Babes Wodumo who was booked to headline the Mapopoma Festival at the Victoria Falls Sports Club in Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe, from 29-31 December 2019, has been dropped by organizers of the event over her tweets which supported xenophobia. 

Recall that the South African singer had a heated exchange with Ice Prince over her tweets shared when the xenophobic attacks led to a showdown between Nigerians and South Africans. She accused Nigerians of bringing in drugs into South Africa, an act she claimed led to the xenophobic attacks. Babes Wodumo also alleged that Zimbabweans were stealing RDP houses meant for South Africans. 

However after the xenophobic storm was quelled, she claimed her Twitter account was hacked. 

Confirming that Babes Wodumo won’t be performing at the event in Zimbabwe, the festival’s founder and operations director, Patrick Mhofu Musonza, said concertgoers were not convinced by Babes’ claims of being hacked and warned her not to set foot in Zimbabwe.

“We wanted Babes to perform but after that tweet, the people who are going to the festival are after her head. Once she arrives in Zimbabwe, her safety is our concern. So it is mainly because of her safety and security concerns (that we have cancelled her performance).

“These are all red flags for us. She is claiming to be hacked but people are not buying that. We do not know whether she was hacked or not but if she is claiming she is hacked, we have to believe her.

Musonza also said the singer’s management sent over screenshots of messages from the hackers who apologized. He however said they doubt the messages were from hackers as no one hacks an account and also apologizes. 

“They have sent us screenshots of the hackers apparently apologising but who hacks and then apologises?” he added.