QUEEN IFRICA - FREEDOM OF SPEECH - PENTHOUSE RECORDS

Click the link below to check out Ifrica's lyrical response to all the flack she is getting for speaking her mind!

QUEEN IFRICA - FREEDOM OF SPEECH -

All Hail the Queen of the Republic of Montego Bay: Queen Ifrica

Now as Montego Bay's image and along with it Jamaica's image as well, is being torn apart by foreign press and media. It seems the identity of the city is in dispute and on debate. Which Queen represents Montego Bay is it Queen Ifrica or is it the Gully Queen alleged gay martyr!

As Cliff Hughes, J-Flag and international gay lobby groups will issue their sanctimonious denouncements from their farcical moral high ground. "In times likes these, when we are missing our heroes," men like Obama, not just the president, part of a rich black elite, would "stand up" for homosexuality and gay right, yet stand down on matters of the black community, while black unemployment is at its worst. When Jamaica is willing to highlight Scamming from Montego Bay yet ignore the undeniable root in and link to homosexuality, when Jamaica endorses Tommy Lee as the best of Montego Bay, some refuse to let go off Jah Cure's past conviction, and fail to endorse Queen Ifrica. When Carolyn Cooper is willing to highlight Vybz Kartel, promote him in the hallowed halls of academia. In an age where Poorsha promise to put away allegiance to the British crown. In an age where Rasta is appropriated by whomever to do whatever... Why is it the that a strong black Rasta woman from Montego Bay has to stand up as Queen... and I believe right now, not just for Montego Bay but Jamaica? Why is it that she is not getting the recognition she deserves.

I think JFLAG is out of line on this and need to hop of Montego Bay's Queen back... OK!

Ifrica a represent Mobay the realest way! She is carrying on in the theatre of the public's collective consciousness, the role of Nanny, Nanna, Goddess Inanna, in the tradition of Queens like Sheba, Nefertiti, Nefertari, Cleopatra, the Candaces. First she schooled Peter Bunting, "Don't Cry Mister Bunting," so till if even only symbolic or effectual or for the sake of PR had to call her in and get advice, She stood up on the issue of Beedies, she has shown she is not afraid to say the unpopular when she sang "Daddy don't touch me there" "And no boy cyah draw mi round no corner," and "Keep it to yourself." She blessed up this city by titling one of her albums after this city... this in an age where everyone does just a city song or a big up weh come from song. Now she makes a stand for another cause, now JFLAG and Cliff Hughes want to make her a big deal for all the wrong reasons... this is how I would love to see other artistes using their powers for good, in a socially active way, more activism, as part of peaceful protests, lobbies, rallies, ganja rallies, ecological fairs etc.

Right now I wish she would attack Minister Ferguson on GMO and car pollution, it would seem he is only concerned with smoking and the financial incentives it can accrue via penalties and taxes. As a matter of fact she should see all the rest of the ministries on matters of education, culture, ecology and the environment. Teach "Hoggish Greedly" aka minister of Agriculture bout organic and urban farming, eco-city, ecopolis, vertical farms etc... She fi kunk Paulwell and step up the urgency of alternative energy!
Ifrica Mobay Love You...

"Keep it to yourself" by Queen Ifrica

As horrific as Dwayne's death is, as mob justice is horrific and irrational, he is no martyr nor any Queen!
Look at the pic on the wall in the background, the carving, is a man with an enlarged penis, and on the other side a picture of another dubious looking character. 

Long Live the Queen! Ifrica vs JFLAG & Cliff Hughes

Once again... a prominent Montegonian makes her voice heard on the issue of Gay Rights, only to be lambasted by JFLAG and accosted by Cliff Hughes... I would have risen to her defense but this write does a suitable enough job... read his take on the matter!

In Defense of Queen Ifrica!

 

 VIA FACEBOOK: Winston Gilling: Posting @ Speak your Mind Jamaica 

DOES SOMETHING AFFECT REASON WHEN THE TOPIC OF HOMOSEXUALITY IS DISCUSSED?? 

