One On One With The Music Man

This time around it had nothing to do with her sexual appeal or any of her sensuous provocations on stage.

It had all to do with the dollars she earned and returned with from a United Nations contract in Liberia.

Upon her return from that laborious musical undertaking, in contributing to restore life to Ghana?s war-torn neighbour through entertainment, Mzbel had hoped for a well-deserved sound sleep.

Alas, that was not to be. Apparently someone from within had stirred the demon in some assailants and robbers by drawing their attention to Mzbel?s $10,000 and ₤500 with which she was said to have returned from Monrovia. And in their vicious pursuit of that, they apparently had more.

At about 1am on Tuesday, with her nephew by her side (apparently the only male in the house with five other young women), Mzbel felt a slap on her back and when she turned, she saw three armed robbers.

That began a torturous ordeal lasting all the way till she escaped to make a report at the Odorkor Police Station at 5am. In her report to the police, Mzbel claimed that the robbers who wielded a gun, sticks and machetes, had entered the room after breaking the door to her well furnished living room. The robbers, said: ?Bring all the dollars?, a comment which presupposed that they had gotten wind that Mzbel had returned from Liberia where she had performed on the ticked of the United Nations.

As is the case with many, she denied having any such dollars on her. The robbers then ransacked the room in search of their booty. All this while, the other members in her residence, namely her cousin, dancer and two other young ones, who were the first to be attacked, were locked up in one of the bedrooms at gunpoint.

Two out of the three robbers each had his turn. Not satisfied with her, they were said to have pounced on the dancer in the other room and subjected her to ?one round? each of sex. Since Mzbel sang her song ?I be 16 years, I go de be like this oo, if you touch my thing oo, I go tell mummy oo,? she had known no peace. But, unlike the lyrics of that song, which has become a household song on the lips of many youths, she told the police about her agony even before the mother and family could get to know about it.

When the Odorkor police got to her rented premises at New Gbawe, the cement blocks which were used in breaking the door were still on the green carpet of the plush living room decorated with white flowery curtains and cream-colour leather chairs.

Wearing a brownish braided hair and an ?Agbada?, Mzbel was in serious grief when the Showbiz team got to her residence. She looked shocked by the incident and was visibly traumatized. From room to room, she took the police personnel round to show them where the robber raided in search of their booty.

?I regret whetting the appetite of my numerous fans about my third album which is coming out soon,? she said in a soft voice. Mzbel added? ?I would have joined my boyfriend in the United Kingdom and stayed away from the public eye for a while because I feel so miserable and sad about what has happened.?

She describes herself as a very quiet person who shies away from the public. She explains that she only performs with sexy apparel on stage ?and it ends there.? ?I do not dress ... the way I do on stage when I am out in public.? She therefore wondered what had made her a target for the robbers who did not only steal her belongings but also her womanhood.

Mzbel, according to her manager and producer popularly known as Goodies, will soon be going to the altar. ?She is getting married very, very soon,? Goodies proudly said. When she was asked about that, the question brought some smile on her face, perhaps the first smile after her ordeal that night, and she replied, ?Yes, very soon?. The smile lingered and it became broader and broader until it turned into a short laughter.

At that stage, she was beginning to regain her composure and progressively disclosed to Showbiz that sometimes, she felt like quitting the job if that would be the only way to stay away from the public domain and away from robbers.

She said she was yet to recover fully from last year?s incident on the campus of the only technology university in the country named after the first President of the Republic, Dr Kwame Nkrumah. ?It is an incident and an experience I would not want to remember and this attack has added to the pain already in me,? she said, adding that ?I do not know but I feel down and traumatized.?

?A person of your stature should have some security around you at all times,? Showbiz remarked and to this she responded: ?I used to have but after some time, I stopped calling them.

?Like I told you, I never like to be seen above others so I always want to lie low just like anybody else.? Mzbel added: ?With this, I have to rescind that decision and find some bodyguards around me as long as I live in this country.?She denied ever having any quarrels with anybody to warrant the attack except to say that sometime ago she had some misunderstandings with her stepbrother, who once lived with her.

?But we reconciled and I wonder why he will order such an attack on me,? she said. The armed robbers reportedly mentioned the name of the stepbrother whose name was not immediately known, a situation which compelled the police to pick him up from bed that same day.

As to whether she had had any sour relationship with a man or something, Mzbel who at this stage was wearing a sad face, replied in the negative.

?My fianc? is in the UK and he wants me to come over. I do not bear him any grudge and I have for one moment not thought evil about him for him to order such a heinous attack on me.?

Earlier, the 19-year-old dancer in her residence who also suffered sexually at the hands of the two robbers told the Showbiz that ?this is the first time I have had such an experience.?

Pleading anonymity, she said she was moved from the room where she and the others were taken hostage into her bedroom and was directed to take off her clothes.

?I was wearing jeans shorts and a small top and when I initially tried to resist, I was given a couple of slaps?, she said. She pointed to the slightly faded blue jeans shorts and the top and said: ?This was what I was wearing. I was not in a night gown.?

The cousin of the famous female musician, for her part, said she was slapped with the back of a gun when she tried to put up some resistance.

She raised her dress in tears and showed to the police officers the thick, black mark on her left buttocks.

According to her, she heard the hard knock on the door but mistook it for her sister until she saw the robbers in the room. ?They made requests about the dollars but I told them ?I have none?, she said. Asked whether she was also raped, she said ?no?.