Damilola ‘Dapper’ Akinwunmi, chief executive officer of Dapper Music and Entertainment, has rejected allegations of financial mismanagement, contract irregularities and exploitation made by some of the company’s former artists, insisting that the company invested more in their careers than the revenue generated has so far recovered.
In his first detailed response to the latest accusations, Akinwunmi said the financial position of the disputed artist accounts was the opposite of what has been portrayed publicly.
‘The investment exceeded the earnings, the balances remain unrecouped, and what is outstanding is owed to the company, not by it,’ he said.
Akinwunmi’s response comes amid renewed scrutiny of Dapper Music following allegations involving former artists including Shallipopi and Seyi Vibez. The dispute has centred on contracts, financial transparency, ownership of recordings, catalogue revenues and the extent to which the label recouped money spent on developing and promoting its artists.
The Dapper Music CEO said the public debate had increasingly relied on social media claims rather than contracts, accounting records and other documents. He said he had remained silent for an extended period because he believed commercial disputes should be resolved through established business and legal processes.
‘There comes a time when silence stops being peaceful,’ Akinwunmi said in his statement dated August 19, 2026. He said he had chosen to speak because his silence was being interpreted as an admission of wrongdoing.
According to Akinwunmi, the relationships between Dapper Music and the artists began through negotiated agreements rather than arrangements imposed on them. He said each artist received contracts in advance, had the opportunity to review them and obtain legal advice before signing.
He specifically said Seyi Vibez was accompanied by his own legal counsel from the beginning of their relationship. He also said Dapper Music invested in Seyi Vibez’s NSNV project, provided A and R services and secured a feature for the project.
‘That is not distribution. That is a label doing label work,’ he said.
On Shallipopi, Akinwunmi said several witnesses were present before the contract was signed and that all benefits and signing bonuses under the agreement were paid immediately after execution. He also addressed an incident involving the arrest of Shallipopi and his friend who had no ties to the label but yet provided legal counsel for both of them.
He also addressed questions surrounding former artist T.I Blaze, saying the issues raised online had previously gone through a documented process in which records and accounts were examined.
A central part of Akinwunmi’s defence is the scale of investment required to develop an artist. He said Dapper Music’s role extended beyond releasing music. The company, according to him, handled administration, logistics, production, A and R, songwriting, features, marketing, release strategies and campaigns.
The company also funded recording, production, artwork, marketing, digital campaigns, music videos, international trips, tours, the settlement of a previous label agreement, accommodation, vehicles and personal cash advances.
Akinwunmi provided examples of the costs involved, saying two music videos for one artist, both shot in the United States, cost the company $52,000. One of those videos was never officially released and therefore generated no revenue. He also said a single trip to the United States for recording camps and video shoots cost more than $200,000 when flights, visas, accommodation, transportation and welfare costs were included. According to him, the trip was undertaken before there was any certainty that the expenditure would generate a return.
The figures are important to Akinwunmi’s argument because he says the financial relationship between an artist and a label cannot be assessed simply by looking at gross streaming or catalogue figures.
He explained that money generated by a catalogue passes through several stages before it becomes distributable earnings. Platforms take their share, distributors take their share, and amounts advanced by the label are then recouped according to the terms of the agreement.
‘A catalogue revenue number is not money waiting in an account,’ he said.
According to him, the figures circulating publicly often represent gross revenue at the top of the chain rather than the net amount available after platform, distribution and recoupment deductions.
‘Advances are recoupable, and that was set out in the agreements and communicated clearly to every artist before they signed,’ he said.
This explanation is significant in the context of Dapper Music’s position in Nigeria’s music market during the period in which some of these artists were signed to the company.
BusinessDay reported in November 2024 that Dapper Music had emerged as the leading Nigerian owned record label in terms of streaming market share, according to TurnTable Charts. The label had surpassed one billion streams by the third quarter of 2024 and held a 7.97 percent share of the Nigerian streaming market between the first and third quarters of that year.
Dapper ranked ahead of YBNL Nation, which had a 3.61 percent share, Mavin Records with 2.56 percent and Chocolate City Music with 1.28 percent. The performance was driven in significant part by releases from Seyi Vibez and Shallipopi.
BusinessDay also reported that Dapper Music emerged as the streaming market leader among local music companies in Nigeria during the first three quarters of 2024. At the time, the company said its performance was driven by strategic partnerships with artists, record labels and distribution companies, as well as promotion, release strategy and relationships with major digital streaming platforms.
