Buju Banton went on an angry rant where he told the LGBQT community to “purge oonu heart so oonu can see God face”.
He accused the community of stopping him from earning and “breaking the cycle of poverty” for his generation.
“Oonu sit down and all oonu do is try tear down oonu one another. “Yu cannot tear I down, mi tear down already, ah build me a build now,” he said, while flashing a middle finger during his rant on TikTok Live.
He said that he would never be a beggar.
“Mi God is real, and mi wuk and sweat fi mine because mi anno battybwoy, mi no draw mi ass nowhere fi mine, mi work hard. So when oonu out de a hate, memba this. To Buju Banton, most of oonu caan relate, ah God mi say , go say something mek we can hear it,” Buju railed.
He announced that he had pushed the dates.
“Mi push dem forward, mi no gone nowhere cause dem caan do it like Buju, good over evil. Dem cannot stop my love, your love or the Father love, so wah dem ah go do? Dem a go use dem fuckery fi divide us, it caan work. We have been divided before, now we solid-er. Mi love oonu and see oonu tonight inna Washington D.C,” he said.
The Overcomer Tour, the first-ever arena tour from Banton, has been plagued by cancellations with at least eight dates of the 14-city tour cancelled in the past three weeks.
Buju Banton posted on his official Instagram account that all the shows had been rescheduled to 2025.
“Due to scheduling conflicts beyond my control, I am rescheduling the Boston, Philadelphia, Connecticut, Houston, Dallas, Phoenix, LA and Chicago dates to 2025,” the Untold Stories singer said.
“I want to ensure I deliver the highest caliber of an experience and my fans are my highest priority. I look forward to sharing the new dates for these cities in the very near future. Thank you to all the reggae lovers across the world for showing up for us all,” he concluded the message.
In the past, Buju Banton came under scrutiny for homophobic songs like “Boom Bye Bye”. In fact, 15 years ago, the gay lobby against his shows led to a rash of cancellations after shows at The Ritz and Jannus Landing in Tampa on the basis of gay-bashing lyrics that Banton wrote when he was a teenager. At that time, Banton ended up playing The Cuban Club in Tampa, where organizers contractually-obligated the singer from playing the “Boom Bye Bye,” a track that was removed from the artist’s catalogue in 2019.
Buju Banton seemed to have turned a corner as he was able to successfully perform at the 21,500-capacity Amalie Arena in Tampa, Florida, on August 25.
