Peter Okoye , one half of the sensational Psquare brothers, has sat down to an explosive interview with The Netng where he dished out a...
Peter Okoye, one half of the sensational Psquare brothers, has sat down to an explosive interview with The Netng where he dished out all the dirty details behind the Psquare break-up drama that has been the talk of town. He also talked about his relationship with his twin brother, Paul, who he referred to as "weak" when it comes to standing his ground with their elder brother and manager, Jude "Engees" Okoye.
Peter disclosed that all he has been fighting for is for Psquare to have a proper business structure and separate family from business while Jude has been against him on this and even instigates Paul against him. He alleged that Paul and Jude are in the habit of going
behind him to get work on behalf of Psquare while anything he (Peter) brings would be sabotaged. He also disclosed that this has been going on for long but so as to avoid public scandal, he had always kept quiet and taken things like that...
Read excerpts from the interview below:
"Fighting back tears, Peter, who’s the first to go public with what’s
been a private issue for years, tells us Psquare fans must understand
that this is the end of the band as they know it.
‘The truth is’, he says, as his daughter Aliona comes
in, needing help to fix her toy, ‘the fans should be happy that we were
able to drop the ‘Double Trouble’ album in 2014. What’s happening now
should have happened then. ‘The issue was the fact that I was in Psquare and it felt like I was in
fear. If I don’t do this, Psquare will break-up, if I don’t do that,
Psquare will scatter.’
‘Four years ago, I told Jude he needs to step down as our manager,
because I didn’t want to disrespect him as a brother, but this is
business, [and] we have to structure it. And Jude said to me that
there’s a way I [should] talk to him, and [threatened to] slap me. So I
kept quiet.’
‘So, a few hours after, Paul came to me and said if I want Jude to
step down it wasn’t a problem, but it meant that he (Paul) would go
solo. The first time word got out about Psquare breaking up, a lot of
people called us; senators, governors, and people like that. In fact,
three of us were once in a private jet to go and see someone who wanted
to resolve our issues, and we didn’t speak to each other throughout the
flight. At the end of the day, I swallowed my pride for peace to reign
and allowed Jude to remain as our manager.’
‘I and Paul stay together in this estate and the last time I saw him was about a week ago.’
‘Truth is, I’ve not been in talking terms with Paul since December
2015 and that was why I travelled in January because I had a lot on my
mind.
Something happened at Mavin Studios last year that broke my heart.
Now listen to this, Psquare featured on songs with J-Martins, Bracket, LKT, 9ice and these 4 songs were done by Paul alone, but guess what, did I appear in the videos, YES’.
‘Now hear this, we have other collabos with Kaha, Darey, Ruggedman. I did these songs alone. How come they don’t have videos? Paul refused to appear in the videos.’
‘So I told Paul that when next he does a collabo alone, he should be
in the video alone, because it got to a point where artistes began to
feel if they did a collabo with Paul it [would] get a video, but if it
was me, it [wouldn’t] get a video.
The last collabo we did was with Flavour
and I refused to do another one. Even Flavour had to speak all the Igbo
he knows to convince me before I agreed to do it. Only for my brother
to come and tell me that ‘shey I thought you said you won’t appear in any video that I did the collabo alone? Why did you appear on this one?’. I was sad but I knew another one will come’.
‘So Tiwa Savage called
me; apparently Paul had done a song with her – not the campaign song
they are promoting now, another Psquare collabo entirely. So she [said]
she’s been trying to reach Paul to get the CD of the song from him
[because] he’s already done his part, so I went to Paul’s house to help
ask for it and tell him I want to go to the studio to do my verse and he
said he doesn’t know where the CD is.’
‘I went to the Mavin studio to meet Tiwa. When I got there, she asked
for the CD and I told her Paul didn’t give me any CD, so I called him
again and gave the phone to Tiwa and [he] told her on phone that the CD
is at Omole, so I got into the studio, recorded my verse and when I
finished, everybody was clapping. I was surprised to realize that Paul
had [told] them that I don’t sing or write songs.’