The label’s position was even more pronounced in BusinessDay’s reporting on Nigeria’s most streamed songs in the first half of 2024. Dapper controlled the rights to three of the country’s top ten most streamed songs, released by Shallipopi and Seyi Vibez. Those records generated 37.6 million streams and gave Dapper a 33.1 percent share of the streams among the top ten songs.
That commercial performance provides context for Akinwunmi’s argument that the company was making significant financial commitments to artists whose music subsequently generated substantial streaming activity. However, he maintains that high gross streaming figures should not automatically be interpreted as money owed to the artists or money already available for distribution.
His latest statement also returns to the question of masters and ownership.
Akinwunmi said that where a label finances the creation of a recording, it holds the recording it paid for, arguing that ownership of a master is linked to the financial risk undertaken in making the music.
He said the position on ownership was contained in the contracts before the artists signed them and that it was negotiated rather than imposed.
‘There is also a great deal being said about masters,’ he said. ‘When a label funds the making of a record, it holds the recording it paid for.’
Akinwunmi also directly rejected allegations that Dapper Music had sold any of the artists’ catalogues to a distributor, a third party, or to anyone else and adding that ownership remains where the agreements specify it remains.
The issue of alleged forged documents has also become a major part of the renewed dispute. Akinwunmi described allegations that Dapper Music falsified signatures or fabricated agreements as false and said the authenticity of the documents could be independently verified.
The latest position represents a continuation of Dapper Music’s earlier response to allegations raised publicly by Shallipopi and Muyeez in December 2024.
At the time, Shallipopi accused Dapper Music of breach of trust, financial mismanagement and lack of transparency.
He also alleged that he had been pushed into a deal with Dvpper Digital, another company connected to Dapper’s ownership, and complained about an arrangement he described as requiring 30 percent of his earnings in perpetuity.
Dapper Music rejected those allegations, saying its contracts did not tie Shallipopi’s future earnings to the company indefinitely. The label also said the 30 percent management commission had been willingly agreed to and that the artist had been given an opportunity to review and renegotiate the terms with legal representation after the success of his first album.
Akinwunmi’s latest statement now takes the financial argument further by saying the accounts do not show a label withholding money that belongs to artists.
Instead, he said, the records show that the money invested by Dapper Music remains greater than the earnings recovered from those investments.
‘When you place what was actually earned beside what was actually invested, these accounts do not show a label holding money that belongs to an artist,’ he said. ‘They show the opposite.’
He has therefore challenged the parties involved to allow independent professionals to determine the financial position.
Akinwunmi said Dapper Music is prepared to provide its complete accounting records, distribution statements, contracts and payment records to an independent forensic auditor. He said both sides should have access to the same documents and that he would accept the findings regardless of the outcome.
‘If there is evidence that we owe anyone anything, let it be established properly and let the appropriate action follow,’ he said.
The dispute has also moved beyond social media, with Akinwunmi saying Dapper Music has cooperated with authorities that have requested information. He said the company had followed the dispute resolution process contained in its agreements and that a date had already been fixed through the appropriate process.
He declined to comment on the specific institutions handling complaints, saying that was a matter for the institutions and lawyers involved.
The CEO also said threats had been made against him and people close to him since the dispute began and that those threats had been documented and reported to the appropriate authorities.
For Dapper Music, the central argument is therefore not that its former artists failed commercially. The company’s position is that their commercial success does not, by itself, establish that the label owes them money.
The company argues that the money spent on developing the artists represented capital at risk. Recording, marketing, videos, international travel, production and other expenses were incurred before the company knew whether the music would generate enough income to recover those costs.
This is consistent with Akinwunmi’s broader explanation of Dapper Music’s investment philosophy. In an October 2025 interview with BusinessDay, he said the company’s decision to sign an artist was based on more than talent, including creative alignment, business approach and the belief that an artist could develop sustainably. He also said budgets are agreed for projects, timelines and seasons, while acknowledging that the specific amounts spent on signing and promoting individual artists vary.
Akinwunmi has rejected the suggestion that the artists did not understand what they signed. He said contracts were provided before signing, terms were negotiated, artists had legal representation and the benefits contained in the agreements were received.
‘What has changed is not their understanding of the contract. What has changed is that they no longer like it,’ he said.
Akinwunmi said he deliberately chose not to publish full financial figures because he believes they should be examined through an audit rather than debated online.
That leaves the central financial question unresolved for now. Dapper Music says it invested more than it has recovered, meaning the outstanding balances are owed to the company rather than the artists. The artists’ allegations point in the opposite direction, raising questions about whether revenues generated from their music were properly accounted for and remitted.