�Freshlyground used us and dumped us� - organisers
Monkagedi Gaothobogwe | Monday March 17, 2014 14:29
The group allegedly refused to honour their trip to Gaborone for the the gig that also featured Tshepo Tshola and Hugh Masekela among others.
The organisers seem to have won sympathy from their fans this time around, after they posted their version of the story shortly after Freshlyground had posted on its Facebook page, blaming the organisers for failing to pay for their flight tickets.
However, the Hamptons organisers responded on their own Facebook page narrating how they have been used and dumped by the famous South African group.
Many Facebookers appeared even more sympathetic after the organisers narrated how they put the Freshlyground on a plane from Cape Town to Johannesburg, and also booked separate Air Botswana tickets to Gaborone on Saturday for them, only for the group to refuse claiming that they would not want to travel in separate flights. The organisers also narrated how they had earlier put one member of the group on a plane from Cape Town to Johannesburg to prepare for the group’s forthcoming event in that city.
That was despite the fact that the Johannesburg event had nothing to do with the Hampton’s jazz promoters.
Freshlygrounds’ Facebook announcement that they were not coming to Gaborone went viral with angry readers blaming the organisers for disappointing the highly regarded music outfit.
The group also claimed that they could not travel to Gaborone from Cape town on road because it is so far; only for the readers to learn later that the group was actually in Johannesburg courtesy of the promoters’ flight arrangements.
“Woke up at 4am to catch our flight to Botswana. Deeply disappointed to find that tickets had been cancelled due to non-payment. We regret that once again due to negligence on the part of @Hamptons Promotions we will not be able to make our performance in Gaborone today. Very very sad that we are once again leaving our beautiful fans in Bots disappointed”, the group’s post read.
That was before the organisers of the Hamptons Promotions put his own version of events: “Freshlyground will not be performing in Gaborone today. We flew them from Capetown to Johannesburg this morning.
They were not happy with flying in two separate groups from Joburg to Gabs and decided to pull the plug on us. Our Gabs booking agent tried relentlessly to resolve things and Hamptons promoters also confirmed flights with Air Botswana. We feel deeply used by Freshlyground as we had flown one of their members early to Joburg on Thursday, as they wanted them to start preps for their other duties happening tomorrow.
We even paid for one of the band members baby to travel to Gabs as instructed by them, but regardless, they refused to come to Botswana. Meanwhile Freshlyground announce they are suing the Hamptons promotions for defamation