‘I felt really bad and betrayed, but I covered up for him. I jokingly asked Teebillz if
they gave him Red Label and he said yes, so I was like you guys caused
it, and we laughed over it. So when my assistant went to pick up the CD,
Paul and Jude started shouting at him to ‘ask Peter what is he doing at the Mavin studio? He knows how we work.’ The next day, I went to Paul and told him how I felt when I heard what he said. Only for Jude to say that he made Paul the lead singer of Psquare 8 years ago! A leader leads, he doesn’t destroy.’
On PSquare's lack of structure as a business entity, Peter said:
‘When it came to decision-making, it was always a Triangle formation,
and the highest vote wins. I never used to complain because we were all
okay, but what has changed now is the fact that we’ve grown. You can
make a certain decision based on how we used to do it and it may affect
everyone as an individual, but it gets to a point when the decisions
taken are never my own and I began to wonder if anything was wrong.’
‘Most of Psquare ideas came from me, like [the] materials we needed to
put out for people to see, video, stage performances and all. But when I
came up with them, nobody wanted to accept it. I didn’t complain
because people still love what we do, but then again, there wasn’t much
competition in the industry back then.’
‘As time goes, we should get better; it shouldn’t be same triangle
deciding, because if we continue that same way, we’ll lose it. All I
want is a proper structure in the sense that, we need to have proper
management, business managers and all.’
‘As I speak to you right now, we don’t have an office, [we have] no
structure. When this issue started about five years ago, our lawyer told
us the way we run our business is wrong.’
‘I’ll give you an instance’, ‘We had to go perform somewhere once, and because I had a slight
argument with Paul, he said he wasn’t going. It was the wedding of the
President’s daughter. When I got to the airport my brother wasn’t there,
and I [didn’t know] how I was going to explain to the President that we
[couldn’t] perform. I made up my mind to go with the band, perform like
that and lie that my brother was sick. So we left for Abuja, and when
we got to the hotel, my assistant manager called [to say] he was on the
way to the airport with Paul, so we had to wait for them to land in
Abuja and that was why we couldn’t make it on time to the reception.’
‘The president was mad. In fact, Mama Peace (Patience Jonathan)
was really mad. But we eventually made up for it with a performance at
the Gala night. Only for Jude to [tell me that] Paul said he wasn’t
going for a show and I still went [without him]. Imagine if Jude had a
proper structure and we had contracts? That wouldn’t happen. And it was
more because the show came through me. If the show came through Jude, it
wouldn’t have happened. I don’t have a problem with doing things as a
family, but structure and proper organization is important too. The name
Psquare is very big outside but inside we have no structure. I see
people like Audu of Chocolate City, Mavin Records, even Ubi Franklin,
and I wanted us to have a structure like that. Psquare is just up there
because of the grace of God.’
‘It’s really sad that people have labeled me ‘Dancer’ and they don’t
really know what I do for Psquare. Kudos to Paul, I’m not a good
songwriter; in fact, I’ll rate myself 30%, so when it comes to song
writing, I give it to Paul 100%.
‘However, not writing songs does not disqualify you from being a
musician. I can tell you for free that a Nigerian wrote two of the songs
on Rihanna’s
new album. I’ve travelled a lot and most times people ask, ‘which one
are you, the singer or the dancer’? And it’s really sad.’
‘In Psquare, I am the creative person, I can sit-down and tell you what
people want to hear, what they want to see and what they want to learn
from Psquare. But it’s not something to brag about.’
‘Jude directs all our videos.’
‘This whole thing began when Paul went online and started posting lyrics
of most of our songs on Instagram [and saying]that he wrote them all,
just because Peter brought in something to the table. I had been trying
to bring more business for Psquare. I didn’t know it was going to cause
problems. I sent my manager to a meeting in Senegal to meet with
Universal music about getting us deals, and when he came back, the way
they responded to him wasn’t encouraging.’
‘So I had to send Diouf (the footballer) to help get
the documents and convince my brothers before we could pull through with
the deal. After some months, we started making money. Meanwhile, while
filling the forms, Jude filled everything as Psquare. So the first
payment came and we shared it. The second payment was bigger, and we
shared it too. That was when Paul said we had to re-fill the form and
give proper credit to the songwriter (Himself) and said if the form
wasn’t brought back, he would expose me and tell the world that he
writes all the songs. The next day he went online to post those lyrics.
