Musician Aubrey Qwana was allegedly heckled off stage at a popular nightclub in Randburg on Saturday night after he was called to stand in for headliner Lwa Ndlunkulu.
This after the popular singer said she did not receive the R13 000 the Louis Café paid a promoter to secure her booking for the Coats and Boots event.
Sunday World understands that angry fans who came as far as Pretoria to see Lwa Ndlunkulu started interrupting Qwana who was called in as a replacement at the eleventh hour, when the organisers learnt that Lwa Ndlunkulu was at another event in Venda, Limpopo and that she had not been paid a booking fee to appear at Louis Cafe.
A staffer, who asked not to be identified because he is not authorised to speak to the media, said patrons left the venue halfway through Qwana’s performance, forcing him to drop his set.
“A lot of people came there to see Lwa Ndlunkulu and only realised later that she was not coming. So, they kept telling the MC that they came for her and not Aubrey,” he said.
“The patrons left the venue one by one. The people who were left [behind] looked so bored and didn’t even focus on [Aubrey’s] performance.
“He obviously gave it his all, because he was just happy to be there, but they were not feeling him at all, they wanted Lwa Ndlunkulu.”
In a statement, the nightclub said Lwa Ndlunkulu could not show up because an events company could not secure her booking on time.
“We would like to address the artist’s no-show last night [Saturday] at Louis Café. We were approached by an events and promotions company [as published on the event’s poster] called EEP that asked us for an opportunity to use our venue to host Lwa Ndlunkulu at their own discretion,” said the club.
“After numerous meetings, we granted the venue to them to use. We noticed that there seemed to be an issue with the flow of the event when the agreed schedule time for the artist’s performance came to pass with no clear communication from their end to us.
“We then took it upon ourselves to contact the artist’s management company directly to find the reason why Lwa Ndlunkulu wouldn’t honour her booking.
“We were then brought up to speed that EEP never secured a booking with them for Lwa Ndlunkulu, and that they accepted another booking coming from Venda. The situation last night was beyond Louis Café control.”
Another booking for the Ithuba hitmaker has since been secured for her to make an appearance at Louis Café at the weekend.
“We are aware about how Lwa Ndlunkulu’s fans are greatly disappointed by this and how our brand has been negatively affected by all this, hence the executive decision to book Lwa Ndlunkulu directly at Inkabi Records, with no third party involved,” the club said.
Lwa Ndlunkulu told Sunday World that she did not show up at Louis Café because she was not booked for the event.
Qwana was not immediately available for comment at the time of publishing.
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