On September 12, 2024, the OAP called Tyla out on Instagram for her comment highlighting the diversity of African music beyond Afrobeats, during her acceptance speech for the award.
He wrote, “Aunty @tyla aka am not Afrobeats, I am Amapiano. We have heard you but your song “Water” isn’t amapiano either. If you thought you were categorized in a wrong category, you should have given the award back or denounced the nomination. You clearly took an award that didn’t represent you or your sound from that statement you made.”
“Again, you see why you “ESAUS” need to rethink. You all sold our birthright for peanuts. Afrobeat is Afrobeat not Afrobeats hence the confusion…” he added.
Tyla’s speech had addressed the tendency to group all African artists under the Afrobeats label, despite the genre’s significant influence and success.
She said, “This is just so special, but also bittersweet because I know there’s a tendency to group all African artists under Afrobeat[s]. It’s a thing, and even though Afrobeats has run things and has opened so many doors for us, African music is so diverse, it is more than just Afrobeats. “I come from South Africa. I represent amapiano. I represent my culture, and I just want to shout out [to] all the Afrobeats artists in this category with me.”
Tyla’s comment sparked intense controversy on social media and received a sharp rebuke from people, Do2dtun included.
The OAP also addressed the matter on Twitter, now known as X, further criticising what he perceives as a misrepresentation of African music genres.
He wrote, “A few selfish ones renamed an established genre to satisfy their pay masters. Yet again you see why it’s best to let the originators be allowed to educate the world. Tyla winning Best Afrobeat song is a miss in my opinion but how do you say it isn’t when a few added “s” to it.”
“Afrobeats was a quickie set up to a quick paycheck. Now you see why most of your faves stop identifying with it. It was quickly fixed to fix an identity crisis just cos the paymasters think it had one when in actual fact it didn’t. Now they define it how a few sold it to them,” he wrote in another post.