‎Popular Nigerian singer, Michael Adebayo Olayinka, professionally known as Riger, has revealed that his exit from his former record label, Jonzing World, led to him being blacklisted.

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‎The 'Bounce' crooner made this revelation while featuring on the Afrobeats Intelligence podcast, stating that upon his exit, he immediately began battling "cancel culture" from both his fans, and some of his colleagues in the music industry.

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‎According to him, many Nigerians are of the notion that leaving a record label means one is ungrateful, and as such begins to ignore everything about the artiste.

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‎Ruger, however, noted that despite everything, he had to begin to do things from the scratch again, in order to get his feet back in the music industry.

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‎He said:
‎“After leaving the label [Jonzing World], there were a lot of comments about it. Some people were saying, ‘This is the last year you’re going to tour’, ‘This is the end’, ‘You’re finished’, this and that.

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‎“Not everybody were willing to help me because the public sentiment once you leave a label in Nigeria is that you are ungrateful. Many people don’t want to associate with that person, even those in the same industry. It happens.”

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‎“I was battling cancel culture. I had to meet a lot of people and reintroduce myself. I was doing a lot of things from the scratch. It’s stressful, I’m not going to lie. It’s not easy to leave a label. You have to build your own system. It was just like starting everything over again. But because I was strong inside -I was also down but I was still strong- I triumphed.”

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