How politics took over Bobi Wine’s Kyarenga concert

Despite cancelling his show twice by Police saying the venue that Bobi Wine initially wanted to hold his Kyarenga concert was booked, the singer didn’t give up on the show. He decided to settle for his One Love Beach in Busabala and the Kyarenga concert finally happened.

Thousands of revellers thronged Bobi Wine’s One Love beach in Busabala wearing red outfits and red berets that many prefer to call the People Power caps.

Revellers were already at the beach as early as 8am and it was action time by 1pm with singers Nina Roz and Full figure opening up the performances.

In the previous shows at Busabala, the performances usually kicked off in the night and ended in the wee hours of the next morning but this time round it was a different case.

Before 7pm, singers like Eddy Kenzo, Spice Diana, King Saha, Geoffrey Lutaaya, Chris Evans, Irene Namatovu and Aziz Azion among others had performed and left the stage. All artistes who performed donned the “People Power caps” except a few.

Bobi Wine stepped on stage at exactly 7pm and kicked off his performance with Dilemma, a song he did with Jamaican singer Mr G and Cindy. He went on to do songs like Mazzi Mawanvu. He took the audience down memory lane with songs like Abalungi Balumya, Kiwaani, Matyansi and Akagoma among others.

After the first hour of his performance, he left stage for Pallaso, Young Mulo, Eddy Yawe and Dr Hilderman who all came and did just one song before they cleared the stage at 8:30pm.

Bobi Wine returned and did songs like Freedom, Uganda, Tugambire Ku Jennifer and Mr Money among others.

During Bobi Wine’s performances, he kept on giving short speeches and one of them was thanking the Uganda Police and the Military for providing security at the event which was tight by the way.

“You were here for me when I was detained and because we were many in numbers, we defeated them, I also need you this time round and the only way we can do this is when everyone has a national ID,” Bobi Wine said.

This left revellers wondering why Bobi Wine would ask Ugandans to make sure they get National IDs. Many concluded that he wanted to be sure of voters when he stands for presidency in the next general election.

He went on and closed the show with the title song Kyarenga at exactly 10pm. But before this, he had performed a song that is yet to be released but it sends a political message.

The song titled Engule (crown) talks about how when ‘Bosco’ goes, we shall celebrate and wear crowns celebrating People Power’s victory in the next elections.