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Music

Skepta Has Helped Build a Playground in His Dad's Nigerian Village, and His Mum Officially Opened It

The grime don shared the heartwarming news on Instagram yesterday evening.

In June last year, Skepta was one of The Fader's cover stars. In the interview, the London artist spoke about a couple things: like the fact he's recorded tracks with Earl Sweatshirt and Drake, his early sets on Heat FM (where he would pay £20 to the running of the station each time he performed), and how he learned to make music on Mario Paint on the SNES and Music 2000 on the Playstation.

Beyond that, though, a portion of the interview is also given over to his heritage. Skepta was born to a Nigerian mother and father who recently moved back. The story concludes with Skepta saying that, despite being on the verge of global recognition, the metrics of his success lay a little closer to home. "I want to give them that house in Nigeria,” he says, talking about his parents. “Finished, done, built. For them to look back on this and say, ‘You know what? That’s what we went to England for.'"

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We don't know if he's built that house yet, but last night he shared pictures on his Instagram of an act of good will that is just as heartwarming. Turns out he's helped to build a playground in his father's Nigerian village, which was opened last night by Skepta's mother. "Me and my Dad been talking about making a place for the children to play in his village in Nigeria," he wrote on Instagram. "He sent me these pics and my heart is smiling, I told him to wait for me to come and add the finishing touches but he wanted my Mum to open it before she flew to London tomorrow haha, sweet boy ting."

They're a kind bunch of people, aren't they – the Adenuga family. Just last month JME sold one of his fans a Playstation for 20p. Now Skepta's out in Nigeria, helping to provide an inspiration and better future for people less off. He continued in a later post: "Gonna keep developing this playground and hope we inspire kids to get into activities and maybe find talents they never knew they had. More life."

See the pictures below, via Skepta's Instagram.