It's as if one cannot put up some argument in support of homosexuality and/or homosexuals without sounding silly.

Heard parts of an interview with Cliff Hughes and Queen Ifrica about an incident at the Grand Gala where she asked all straight people to identify themselves (or something to the effect).

Now, Cliff Hughes argued that the "Jamaican Family" was gathered at the stadium, which included heterosexuals and homosexuals, and it was therefore in poor taste for her to single one group.

How silly can we get?

Could someone ask Mr. Hughes for me if, included in the "Jamaican family" at the stadium were men who support their children and men who don't.

Would it have been in poor taste if she gave a shout out to men who support their children? Would Cliff Hughes then tell her she was insensitive to men who don't support their children?

What if she asked all women who would never sell their bodies to raise their hands? Would Hughes have a problem with her being insensitive to prostitutes?

And since we are getting silly. What if she asked for an acknowledgement of all who would never take another man's life. Would Cliff Hughes say she was being sensitive to the murderers among the "Jamaican family" gathered at the stadium?

What is this passion that we feel and this need to come to the rescue of our very sensitive men who have sex with men, who are apparently in a crying mood whenever someone dares to suggest that something is wrong with homosexuality? Even if Cliff Hughes is comfortable with that, it is still WRONG. I'm sorry, Mr. Hughes, but you cannot sanitize it.

And let me just say this one last time - because Hughes went down that road too - no one was murdered in Western Jamaica recently, merely for being homosexual. He was murdered (AND I CONDEMN HIS MURDER) for apparently deceiving a straight man.

Queen Ifrica can understand that and pointed it out tho him. Apparently, Cliff Hughes cannot understand that point. Just to finish that point.

The cross dressers in this photo

- IN WESTERN JAMAICA - were not murdered - though in full sight of everyone. Apparently, they danced with their own, or did they?


FINALLY - Queen Ifrica sounded much more intelligent than Cliff Hughes when she asked him to define homophobia. Which public is it that FEARS homosexuals or homosexuality?? KMT

Read the link below for more insight into the Queen Ifrica JFLAG Saga!

The Montegonian: Queen Ifrica's Grand Gala performance disappoints JFLAG :: News

Montegonian Editorial Exclusive: Jamaica, Black Leadership and the Future!

It's been almost one year since Jamaica 50 and sometimes I wonder have we forgotten who we are as a people and has the media forgotten who we are! 

There was a time when PanAfricanism was ripe in the island, with the likes of Walter Rodney and Rastafari played a role as the memory of the people, when people remembered their Africaness. There was a time when Michael Manley was in dialogue with Kwame Nkruma and Julius Nyrere. 

Oh come on, for goodness sake! We were a people that inspired Haile Selassie to come here, a man so revered he was on the cover of Time several times and featured in the national geographic and is even spoken of highly still today in modern literature such as Robert Greene's Strategies of War and Laws of Power, as well as Wings to Freedom by and Indian Yogi named Yogiraj Gurunath Siddhanath. Jamaicans are a people that inspired Nelson Mandela to come here. We produced Marcus Garvey one of the greatest black icons and PanAfricanist of all times. We produced Bob Marley who not only the world loved but Africans.

So why is it then that as Africa is now being looted and plundered by Europe and America, commercially colonized by China with a renewed 21st century thrust... Why is no one speaking out about it? Europeans are streaming into northwest Africa en masse, the huge U.S. airlift capacity may soon be necessary to keep the “Crusaders” supplied and the military industrial complex oiled and firing. African militaries are being cobbled to do the Caucasian’s bidding. 

The U.S. has almost practically establish a Somalia-like operation on the near side of Africa – with Americans at the helm. A sentiment echoed by even republican politician in the states Ron Paul who said "U.S. Action in Mali is Another Undeclared War".

