SINGER Kelly Khumalo's performance at the Tribute To Women Festival has been cancelled.
She will no longer perform at the festival, which is set to take place on Saturday, 12 August at Emmarentia Botanical Gardens, Joburg. The purpose of this festival is to celebrate Mzansi women.
They revealed to Daily Sun that she would be replaced with another artist.
Kelly was going to perform alongside Amanda Black, Nkosazana Daughter, Mafikizoko, Kabza De Small, among others. But fans were not happy about Kelly being part of the line-up. They put pressure on the organisers until she was excluded.
On Monday, 31 July, they announced they have excluded Kelly from their line-up.
They wrote: “We have noted, with concern, various comments on social media platforms and calls from many patrons of our festival. We respect the legal processes and wish to indicate that Ms Kelly Khumalo is innocent until proven otherwise.
“However, in the interest of safeguarding our festival, management has taken the decision to relieve Ms Khumalo of her obligations to perform at our festival this year to afford her and her team the time they require to deal with the issues emanating from the current court proceedings.”
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This announcement was music to the ears of music supporters.
Portia Ntombifuthi Maseko wrote: “Thank you for respecting our concerns. We will miss her sterling performance but as a country, we need justice.”
Keadumetse Ledwaba-Madonsela said: “Thank you. The only performance I was uncomfortable abt. I hope we get replacement no hard feelings but justice must take it's course.”
Last week, music followers slammed the South African State Theatre for booking Kelly.
The event, Gospel Explosion was announced on Friday, 28 August and it is happening on 26 August at State Theatre, in Tshwane and tickets are already on sale. But music lovers made it clear that they are not happy with Kelly’s booking.
Tribute for Women spokeswoman, Bridgette Makhela said they are “legally obliged to safeguard their event, as per the SASREA Act of 2010 and the related Event Safety and Security Planning Committee that is born out of it. This sets about very stringent safety protocols and requires us to mitigate any potential risks, however unlikely. The potential media spectacle is one such risk. Secondly, it also affords Ms. Khumalo’s team the time to focus on the case,” said Bridgette.
“Khumalo’s team was aware of this decision, and we had been having an ongoing dialogue with them for some time prior to the decision,” she said.She revealed that they will be replacing Kelly with another artist. “Once we're in a position to make an announcement in this regard, we will make one,” said Bridgette.
Kelly and her manager, Khothatso Tsotetsi had not responded at the time of publishing.
