According to sources Iyanya was paid the said amount to perform at two ‘Nite of a Thousand Laughs‘ events which held in Benin and Port Harcourt. The ‘Kukere‘ singer missed both shows.
The latter which was held last night on New Year’s Day featured a performance from rapper Olamide and was hosted by Bovi. Guests had waited for the singer to step on stage and thrill as the highly publicized show had promised a performance from him. Iyanya never showed up.
Interestingly, Iyanya is believed to have traveled on the same flight (allegedly paid for by the show organizers) with Olamide and Bovi.
Sources told NX the singer shunned Opa Williams’ event, performing instead, at another show in Omuma local government area, also in Port Harcourt which also featured Timaya.
‘We were all disappointed, we waited in vain. As soon as Bovi announced he was not going to show up, everybody started leaving‘, a guest who attended the event held at the open ground of the Hotel Preseidential, PH said.
Just this morning, sources say Policemen from the Nigerian Police at the Mile 3 division invited Iyanya and his manger Ubi-Franklin Ekapong to the Police station over the matter which was reported by the show organizers led by Opa Williams.
The officers could only get Ubi-Franklin to station. ‘Yes I was at the Police Station this morning, we have decided to return all money paid to us, it’s not a problem‘, Ubi-Franklin said.
Ubi went on to explain what the whole brouhaha was all about:
We were paid to attend and perform at the Benin and Port Harcourt shows but we missed both due to reasons beyond our control. We missed the Benin gig because we were in Ghana as at that time and we arrived pretty late for the PH gig. We however had issues with initial payment from the show organizers also.