Bounty Killer says artists like Skillibeng and I-Octane should stop endorsing banga phones.
EastSyde Records’ most sought after talent, Skillibeng, has grown tired of scammers tarnishing his brand by targeting potential clients and demanding large sums of cash for services they are obviously unable to provide. In a move to put an end to the issue, the “Mr. Universe” deejay reached out to the Jamaican Star to put the culprits on blast. The situation drew a controversial comment from dancehall veteran Bounty Killer, but only after the EastSyde champ provided some clarification.
Skillibeng seemed to have approved the information written in the body of the article, which contains quoted lines from himself and producer Gutty Bling, however, he had an issue with how The Star worded their title. According to Gutty and Skilli, persons have been robbed of sums in the ballpark of US$2000 by conducting business through fake Instagram pages, which have barred Skilli and his manager’s official pages from even viewing their content.
The publication translated that into a headline that proclaiming that Skillibeng is being scammed. The publication ran the story on their Instagram page, and that is where the “50 Bag” deejay pitched his correction. He wrote, “customers of @skillibeng are being scammed not me!” Followers of The Star were quick to highlight that the publication was correct in their stance of the artiste being robbed since the scammers were making away with the profits that would have eventually made it to his bank account.
“indirectly you’re losing money as well fam…” came one comment before another expounded on why, “yeah G but if them a use yo imagine a tek money you fi a get , that mean ya get scam mi fam , if me did fi get 10k but a man a pretend to be me end up get it then him scam me by using my imagine and a profit off a it uzimi , mi nuh think star a try diss you fam.”
Skillibeng’s adamance that he was not incurring any losses came through once more. “money I know nothing about isn’t mine.. I’m not the one losing money, my customers are,” he responded.
Another reader who backed The Stars’ headline used a more tangible scenario to explain his point of view. He penned, “The man say a only the customers get scammed..not to hard to understand..if me send u money via western union and a person use a fake id and say it is U and collect the money..U GOT SCAMMED TOO..same like Skilli here.”
Having had enough of the back and forth, the entertainer answered with a firm “No” to a question asking if he was okay with the situation then opted out of the discussion. An hour later, dancehall’s official Warlord and poor people governor Bounty Killer, left a comment that seemingly took aim at the young deejay, inciting that he got taught a lesson out of his own book. “That’s why artiste must not be endorsing banga fone since dem a get bang too,” wrote Bounty.
Skillibeng’s breakout single titled, “Brik Pan Brik” has been touted as an ode to ruthless Lottery scammers who call unsuspecting persons demanding money to clear fake winnings.
Throughout the first verse of the song Skilli list the importance of his phones which includes a ‘banga’: “Nuh ramp wid me madda food/Spanish town, foreign account/Banga phone, couple odda phone/Di ting cya too loud.”
While a few persons approved Bounty Killer bold comment, another urged Killer to support the youths instead of fighting them.
Someone else highlighted that Bounty Killer himself is not perfect and has made numerous mistakes, some of which demanded a public apology.
“as a child we watch you do an say some of the most derogatory things on stage and on record, no man couldn’t tell you seh stop sing bout gun. BANGA PHONE tell people to scam? How many times you apologized on TV fi f__fry weh u do. Low the youth them,” protested the disgruntled commenter.
“U may got a point there but all the errors and mistakes u made during ur coming up’d u encourage the younger ones or ur kids to do the same tell me?” asked Killer, hinting that he as toed the lines of the law before but he is seeking better for the youth.
One thing is sure, Bounty Killer was not in agreement that his comment was meant for Skillibeng since other artistes have used the topic to craft hits. Xklusive penned his breakthrough hit “Big Money Popping” in 2016 meanwhile, I Octane only recently dropped “Banga Fone.”
“Did I said Skillibeng shouldn’t sing about banga fone or I said artiste in general shouldn’t?” the Warlord asked with a two-part rhetorical question. The question got at least one answer which lashed out against him, “u commented under a post pertaining to him and he sang about banga phone,u were reffering to him.”
Other comments simply listed that the situation is ironic since it’s much like a real-life scenario of Brik Pan Brik.”