So my question is, when he was doing that what did Jude do about it?
Absolutely nothing!’
‘I remember I once told Paul something when Jude became our manager; he
was using the term ‘Our Money,’ that was when we made our first 1
million [naira]. I called Paul and told him that our former manager used
to make about 15%, and now that Jude is our manager, let’s think of a
percentage that we’ll be giving him and put it on paper. Paul said it’s
not necessary. He probably went to tell Jude about it. I’m sorry to say
this, but I think Paul is weak.’
‘You know they say change is constant, you can’t stay in one spot. As
the industry moves, you move. So I won’t say the problem we have is
money. I think everybody is just dragging power unnecessarily. Imagine
Jude telling me that he’s in charge of Psquare and there’s nothing Peter
and Paul can do about it, and I look at Paul and he’s quiet about it.
I’ve never seen where a manager talks to his artistes anyhow. If there’s
an issue you should call us aside quietly to talk about it.’
‘On December 14, 2015, we sat down to have a meeting hoping to set a
proper structure in place, but Paul noticed that it wasn’t working the
way he wanted, so he said he’s starting a new group. I thought he meant
he wanted to start a record label, and he was like no, he’s starting a
new group that he belongs to. And Jude simply said, ‘anybody stop you?’
He picked up his phones and walked out of the meeting. I felt it had
already been discussed behind me. I later found out that Paul was
already recruiting for the group and Jude is their manager. At the
moment I hear they are called ‘The MVPs’ I don’t know what it means
yet.’
‘So how do you expect me to be managed by the same person we’ve been
having issues with, who is now the manager of the other group? There’ll
surely be conflict of interest.’
‘[Recently] Jude called me, after I had said he was fired. He called
me on a Thursday to say ‘Hope you know we are going to the embassy
tomorrow for that show in Holland.’ I know about the show, [because] it
was already booked before the issues started, so I told him, ‘Bro you
are not my manager, talk to my manager.’ He said, ‘Noted.’ The next day,
they went to the embassy with the new group members, which means they
had already set up their interviews at the embassy because it’s not
possible to get an appointment in less than 24 hours. I traced the
organisers and told them Jude represents only Paul. I told them this is
what it takes to get Peter and Paul, Peter alone or Paul alone.’
‘So
I went on social media to protect our careers, because if I didn’t do
that, Psquare will not release any material anytime soon, they’ll be
busy promoting their artistes.’
‘And I remember going to talk to Paul about it before I went on social
media. I went to his house, and he was in his room with his friend,
[whom I asked to excuse us, but] Paul said, no, his friend should stay,
[and that] anything I want to say should be said in front of him. So I
said, no, you know we are brothers and he was like, ‘oh, na now you know say we be brothers.’
I told him I came to talk to him about what’s been happening, but it
was turning into an argument so I left and I travelled out. I was away
for over a month, knowing that we didn’t have any shows at that time. I
went to Turkey and London to rest my mind, my friend Samuel Eto’o invited me to come.’
‘The day I fired Jude was at a concert. The day I came back, we had a
show, so I went straight to the venue in Lagos and told Jude I want to
talk to him, and he said I should say anything I want to say in front of
everyone, [which] was the same attitude Paul gave me before I
travelled. So Jude said if I like, I should get out, and I said ‘guy
don’t embarrass me.’ He said who are you, because you think you are
Psquare? So I told him openly that if he cannot resolve me and Paul’s
issue, he doesn’t deserve to be our manager, and he said I should get
out. There and then I told him ‘You are fired’! He looked at me and
said, ‘You fit fire me?’ That was when I entered my car and started tweeting. How else can you take him out?’
‘[In
fact,] long before I made up my mind, Paul had already said there’s no
more Psquare, [and that] if Jude leaves, he goes with him.’
‘Before I announced my management, I wanted my mind to be clear, so I
went back to Paul, this time we were alone and we [discussed things]; I
told him I had no issues with him, but he needs to stop letting Jude use
him as a shield. Both of us started shedding tears, and when we
finished he still said he hopes I’m not here to tell him that I still
want Psquare, and I told him I want to move on, because he already has a
manager (Jude) and I don’t, so I had to structure myself too. And I
didn’t want to allow the Psquare name to fade before moving on. Look at
Don Jazzy and Dbanj, when they broke up, they waited for like 6 months
and had to start again. Now, that Psquare just broke up, let me use the
name to move on quickly, because there’s no time.’
