Nigerian singer Asake when he headlined the 2024 Afronation concert in Portugal.
Wueh! Wueh! That was me every single minute at the Asake concert held in Nairobi on December 20, 2025.
It started at the entrance. I arrived around 9pm. My driver dropped me near Gate A. As I started walking, I met two girls looking shaken. They warned me: “Don’t go that direction... girls are screaming that side.”
I thought people were getting robbed. But the reality was a different kind of horror: a stampede.
When I arrived, there were no clear signs indicating where the respective gates were located. Those who had purchased regular tickets were using the same entrance as those with VIP tickets. Everyone ended up at Gate A, only to be redirected by the Tukutane Entertainment staff – very casually – to other gates. Regular ticket holders were sent to Gate C.
Some attendees told us they had queued for more than 40 minutes, confused, watching no tickets being scanned and no one entering.
Frustration kicked in. People pushed through weak security, gates were breached, and chaos followed. People fell. Others were trampled.
The chaos led to the tragic death of 20-year-old Karen Lojore.
Daystar University student Karen Lojore lost her life at the Tukutane concert headlined by Nigerian artiste Asake.
What was supposed to be a night of Afrobeats and vibes turned into a concert marred with poor organisation, technical failure, and, tragically, the loss of a life.
The VIP that wasn't
I managed to get in, but the "VIP experience" was nothing to write home about. For Sh12,000, you’d expect value. Instead, people got total incompetence.
All of a sudden, the VIP queue at Gate A just stopped moving. People stood there for 40 minutes, trapped. No one in, no one out.
When they finally let them in, they didn't even scan tickets or provide wristbands. These people wandered toward the VIP section – again, no signs – only to be blocked by the security team because they didn't have the tags they never gave them!
They had to trek back to the main gate, argue their way through, and trek back in. All this while being rained on!
Once inside, the VIP section felt like a joke. It wasn't "VIP" anything. In fact, the regular section looked better because it wasn't as cramped. When the rain got heavy, everyone flooded the seated VIP area anyway.
The staff? They didn't care and they were not helping. At one point, when the VIPs were being held in a "no-go" zone, I asked a staff member where we could get drinks.
Their response? “Maybe you’ll just have to stay without drinks and food.”
Imagine paying Sh12,000 to be told to go hungry and thirsty while standing in the rain.
Technical disaster
Even the performances were marred by a lack of preparation. Azeezah, the official host of the Asake concert, did her thing – she’s a pro, and then called Gabzy, (Gabriel Akinyemi), a prominent British Nigerian singer and songwriter, to the stage.
She called him three times. Nothing.
We thought he had cancelled. When he finally emerged, he was constantly tapping his earpiece. The sound was so bad he eventually just said, “The show must go on, even with bad sound,” and he proceeded.
Then came the rather awkward wait for Asake, the Nigerian Afrobeats star.
Asake, whose real name is Ahmed Ololade, burst into the music scene in 2022 with his debut album Mr Money with the Vibe.
There was no DJ, no music, nothing to entertain us as we waited for the man of the hour. We became our own entertainment system, making phone calls and cracking jokes just to keep the mood up.
When Asake finally appeared – an hour later – the earpiece issues continued. While performing Remember – my all-time favourite – he kept missing the beat. They eventually cut the instrumentals and let us sing most of it.
The warning signs were evident long before the gates opened. Kodong Klan, known for their song Disko cancelled that morning, citing a "consistent pattern of disrespect."
According to multiple sources familiar with the concert preparations, who requested anonymity because they were not authorised to speak publicly, tension had been brewing behind the scenes ahead of the event.
And while apologies have followed, they will not undo what was lost that night, not just money, but trust in future concerts in Kenya, safety, and a young life.
