Sizzla's publicist robbed, pleads for return of laptop

Krista Henry, Staff Reporter


Sizzla's publicist and entertainment personality, Olimatta Taal, grooved to the music at Judgement Yard recently. - Nathaniel Stewart

Popular publicist and journalist Olimatta Taal was robbed of her laptop while at home last Saturday night.

Taal, who is a publicist to reggae act Sizzla Kalonji, among others, as well as a well-known activist was born in the United States and raised in Gambia, in Africa.

Taal has been working in Jamaica for a number of years. An obviously upset Taal told THE STAR what happened, "I went to bed early cause I was real tired and fell asleep watching TV at around 4:30 a.m. I woke up and went to the kitchen, I had left my room window open cause the apartment is high. Like 10 to 15 minutes later, I woke up and realised my laptop was gone and I heard the noise of someone jumping down."

According to Taal she screamed and knocked on her neighbours' doors for help, but by then the person had already left through the back lanes of the apartment in the Barbican/Liguanea area. For Taal, her years of work in the music business internationally and locally was on the laptop, as well as family pictures, her university essays and her writing.

"This is a middle-class area and honestly, if it was the ghetto I don't think this would have happened. There have been several laptops stolen in that community but no one talks to each other and nothing is done about it. It just goes to show that we need to address the issues of the poor in this country. I should be able to feel free in my own house. We gotta change the society, there are too many rich people in this country for there to be crime," she said.

Taal has reported the incident to the police and is glad that her life was not threatened but pleads with the thieves to give back the information she had on the computer. She said, "Please, give me back my things, I beg you. I don't really want the computer, all I want is my work, my years of work."