Nigerian pop star Davido: 'Africans were made fun of. Now everyone wants us'
The singer was taking a good-time sound to the world – but after his song Fem became the anthem of the EndSars protesters, he joined them on the streetsThe buoyant, trumpeting chords of Fem, the opening track on Davido's fourth album, A Better Time, suggest an artist who is vivacious, free of self-doubt, revelling in the limelight. David Adedeji Adeleke, 28, is part of a generation of Afrobeats artists who have blown the African dance-pop genre on to the global stage over the last decade; his songs have become the feelgood soundtrack of Nigeria's nightlife, and made him one of his continent's biggest pop stars.Yet “Femâ€, meaning “shut up†in pidgin, has taken on a different meaning. Last month, Lagos governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu pleaded with EndSars protesters, who had taken a stand against police brutality. The largest protest movement in Nigeria for decades had erupted, incensed at the abuses by the infamous and since disbanded Special Anti-Robbery Squad (Sars). As the protesters outside the government secretariat in Lagos grew impatient, a DJ at the demonstration suddenly played Fem, already a hit across the country. Scores began belting out his lyrics, drowning out the governor's futile pleas. In a culture where reverence for authority figures can be brutally enforced, protesters recast the song into a defiant statement.
