One of the finest musicians to have come out of Limpopo, the self-styled king of Kwasa Kwasa music, Stephen Sefofa, came out smoking fire this week and has warned the public to stop buying pirated music, saying piracy had become a curse in the community.

He urged the community to desist from buying pirated music, as a way of assisting musicians in fighting the scourge of piracy. He has warned that musicians will be forced to take the law into their own hands if police do not display commitment to stop the scourge.

Sefofa, who is better known as Malo A Botsheba to his thousands of fans, made headlines last year when he staged a solo protest at the Department of Arts and Culture, demanding to be included in the line-up of the annual Marula Festival. He has now assumed this new role as anti-piracy ambassador.

Driving his kombi fitted with ghetto blasters, wherever he stops he always has a ready audience who comes to listen to his loud music. “We have tried all sorts of tricks to stop people from copying our music, but this does not seem to help. After a careful thought, we decided that the best way would be to educate consumers about the effects of buying pirated music,” said Sefofa.

“We spend a lot of money preparing our work to be better products. A lot of effort is put into making our music of a good standard, but we end up hearing ourselves in most households. We do not, however, receive any money to confirm that our music is selling. Artists who are supposed to be very rich are poor to the extent that even the younger generation sees no reason to emulate musicians. We die paupers, while our music is selling like hot cakes on street corners,“ he said, pointing at a group of people who were looking at pirated CDs in Thohoyandou.

Sefofa said they had engaged police on the issue, but the latter seem reluctant to arrest the culprits, who were doing their trade openly, without fear of retribution. “As artists, we are very worried about the lack of commitment on the part of the police to stop these criminals in their tracks. If this continues, we might be tempted to take the law into our own hands. We are trying to be gentlemen, but this seems not to be helping. Please help us stop this scourge, as it is killing our business,“ he said.

He said consumers were their last hope in the fight against piracy as they were ones who bought the pirate copies. “We are making an appeal to the public to help us fight this crime. Do not buy pirated music. Pirated music is easy to spot: it is of poor quality and sells very cheaply. The next time you find people selling DVDs and CDs at street corners for as little as R10, just know that it is fake music. Know that you are preventing the artist from making an honest living,” he said.