Delta State-born reggae super star, Ekeleke Elumelu Onwubuya popularly known as Ras Kimono is dead. Kimono, 60, passed on at the Lagoon Hospital, Ikoyi, Lagos, yesterday.
According to reports, Kimono was billed to travel to the United States but complained of being unwell on Friday. He was taken to a hospital in Ikeja from where he was referred to Lagoon Hospital.
After being in the Intensive Care Unit on Friday because he said he could not breath well, the musician showed signs of recovery on Saturday and even received visitors and friends. But things were to take a new dimension on Sunday, when suddenly between 11am and 12pm, he went into some kind of situation and died by 12:30pm.
Ras Kimono who celebrated his 60th birthday on May 9th, became an instant hit on the Nigerian music scene when he released his debut album with his Massive Dread Reggae Band, ‘Under Pressure’ on Premier Music label in 1989.
He started his musical career as a student of Gbenoba Secondary School, Agbor, Delta State and joined a group called Jastix Reggae Ital along with Majek Fashek, Amos McRoy and Black Rice Osagie.
He released among other albums, ‘Rasta get jail’, ‘What’s Gwan’ and ‘Rhumba style’, He won many awards including the Nigerian Music Awards, and Fame Music Awards.
After a hiatus, Kimono in 2017, returned to the music scene with a single, ‘Blessed Africa’ which critiqued the continent’s ironic poverty, despite its rich deposit of human and natural resources.
