By ALEX BITEKEYE
Tanzania-based veteran guitarist and singer Ramadhani (Remmy) Ongala, popularly known as Dr Remmy, is dead.
Ongalla died on Sunday evening at the age of 63, after battling with kidney failure and diabetes.
Dr Remmy, who left hospital recently, was scheduled to meet a specialist at Regency hospital in Dar es Salaam Monday.
According to his son Thomas Ongala, the family decided to take him to hospital after his condition worsened.
Though he was scheduled to meet the specialist, we decided that he should be taken to the hospital from where he could wait for his appointment,” said Thomas.
“His condition worsened to the extent that he was unable to speak and we decided to rush him to the hospital, where they told us that his sugar level was too high,” he added.
A popular band
Thomas told Tanzania’s The Citizen that his father’s kidneys had already been cleaned four different times before, and the family decided to change his hospital.
Dr Remmy was born in 1947 in the Kivu region of eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, which at that time was known as Belgian Congo.