"I Take Money from Oshiomole Because He Is a Good Governor" – Eedris Abdulkareem

Eedris Abdulkareem, says that he accepts money from the Edo State Governor, Comrade Adams Oshiomole, because he loves to be identified only with Governors that are popularly acknowledged to be ‘doing well’.


The pop artiste declared this position during last Saturday’s SaharaTV’s Inspiration segment with Omoyele Sowore, in effect saying he could not accept a gift from those politicians who are failing to serve the people. During the interview, Eedris also talked about his famous feud with Nigeria’s former President, Olusegun Obasanjo; his tussle on a plane with American rapper 50cent; and other controversial issues.

On former President Obasanjo, Eeedris opted to refer to the embattled man as ‘Baba’ throughout the interview. He insisted that he has never taken money from Obasanjo, nor did he assume a low profile for some time after he
released his famous Jaga-jaga album because he was jittery.

“I have never collected any money from Baba before. Eedris Abdulkareem
is a social crusader and my responsibility is to use music to add values to the lives of common people who can’t speak for themselves”, he declared.

“As a social crusader, back in 2000, I came up with “Mr. Lecturer,” which talked about sexual harassment on our campuses and “Jaga-jaga” came up after millions of youths voted me to represent them at the Olympic Torch Relay, which automatically made me an authority as an Olympic Torchbearer, and my responsibility is to speak for my people.”

Eedris pointed out that the former president became angry at him after he released the Jaga-jaga album. The title, he told SaharaTV, was adopted from a childhood game and suggests things gone awry. He further said that the Jaga-jaga album was motivated by his aspiration to reflect the ills in the Nigerian society occasioned by widespread corruption and the selfish activities of the country’s rulers.

Attempting to clarify the stoic silence which followed the threat from the former President after his famous Jaga-jaga album and his subsequent behavior which seemed to have been aimed at reconciling with the Government, Eedris said his album which followed Jaga-jaga was ‘Letter to Mr. President’.
That album, he said was to explain to the Government what he meant by Jaga-jaga in his prior album that had seen him crossing swords with Obasanjo. He denied that his subsequent meeting with Obasanjo’s successor, Late President Yar’ Adua, was to engineer peace with the Government and to regain his “restricted” freedom into the society