‘To be honest with you, I feel if our mum was still alive, we would
have pushed her to her grave with this whole thing. It’s really sad that
even with everything going on, I still stand with Paul.’
‘It still boils down to the fact that Psquare was not structured. Music is like football, Messi has his manager, Neymar has his manager, Suarez has his manager, but when they get to the pitch, they play as a team’.
‘Before I did the Olympic deal, I’d brought some deals for Psquare. The
people endorsing Psquare only see Peter and Paul, but behind [the
scenes] its Peter, Paul and Jude so the price goes so high that it never
works.’
‘But when a deal comes to my table, it’s not like they called Jude
and I went behind to talk to them, the deal came directly to me from
Jude’s friend. He called me and told me about it, and before then I had
already established my own beverage factory and the deal coming was from
PZ, which means I could do more business with them, so should I lose
that deal because they didn’t call Jude?’
‘I asked them
why me and not Psquare, and they said they couldn’t afford Psquare, and
the brand was tailored to fit one person. So I went back to tell Paul
and Jude and they didn’t say anything. They didn’t ask me not to do it.
Don’t get it wrong, we’ve been doing different private businesses, the
only difference was that the Olympic deal came out in public. I’ve been
doing mass housing projects on my own, Paul has been doing real estate,
Jude has been doing his own thing, he even [set up the] Northside record
label, so it’s not like it’s the first thing I’m doing alone. It’s just
the first one that went public.’
‘So even when I decide to open my beverage factory, people will still ask why I am doing it alone without my brother.’
‘I hear lot of people think it’s all a stunt, and that’s what I
really want to put an end to. It’s not a stunt at all. It has been going
on for a while’.
‘When Jude didn’t come to my wedding,
people started saying we broke up and then others said it’s a stunt.
When Paul posted those lyrics on Instagram people thought it was a stunt
too, but the truth is that this is not and has never been a publicity
stunt. I am telling you the truth. I am moving on because people are
already getting tired of this Psquare brouhaha. Now I have my manager,
Olatunde Michaels, and I expect everybody to respect that. I am a family
man, a musician, singer and dancer. If I don’t move on, Psquare will
collapse and there’ll be nothing left’.
‘Already Paul has done two
songs without me but no one is saying anything, he did a song with his
artiste ‘Muno’ with his name as Rudeboy did they feature me? He did a
song with Tiwa Savage, did they feature me?’
‘Last week Yemi Alade
sent me her album track list to help her share on Instagram, guess what
I saw, she had a song with Psquare that I didn’t even know about. Only
Paul did it.’
‘Because I announced new management, people feel I’m the one going solo,
but Paul has already gone solo. He’s moved on and didn’t need to
announce any new management because he still works with Jude, so I had
to announce mine and believe it or not, people are booking me for gigs
already.’
‘And guess what, I’ll still perform Psquare songs, nobody can stop me,
nobody can stop Paul too, we didn’t have a contract with Jude, so I have
the right to perform Psquare songs especially the ones I took part in’.
‘I’ll also consider releasing solo songs and even albums. Truth is – in
the last album Paul did some songs alone, I did some songs alone. ‘Bring
It On’ was Paul alone, ‘Eje Ajo’, ‘Shekini’ was done by me alone’.
‘Remember the 4 songs ‘Free For Fans’ that we released, those songs were removed from the last album and I leaked them’.
‘I have some songwriters already, V-Tek writes for me, and I’m still bringing up more’.
On sharing of their joint properties:
‘Because of what was happening, it was like two against one, so I
said let’s share our properties. When I said that, Paul said if we want
to share our properties, Jude must get the same share with us otherwise
Psquare will split and I was like ‘SPLIT-AGAIN?’
‘Our
lawyer came and told Paul that it’s wrong to share it equally with Jude,
but he insisted, so we divided every property we owned in Lagos, Jos,
America, Abuja. In-fact the right and left wing of the Square Ville
mansion belongs to Paul and Jude now.