All this while in America itself under the Obama administration the plight of Black Americans has worsened:  A recent interview on MSNBC’s “Meet the Press,” NAACP CEO and president, Ben Jealous, told the show’s host that black Americans “are doing far worse” than when President Obama first took office. “The country’s back to pretty much where it was when this president started,” Jealous told show host David Gregory. “White people in this country are doing a bit better. Black people are doing far worse.”  Dr. Julianne Malveaux of Your Black World recently wrote that the Obama Administration needs to speak out more about existing racial disparities and persistent problems in black unemployment.

The Black Diaspora has seen the US elect thousands of African American local and state officials and re-elect the first black president. But Obama seems to have proven just a symbol, symbolic and nothing more. Nothing real, nothing substantial, nothing progressive as it pertains to the plight of blacks.

The media is slow and unwilling to note that our black leaders are dithering. Floundering. Flailing... failing and falling even. Symbolism supersedes the fact that black leadership has few or no victories to boast for the seventies, the eighties, the nineties or the new century, apart from their own illustrious careers. 

No black leader is man enough to speak to or look at the fact that the war on drugs and the prison state sprung up in north America. The symbol of Obama over rides the fact that black unemployment remains at record levels, that US wages have not risen in thirty years and that the first black president apparently forgot his campaign promise to raise the minimum wage to $9.50 an hour almost as soon as he made it. And what has been done for the Caribbean? Nothing. He continues an illegal international embargo on Cuba, he continues Gitmo torture in our territory, and turned down our request to exonerate Jamaica's hero and Rastafari Icon Marcus Garvey. 

Obama seems a symbol used to nullify and quiet the analytic black mind and voice. "Nigger shut up we got a black president now!" 1 black President... and 10 million  black persons still suffering. And let us not examine his neglect of his black family in Kenya, or his brother that lives in a Shanty Town.

Who in Jamaica or the media is willing to look past the fact that he is JUST a black president and willing to examine the fact that the black role model president conducts weekly “Terror Tuesday” meetings in the White House basement at which he dispatches drones to murder and special forces to kidnap and torture in Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia and across the African continent. It matters not at all that the First Lady is a poster girl for Wal-Mart, attacking child weight, rather than bolstering education, that the Department of Justice prosecutes whistle blowers instead of war criminals, or that black military and diplomats like Susan Rice are up to their armpits in African blood.

The black political class at home and abroad is utterly self-interested. It cannot begin to mobilize black communities to demand higher wages, a massive jobs program to relieve unemployment, a new paradigm of urban economic development that isn't just moving poor people out of neighborhoods and richer ones in. It seems our egotistical black intelligentsia can't begin to make these things happen because foisting itself and its own advancement off as “representing” the black oppressed masses is the beginning and the end of who they are and what they do. They are not truly about the black diaspora and its plight, they do not truly care to ease the existential condition of his brothers, neighbours and friends.

For them, the election and and re-election of Barack Obama is the end of black history. The be all and end all of our history. Addressing black unemployment, pervasive economic injustice, opposing the neo-liberal,capitalist, globalist, transnational agenda of privatization and austerity put forth not just by the black president, but by an entire layer of black thinkers are, in their language not pragmatic or “realistic.”

So if our black leaders have anything to say about it, more years of Barack Obama means more years of black silence and irrelevance on the issues that matter most to our communities; on jobs and economic injustice. It means black leadership will wring its hands and do nothing as American federal policies drive the militarization of Africa. Our politicians will continue to philander and spinelessly acquiesce to whatever old might Uncle Sam says, we will genuflect at his very whim. We will not be the bold humans, bold leaders that stood down injustice and untruths in the past we will be the bandwagonists of a new age much to our demise!

