Piracy and lack of airtime for his records on radio and television are some of the reasons the ‘people’s poet’, Mzwakhe Mbuli, has decided to stop recording in South Africa.
On Wednesday he announced his ”retirement” from the local industry, saying he was forced to look for other avenues for his talent.
”I would love to be continuing to create and record music in South Africa until I am the age of someone like Miriam Makeba, but I can’t keep on fighting the battles,” Mbuli said through his public relations company.
He said it was in trying to get his latest album, Thunder, to the public that he realised that local stations would not give him airplay.
He named several radio stations, and said it was even more difficult to get airplay on television.
Mbuli also pointed to retailers for refusing to stock Thunder, in spite of what he said was public demand for the album.
”The doors of the airwaves are closed and I can only point to a deep-seated conspiracy and a culture of victimisation on the part of what I can only call a mafia on the airwaves,” the artist said.
Mbuli said he would only record again outside the borders of the country.
”It’s the practices of certain individuals at certain broadcasters who are forcing me to join the creative brain drain from the country. I will consider pursuing recording and performing outside South Africa’s borders because I cannot work here any longer,” he said. — Sapa