So that was how we shared all our properties equally among the three of us about two or three years ago.’
‘After sharing everything, I called Paul again and spoke to him about a proper structure. We’ve been with people like Akon and co and we see how it’s done. Right now, Psquare has millions of dollars in royalties hanging in the air.’
‘All our endorsement and shows are shared equally between the three of us as well.’
‘After
what it took to share our properties, I was embarking on a project, so I
needed more money and I wanted to sell my house in America and buy
something smaller, because I spend close to $30,000 to maintain that
condo every year.’
‘So I called my caretaker to begin the
process and she told Jude and Paul to send their data page and passport
photographs, but they refused because they know I wanted to the sell the
house. And see the value of dollars now. The house was valued at 100M
then, but if I sell it now, I could make extra 250M.’
‘And we already signed paper works and document of the house that it belongs to me but Jude ignored it, so I called our lawyer, Festus Keyamo to
inform him about the development. He called them and they both refused
to pick his call, so he sent them a text and requested that we should
have a meeting, but Jude replied him and said no need for a meeting that
the America house will be sold.’
‘Paul said we agreed and
signed on how to share but we haven’t really shared it yet, after all
Jude is still holding on to the documents.’
‘Three of us have properties close to each other in Parkview and that’s why I want to sell my own and move to Banana Island.’
‘I
can’t really understand why they don’t want a structure, to me I think
it’s ignorance, and if I decide to do it, it’ll seem like I’m looking
for trouble.’
On his wife and mother:
‘People think we changed when we started having wives. Before my mum
died, she was at St Nicholas hospital on the island, and my sisters were
living in this house (in Lekki), and every morning before my wife goes
to work, she’ll leave home at 5am in
the morning to go and stay with my mum even before we get there
ourselves. And when she closes from work, she’s back with her again.’
‘So
I just laugh when I hear people say my mum didn’t like my wife. It’s my
wife and sister that prepare my mum’s meals in the kitchen.’
‘Now
let me shock you: our wives, the three of them are the closest set of
people you can imagine. Even with all that’s going on. It’s really
surprising. Somehow, they respect themselves and stayed out of the whole
drama and I respect them a lot. And that’s somehow what has kept us
together for this long, otherwise Psquare would have ended like two or
three years back.’
On The issue with Cynthia Morgan
‘When I set up P-Classic records because people were saying Psquare
haven’t helped anyone, I saw the success of Tiwa Savage and I was close
to signing Cynthia Morgan and Simi. Ask them they’ll tell you.’
‘I
remember Paul came to the studio and said he heard I’m signing Simi and
Cynthia, I said ‘Yes’, and he was like ‘What will people see Jude as’,
and I gave him example of Drake and Young Money, Cash money.’
‘Oscar
(Producer of ‘Collabo’ ft. Don Jazzy) called to tell me that they can’t
sign the deal, because he heard it’s causing problem in Psquare.
Meanwhile Cynthia and Simi were both going through the contracts I gave
them only for them to return it two days later that they can’t do it.’
‘Two
weeks after, I was shocked to hear that Jude had signed Cynthia Morgan,
and she knows deep down that she’s never going to get a Psquare
collabo.’
He concluded by saying:
‘The truth is I feel happy it has come, because I’ve been staying in
Psquare out of fear for the last four years. The situation now is, if
you want Psquare to perform, you’ll have to get in touch with two
managers. I don’t care if you pay Paul’s management more than you pay me
– once we are able to agree, Psquare is still there. I just don’t want
to have a manager that feels he’s in control because he’s my elder
brother. And because of the legacy that I want Psquare to be remembered
for, that was why I went to talk to Paul the last time. I don’t want us
to start doing beef songs, or we see at the clubs and we don’t greet
each other, or ignore our kids and stuff like that. And even if Psquare
breaks up, I still want us to have our relationship as brothers. If I’ve
regretted anything in my life so far, I swear to God this is not one of
them, I’m happy because I’ve been in pain for a long time.’
‘It’s
good if we go and do stuff separately so that even IF we come back
we’ll have respect for each other. I wish Paul the best and I wish Jude
the best as well.’
