Seun Kuti celebrates birthday on the street

Afrobeat progeny, Seun Kuti, was a year older on Wednesday. But instead of popping choice drinks and clinking glasses with friends and fans to mark the day, the last son of late Afro beat iconoclast, Fela Anikulapo Kuti, joined millions of other Nigerians to protest the removal of fuel subsidy by the President Goodluck Jonathan-led Federal Government. Despite the raucousness of the gathering and the scorching intensity of the January sun, Seun was especially very active and vociferous from the first day of the protest, motivating young Nigerians to come out and say no to subsidy removal.

“Today na my birthday o and the only gift I wan from everyone is to come out and support our rally. Jonathan must hear word. Don’t come because of me, come because of Nigeria,” he tweets.

Further, Seun states, “President Jonathan, listen to the voice of the youths now, if we spent N300bn on average and it suddenly hikes to N1.3trn and we Nigerians know we can’t consume the almost 500 per cent increase, then, some people are guilty of fraud on a monumental level. Persecute them now. This is the last opportunity for the Nigerian government to embrace the youths in peaceful harmony.”

Seun also caused a well-articulated treatise entitled, ‘End of fuel subsidy is treason against Nigerians,’ to be published on the CNN website. He submits, “We the people of Nigeria will fight for the right to survive in the face of tyranny and deceit and I am calling on all the great Nigerian youths to join the mass action and rally everywhere in the country and abroad.”