SOUTH AFRICA – DJ Maphorisa has been pushing musicians under his stable to take extra gigs because of his failure to repay a R20 million debt he owes to Sony Music, it has been revealed.
Maphorisa has found himself embroiled in various controversies over royalty payments recently, with some artists accusing him of swindling them of their earnings.
According to Zimoja, the music producer had been pushed to the financial limits due to the failure pay the debt which had been ballooning due to interest.
“He took an advance from the company, because he was sure that he was going to be able to pay it back, but now he’s struggling to pay it back, because of course he has to pay the interest back,” a source told Zimoja.
According to the source, Maphorisa has been having sleepless nights on how to address the problem.
“He’s stressed, because he has to pay them back, he fell into the trap that most artists fall into and take advances from record labels forgetting that they’ll want it back with interest,” said the source.
So bad had the situation that Maphorisa was now forcing his artists work overtime in a bid to cover his arrears.
“Other artists are bearing the brunt of his debt, because he needs to pay up or else he stands to big time, because the debt is old now and he promised to pay it up,” another informant revealed.
Maphorisa refused to comment on the issue.
In April, Limpopo singer Shebeshxt criticised DJ Maphorisa during a podcast with L-Tido for their collaboration on the song “Twerka.”
Shebeshxt complained about not getting the agreed split sheets and finding out about the release date online and not through Maphorisa.
More recently, Sir Trill has claimed that he did not earn a cent from his work with Maphorisa and had to go to bed hungry because of financial disputes between them. Telly Africa
