As the second day of Homecoming begins, Rattlers face a huge shock. FAMU Homecoming is known to have great events, entertainment and celebrities in attendance. This year students would be able to see the City Girls, Latto, Saucy Santana and many more at the FAM FEST concert on Saturday night.
However yesterday at 4:42 p.m. EST, Latto made post on Instagram contradicting what many Rattlers were under the impression was definitely happening.
“I’m not booked for this looks fun tho lol sorry y’all!” stated Latto on her Instagram story post.
The rapper actually shared the graphic that has been put out by the University that portrays her to be one of the headliners.
Now this may not seem like a big deal to most but many Rattlers are upset and frustrated as they have purchased tickets.
“I was flabbergasted, and felt bamboozled especially after they fumbled on two of the artists and I was very excited to see her,” said 3rd-year Arie Riley.
Riley said she is a big Latto fan, bought two tickets, and her friend was planning to drive up from Broward just to see Latto.
In addition, this is the second artist to take to social media and announce that FAMU has not paid for them to perform.
Just a few weeks ago, a popular Florida artist from Jacksonville, Lil Poppa, went to Twitter and tweeted a similar message stating that he was also not booked. A large percentage of the student body is from Jacksonville, so many students were disappointed and took to Twitter.
At 2:25 PM today, the Bell-Burns administration released a statement on Instagram and at 2:27 PM students were emailed the statement which explained what is going on and attempting to answer questions and concerns the student body has been having.
A quote from the statement:
“Like you, we were extremely disappointed when on Monday, October 25, Latto announced she was not booked for the event; however, WRLD Entertainment denies Latto’s assertions. She has been booked for the event.”
The Bell-Burns administration explains in the statement that due to lack of funding they used a third party booking agency.
Later on today circulating on instagram was a picture of the contracts showing that student leaders did do their job.
Former SGA Vice President Marcus Thomas shed some light on this situation as someone who was in this position last year.
“Our student leaders are working diligently and we cannot fault them for everything that happens, especially on the contractual side, since students don’t control that” said Thomas.
Thomas says Vice President Burns is working with a third of the funding he had for last year’s festivities. His budget for one of the artists last year is VP Burns’ budget for the entire week. The budget last year was said to be close to $375 thousand dollars. He also stated that the budget last year was only enough for one artist, so the fact that Vice President Burns was able to not only have a concert but get the artist she has is amazing.
Student leaders are working towards resolving this issue and students can keep updated on this matter through the @FAMU_1887 Instagram.