Throughout his career, AKA never shied away from confronting his adversaries — whether in song or on one of his infamous social media rants.
His character and competitiveness often saw him feud with some of his closest rivals (or anyone who he felt needed to be addressed for that matter). Simply put, the Supa Mega was not to be played with.
Here are five of his most infamous beefs:
Cassper Nyovest
AKA and Cassper Nyovest’s beef has been ongoing for almost a decade now.
From 2013 to 2015, the two rappers found themselves going head to head for virtually every award and every radio chart show they were both eligible for. This constant jostling ultimately led to friction between the two.
Throughout the beef, AKA and Cassper dissed each other on countless occasions both on social media and through their music.
The bitterness never seemed to subside and, unfortunately, they didn’t get to squash the beef while they had time.
Anatii
AKA and Anatii produced one of the greatest collaborations we’ve seen in SA hip-hop when they teamed up for “The Saga” in 2015.
With interest in both artists at a fever pitch, the song instantly went viral upon release and it went on to become one of the year’s biggest hits.
A few months later, things went south as AKA released a scathing diss track titled “Composure”.
On it, he accused Anatii of trying to charge him a whopping R80 000 for the very same beat he was rapping on and claimed that his contribution was the reason “The Saga” was so popular.
Burna Boy
When Burna Boy decided to briefly relocate to South Africa from his native Nigeria in an attempt to penetrate a new market he quickly forged a relationship with AKA.
The pair would go on to collaborate on three songs, “All Eyes on Me”, “Paid” and “Baddest”.
But in 2019 their relationship soured when they had a bitter social media feud around the xenophobic attacks in SA that saw many foreign nationals’ shops and properties looted and burned.
In the midst of the tension around the attacks, Burna called AKA “retarded” and threatened violence if they ever crossed paths.
Black Coffee
In 2016, while AKA was preparing to perform at a show in Limpopo, a disagreement unfolded on stage between Black Coffee and one of AKA’s manager, Tshiamo Letswene, that ultimately led to Coffee slapping Letswene across the face.
Black Coffee would later share that the animosity had been brewing for years.
"AKA started it, I can't remember which year it was. I had won an award and he tweeted 'Give Black Coffee a hand'.”
Da L.E.S
In hip-hop, friends turn to enemies real quick. There’s no better example of this than the complicated relationship AKA had with Da L.E.S.
Despite the love and adoration they seemed to share for one another, the two have fallen off with each on a number of occasions over the years.
Fortunately, they seemed to have squashed their beef after AKA invited Da L.E.S to join him on stage for a performance of some of their classic collaborations at Cotton Fest last year.