An Headless Fela is No Respect But An Insult – Angry Fan Writes Open Letter To Lagos State Government

We woke up to this Open letter to the Lagos State Government from Steven Ofishea.

I heard about the plans to unveil a statue of the King of Afrobeats “Fela Anikulapo Kuti”, that news made my day as I was so excited about it then finally on the 15th of October the almighty statue of the legend was unveiled (See Here).

I was so anxious to see it as I viewed the post on Naijaloaded, only to see an headless and handless statue of the legend 

At first I refused to believe this was on purpose, so I relaxed onwards to conclude within myself that the artist wasn’t able to round up the work at the time it was to be unveiled then probably they would fix the head and hands later on, so I kept my cool and waited for the announcement.

Lo and behold, the daughter of the great legend and the artist who made the portrait are cool with this as they said “it was designed to generate discussion about the emancipation of the people.” Really? 

The artist went further to say:-

“The work was an expression of how he feels about the late Afrobeat legend” Really? First of all, no one cares about how you feel Mr Artist, we care about who the legend is and what he stood for and at no point in his life he stood as a faceless fighter as he always confronts corrupt leaders boldly with his music.

I don’t want to be like an headless and handless man, never have I & never would I.

As humans, how do we tell who is who? If we are being known by our dress and how we pose for pictures, then I could impersonate anyone on earth 

This legend is remembered not by his dress nor his picture pose (as anyone can achieve that) but by his music which was composed and performed from his head, written and arranged by his hands.

Am so surprised the Kuti families are comfortable with this, I urge the Government to accept this mistake and complete the portrait. I believe the reason for a statute is to proof that the legend’s legacy is still alive and should be carried on, the legacy of Fela Anikulapo Kuti and not the legacy of an headless molded portrait at Allen roundabout, Lagos.

An headless statue is no respect to a legend but an insult.

My name is Stephen you can call me Ofishea.

What do you think about this Open letter?