Diamond has turned over a new leaf, he’s unrecognisable

Tanzanian superstar Diamond Platnumz has been long reputed to be a talented singer, performer and dancer, but also big-headed.

When he was booked for Koroga Festival and subsequently offered to us on #theTrend, we knew what to expect. After all, we first met him on the show in August 2013, when he performed in the city and suffice it to say that it had all the excitement of a tooth removal.

So when he and his entourage rolled up a full half hour early at the University of Nairobi where we were broadcasting from last Friday, we were pleasantly surprised. He was at his most charming, keeping the energetic campus crowd entertained with zingers and one-liners that endeared him to them.

He just launched a song by the newest artiste, Lava Lava, in his growing 51-employee WCB Wasafi label.

“Siwezi kusema eti ni kwamba nina uwezo mkubwa sana wa kifedha au eti nina akili sana lakini support ninayopewa na watu ndio imenifanya niweze kufikia hapa (I can’t say that I have the greatest financial might or the best brains but the support I get from people is what has brought me this far),” he said.

He laid out his guiding philosophy with the conviction and clarity of someone who had the benefit of learning from experience and finding their place in the world.

“WCB doesn’t just belong to Diamond. It is about young people with a dream and that is why I keep tapping youth from the streets and showcasing their talent so that if God helps them, they can also be successful. It is because I believe that if I hadn’t been helped along the way, I wouldn’t be where I am, so I’m helping everyone.”

The rough English translation doesn’t do the original Swahili justice but that is the general concept of why he does what he does.

LIVING LARGE

Viewers at home were just as impressed by the older, wiser Naseeb Abdul Juma as I was speaking to him. Evidently, he is no longer the dramatic 23-year-old who we met on the show the first time. He has undergone something of a temperamental transformation over the last four years, partly attributable to becoming a husband and father.

Still one of East Africa’s biggest names in music and a solidly bankable cultural export, the bongo flava star is mellowing as he approaches his 30s. He asked the students to be creative, regardless of whatever professional course they were pursuing.

“I’m not that well educated myself, I only went as far as Form Four” he said in a moment of immense self-awareness. “But I’m here because of the creativity  I have. If you’re a lawyer here, how would you convince me to hire you to represent me?”

That a famously difficult artiste has the presence of mind for some serious introspection is disarming in itself, but when the same musician is aware of the quicksand on which his career is based, it is almost unsettling.

“Every right thinking man must be afraid of the future because they don’t know what tomorrow portends. Because I am afraid for my future and afraid to fail, I have to save up for tomorrow and assist other people because you don’t know who will assist you tomorrow,” he said.

It is a sentiment already expressed in his song, Utanipenda? (Will You Love Me?), in which he muses about how his life would change if he didn’t have his current fame and fortune. Nearly 10 million people have watched the music video and he says it is wildly popular in East Africa where the idiomatic Swahili is easily understood.

Not that Diamond is all humility and 20/20 hindsight, he remains the fast-lane living, top-billing superstar millions of fans know and love. Asked why he wears so much “bling”, what with the ostentatious gold chains and rings, he shot back: “I’m a platinum, I have to shine!”

On why he seems to live such a glamorous life on social media, it is all part of the package. “When it comes to social media, you have to show those things because that is how you can get respect but as a celebrity you can’t be fake,” the teetotaller explains. “And that’s the thing about Zari (his wife); we are trying our level best, even if we are eating ugali. I grew up in poverty so I’m not afraid of poverty but what I show you is what I have.”

Thanks to the flexibility of live TV, we allowed the interview to run much longer than we had planned as we became fascinated by a man we thought we knew. In the eyes of many, he gained new respect by disabusing them of the “diva” branding he has worn so long. He is no longer a diamond in the rough and if he can mature, maybe there’s hope for some notoriously haughty but less accomplished Kenyan artistes.

*****

GREAT EXPECTATIONS

Has Kabogo set his sights on top seat?

Who wants to bet that the Kenya Alliance of Independent Candidates will morph into a political party within the next five years?

Kiambu Governor William Kabogo is the association’s chairman and if he wins his tough re-election battle, he will need some upward mobility in his political career.

“I have ambitions after governor,” he told me on Sidebar on Wednesday.”‘And what’s there after governor?” he asked, leaving the answer wide open. On the night he lost the Jubilee Party primaries to Kabete MP Ferdinand Waititu Babayao, he famously said someone didn’t want him to be governor of Kiambu.

He has now confirmed that it is about 2022 and considering his past tiffs with Deputy President William Ruto, some deductive reasoning easily settles whom he might have been referring to.

As I have previously written on this page, two-term governors will be looking for national opportunities and Kabogo appears to have launched a head start with this movement. He’s got some solid political names in his corner in Jubilee strongholds and if he can interest candidates from traditionally Nasa zones, he could really have something going here. That is likely why he is so keen to return as governor and continue working on the game plan for 2022.

*****

FEWER FRIENDS 

Merkel loses faith in Trump

She saw Donald Trump shove a world leader so he could get to the front and then lecture European leaders on something or the other and she is not impressed. The real leader of the free world, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, now says Europe can no longer rely on America in the era of their new president. “I have experienced this in the last few days,” she said. “And that is why I can only say that we, Europeans, must really take our fate into our own hands – of course in friendship with the United States of America, in friendship with Great Britain and as good neighbours wherever that is possible, also with other countries, even with Russia.”

This was just days after she shared a stage in Berlin with her old friend, Barack Obama, who ruled America with grace, intelligence and complete sentences. While African leaders were scrambling for a picture with Trump, the Europeans have had it.