Betrayal And Political Persecution
Surprisingly, on the second day of rehearsing for the show, Selvyn Walter, Baldwin Spencer and Zackey, a local tailor from Green Bay, came to the band house and told the band they cannot play for the ALP queen show.
Three of the band members did not object for they were diehard supporters of Selvyn and the PLM party, but the demand did not sit well with the Rastafarians, so things got heated and an argument ensued.
Selvyn was a bit hesitant to act because his seat was up for grabs in the 1976 national election, but it was Baldwin Spencer and Zackey who reminded him that they did not come to negotiate, so they encouraged him to quit talking and seize the instruments.
Resistance Against Political Injustice
The Rastafari fraction was putting up resistance, but Selvyn was allegedly armed so the effort to prevent them was futile. They eventually took away the instruments from the band except for the Organ and a pair of Conga drums.
Feeling powerless and betrayed by Selvyn, the Rastafari members of the Band went to the Grays Farm Police Station to report the incident and was told by the officers on duty that they can't do anything about lt, take it to the police headquarters.
Opposition Party Political Opportunity
It was clear to the band that no police is going to question or arrest Selvyn, they might arrest them instead. Nekuma thought it would be a better idea to let the nation know what happend using the radio, so they went to ZDK radio station and was met by the station manager Vere Bird Junior.
Vere saw the report as the perfect opportunity to attack Selvyn and the ruling PLM government, so he interrupted the regular program with a news flash attacking Selvyn's character and portrayed him as an armed and dangerous bully.
The original band eventually broke up, and some of the members who supported the PLM party realigned themselves with Selvyn Walter, and he gave them the instruments he took from Wadadli to form a band that played for his reelection campaign events.
The incident left the deadlock members in the group feeling betrayed, but they were not deterred. In the interim, Kumasi became the new leader and Iceman his deputy, while Lester and Vere Bird Junior prepared the legal documents to restructure and register the band as a local music production company.
After receiving the Article of Memorandum, the official name of the band became "Wadadli Experience Enterprise. 1976 Ltd" and It was the beginning of the Wadadli era. It wasn't long before it became obvious that Selvyn underestimated the emerging cultural influence of Wadadli Experience.
It turns out that Selvyn's 1976 re-election campaign was a complete failure, he was rejected by his constituency and badly beaten by his challenger DC. Christian of the ALP, he never recovered, It ended his political career.