has his full support.
“So I called Eddy again and humbly asked to meet them to hear them out which I got an opportunity to do today. I must say this is the team that we probably needed ….artists,we have so much power and the time of handing it over to any user is over , every single time we fight within ourselves the enemy takes all the money,” he added.
“Now the time is up for all of them and many are reading this conversation, my name is Ykee Benda and I am going to fight for everything anyone ever took from me under the leadership of our president @eddykenzoficial and @Ksheebah1 and the rest of the team,” vowed Benda.
To the artistes he called ‘bad fruits’, he challenged them to first think about how their attacks on the federation is going to enable them get all the passive income they should be getting from their art.
“Now please before you sit before any camera my fellow artist to attack this movement, ask yourself what new thing are you going to do that will get you your royalties, caller back tune money and copyright? Nothing bruv….let’s come together and take them on one by one …..THEY ARE PANICKING!!”
Ykee Benda was sworn in as UMA president in 2020 after Sophie Gombya, resigned from the position to join politics. He was later to resign citing disrespect by a section of artistes paving way for Cindy Sanyu, the current president to take over.
