Bahati slams Jalang’o and Jaguar over failure to champion Kenyan artists’ rights in Parliament

Musician Bahati has hit out at Lang’ata Member of Parliament Phelix Odiwour, popularly known as Jalang’o, over what he feels is a failed stint in Parliament.

Bahati, who announced his bid for the Mathare parliamentary seat on Friday, says Jalang’o has done nothing to push for the rights of Kenyan artists and he will look to correct that if he is elected.

The hitmaker claims Jalang’o and former Starehe MP Charles Njagua alias Jaguar never sponsored a bill in Parliament to ensure Kenyan music is given priority among local media stations and this is one of his main mandates if he gets elected.

“Jalas and Jaguar were in parliament and they are the reason I am being shown videos of artists who went to Parliament but failed to support the industry,” Bahati said on the Obinna Show.

“In Kenya, when you listen to our stations, you would think we are in Lagos or Zanzibar. We want to make sure Kenyan media plays 70 or 80 per cent local.

“There is a guy in Homa Bay dreaming to be Bien but Bien has taken over 20 years to be where he is today. If our media is playing over 70 per cent foreign, tell me when there will be another Willy Paul, Bien or Otile Brown?

“It is almost impossible and that is why in one year, we get few music sensations who are not even national brands.”

Bahati does not understand why the aforementioned legislators failed to push for such rights when they had the platform to do it.

“What was so hard for Jalang’o or Jaguar to do that in Parliament? Just a bill to say if we want to create other musicians, we must say a local station will have no option but to play 70 per cent local and that is how an unknown artist in Kisumu will get rotation and will be big because of enough airplay,” he stated.

“The media has made it look like Kenyan artists are not great.”

Bahati claims the situation is not different from those in the film industry where actors are suffering because their plight has not been brought to the fore.

“It is the same thing happening among actors, it is just that they don’t talk. Look at our stations, we have Indian soap operas translated in Kikuyu so how will an actor in Nyeri get that opportunity?” he posed.

The musician dismissed claims that he is looking to go to Parliament to make money, claiming that he has enough to even pay some of those already in the August House.

“I am not going to Parliament because an MP makes a lot of money,” he added. “I like [Peter] Salasya but I am sure he does have more money than me. There are MPs there who I can even pay. That is not the reason.”