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Nigerian singer Naira Marley has finally spoken out about the death of his former signee, Mohbad, in a detailed YouTube video. Mohbad’s passing on September 12, 2023, sparked nationwide outrage and calls for justice, with many questioning the circumstances surrounding his death.
According to Marley, he was in Amsterdam when he first heard the news of Mohbad’s death through social media. Initially, he suspected that the news might be a publicity stunt staged by the singer to attract attention. However, after seeing a blogger’s post suggesting that Mohbad died from an ear infection, Marley began to believe that the news might be real.
“I saw Instablog posted that he died of an ear infection,” Marley said. “I said ‘how can he die of ear infection’. We were still saying that when posts began to flood Twitter.” Marley revealed that he had not seen Mohbad for about a year prior to his death, and he claimed that a particular narrative was swiftly constructed to implicate him, drawing focus away from a proper investigation.
“People started accusing me and posting videos from the NDLEA incident, the fight he had with his manager on the 4th of October 2022,” Marley said. “I called Zino and we drove to Amsterdam. We could not shoot the video anymore. We did not even have time to mourn Mohbad properly because people were blaming us for what we did not do.”
Marley further criticized the investigation, arguing that in a more effective system, authorities would have concentrated on “arresting everyone who was with him in the last 24 to 48 hours” instead of singling him out over previous disputes. “If we were in a working country, they were supposed to arrest everyone who was with him in the last 24 hours, 48 hours,” he added.
It’s worth noting that Naira Marley and his associate Sam Larry were taken into custody over allegations of involvement in Mohbad’s death, but were granted bail in November 2023 after spending over five weeks in detention. A Yaba magistrate court later acquitted Marley, Larry, and others in February, ruling that they had “no case to answer” regarding Mohbad’s death.