Jamaica Gleaner News - Queen Ifrica plays, explains 'Montego Bay'

Queen Ifrica plays, explains 'Montego Bay
'Published: Thursday | July 16, 2009
Mel Cooke, Gleaner Writer

Montego Bay is Queen Ifrica's first album with VP Records.As she presented Montego Bay, her second full-length set, at her first album launch on Tuesday evening, Queen Ifrica's face and posture reflected the mood of the songs.And there was ample time and reason for the changes, Ifrica explaining the background to almost all the songs on the 13-track set in an extended stint at the podium during which she got noticeably more comfortable as time went on, engaging the large audience at Kabana, Hope Road, St Andrew.The trip through an outstanding album actually started with her voice alone, not the actual recording, as after a herald of horns, Ifrica delivered the album's title track a cappella, smiling, the audience cheering at the start and again when she hit the chorus.After the recording was played, Ifrica explained, "Montego Bay is special to me. That's where my whole Rastafari development took place." Still, she noted, the inner-city communities do not see the benefit of the 'lush' from the tourism industry.She was sombre for Streets Are Bloody, dedicating it to 20-year-old Ejaun, "a very close individual to Flames. He was gunned down by a soldier at a club". Ifrica described Ejaun's kindness, respectfulness and computer wizardry, commenting that in the society "the people who do good are the people who die like this". The song has the line "none is immune, Ejaun gone to soon".In My DreamsIfrica smiled as she asked, "Any lovers? Any husband, any wife, any matie?", before In My Dreams was played, rocking away with eyes closed and clasping her left shoulder with her right hand.And when she said "we ago step up the vibe" with Yad To The East, commenting "dis a di man whe dem sey inna Ifrica", Ifrica grinned gloriously as the rhythm hit and the crowd exploded at the opening line, "Selassie I never lose a fight yet".And so it continued, Ifrica often merging her voice with the tail end of the recordings, playfully prodding the audience to more enthusiastic applause and dropping advice on hard work, focus, purpose and the importance of teamwork to younger artistes.She has stuck to a team, as before she sang along to the recorded songs on Tuesday night, Ifrica sang the praises of Tony Rebel, giving the background to starting to work with his Flames Productions in 1998, after performing at a Garnet Silk tribute concert. And among the other persons Ifrica said thanks to was Penthouse's Donovan Germaine who "say I am a granddaughter of Penthouse, because Tony Rebel is a son".Guest speaker Kay Osbourne, general manager of TVJ, heaped praises on Queen Ifrica and Montego Bay, which she described as an awesome collection that showcases the inner workings of Ifrica's mind and soul."It is clear that this unique woman of truth has something to say," Osbourne said, taking a closer look at many of the songs. "She expresses the personal universally," Osbourne said later in her address.However, Osbourne is not impressed with much of Jamaican music being produced currently, pointing out the narcissism, exhibitionism, image manipulation and "the mere ability to attract attention is rewarded".Tony Rebel, who welcomed all to the album launch, spoke about Queen Ifrica's development, from not being able to do a song properly in the studio and having to be told 10 times what to do, that being reduced to thrice, then twice and "now you don't have to say anything".There was a time when she had to be asking producers to go on rhythms; now she is being requested. Long gone are the days when she was trying to get on shows; now there are so many offers she has to decline some."When you have someone like a Queen Ifrica standing up and not taking off her clothes I have to salute her," Rebel said.Extensive exposureIn presenting Montego Bay, Ifrica noted the struggle that her song about incest, Daddy (which appears in English and Spanish), has been going through in terms of getting extensive exposure on the airwaves, although it has connected in the streets and at live performances.When she was asked which track was her favourite Queen Ifrica did not name one, but said that the opening chant, TTPNC, is special, as "it is my whole Rastafarian belief ... That is who I am. I am a Niyabinghi woman".The recordings ended with Far Away, Lady Saw, Assassin, I-Wayne, Capleton and Tarrus Riley embracing Queen Ifrica onstage. It wasn't all over, though, as there was one more a cappella song for her to deliver, the crowd whooping for Keep It To Yourself.

Jamaica Gleaner News - Queen Ifrica plays, explains 'Montego Bay' - Entertainment - Thursday | July 16, 2009