MTN’s Next Afrobeats Star Promised a $100,000 OneRPM Deal for Ten Months. Winner Ayo Benzi Got ₦150 Million, a Figure the Page Never Once Used.

Correction, 17 September 2026: This record’s primary citation, a Nigeria Communications Week report on the Next Afrobeats Star finale, no longer resolves; two independent checks on 17 September 2026 found the domain unreachable. The ₦150 million winner figure it supported is unchanged and was never sourced to that outlet alone: it remains independently corroborated by New Telegraph’s report of the same finale, already cited in this record’s sources, which has been promoted to primary citation. No factual claim in this record has changed. Standards desk: Yewande Coker.

Ayodeji Benson, performing as Ayo Benzi, was crowned the winner of MTN Nigeria’s Next Afrobeats Star competition on 13 December 2025 and awarded a recording deal reported at 150 million naira. That figure comes entirely from Nigerian entertainment press covering the finale at Ultima Studios in Lekki, Lagos. It has never appeared, at any point checked in this desk’s review, on the competition’s own promotional page, which has advertised a different prize, in a different currency, continuously since the show launched more than four months earlier.

What the competition’s own page has said, and for how long

Next Afrobeats Star launched on 2 August 2025 at an event in Lagos, described on its organiser’s own materials as “powered by MTN Nigeria and produced by Ultima Studios.” From that day, the competition’s promotional page has told entrants what they stand to win: “a $100,000 record deal with OneRPM,” repeated in the page’s own FAQ section as “a $100,000 OneRPM record deal.” A snapshot of the same page taken in June 2026, six months after Season 1 had already concluded and its winner announced, and a month before Season 2 was even announced, carried the identical wording, with no update reflecting the naira figure trade press said the actual winner received. No dollar-to-naira note, no correction, no mention of Ayo Benzi’s name.

The competition’s own official news page adds a detail neither MTN’s site nor most trade coverage carries: the $100,000 figure was not simply “a OneRPM deal.” It states that U-Records, described as Ultima Studios’ in-house music label, joined with distributor ONErpm to fund it. That structure, a television production company’s in-house label pairing with a distributor to bankroll a competition prize, does not appear anywhere on Ultima Studios’ own corporate site, which lists the company’s television and radio productions but never mentions U-Records.

What trade press says was actually paid

Multiple Nigerian outlets covering the 13 December 2025 finale agree on the same figures: Ayo Benzi’s win came with a 150 million naira deal, first runner-up Dave Cash received 100 million naira, and Kaeko, Somto O’Laker and Lucky Yay received 75 million, 50 million and 25 million naira respectively. Two of those outlets attribute the finale to a Saturday night event, one dates it a day later, to the Sunday. None of them reconcile the naira figure with the dollar figure the competition had spent the entire season advertising. None names Ayo Benzi’s actual signing counterparty, the company whose name would appear on his contract, distinct from the companies named as sponsors, producers and distributors of the competition that produced it.

MTN Nigeria’s own chief marketing officer, Onyinye Ikenna-Emeka, is quoted in coverage of the finale saying the platform is “about creating real opportunities for young Nigerians and giving their talent the structure, visibility, and support it deserves.” No statement attributed to her, or to anyone else named in connection with the finale, addresses the gap between the advertised and awarded figures.

Not a currency conversion

It is tempting to read 150 million naira as simply what 100,000 dollars became once translated into local currency at the time of payment. The numbers do not support that reading cleanly. The naira traded at roughly 1,602 to the dollar during its weakest stretch of 2025, in April, which would put 100,000 dollars at closer to 160 million naira. It then closed out the year at roughly 1,429 to the dollar, its strongest year-end close in thirteen years, which would put the same 100,000 dollars at closer to 143 million naira. A payout of 150 million naira sits inside that range, but no document states that the figure was calculated by converting a dollar sum, and the more basic problem remains: MTN’s own competition page kept advertising the 100,000 dollar figure to new entrants for months after the 150 million naira prize had already been reported as paid out to a real, named winner. A live currency conversion does not explain a stale advertisement.

A prize that has now moved twice

In July 2026, MTN Nigeria and Ultima Studios opened entries for a second season and, according to the general manager for brands and communication at MTN Nigeria, Emamoke Ogoro, raised the winner’s prize. “Season 1 was our proof,” she said, framing the first season as evidence the format works. “Our contestants did not simply gain exposure; they released original music now available on major global streaming platforms. They left the competition owning their intellectual property, with industry credentials and meaningful relationships in a music industry that now knows their names.” The new prize is reported at 225 million naira plus a car, an explicit increase over the 150 million naira Ayo Benzi received, according to trade coverage of the Season 2 launch. That reporting is useful for one reason beyond the headline figure: it confirms that 150 million naira and 225 million naira belong to two different seasons and are not, as a reader skimming MTN’s own still-unrevised competition page might otherwise conclude, two descriptions of the same prize.

Ogoro’s statement that Season 1 contestants left “owning their intellectual property” is itself a claim no document in this record can test. No source, official or trade, discloses what rights sit inside the 150 million naira deal: whether it is a fee or a royalty-bearing advance, whether it is recoupable, whether it covers a single project or a multi-year exclusive term, or which company holds the resulting master recordings. A statement that artists retained their IP is not the same thing as a published rights schedule, and this desk found no published rights schedule for this deal, or for any Next Afrobeats Star deal, from either season.

What this means for artists

A recording-deal prize built into a talent competition is not automatically worse, or better, than an ordinary label signing; it is a signing like any other, and it deserves the same scrutiny before an artist puts a name to it. What this record shows is that the number an artist is competing for in public is not necessarily the number that shows up on the contract, and that the companies named as running the show, a telecoms sponsor, a television production house and a distributor, are not automatically the company an artist actually signs with. Here, an in-house label most people watching the show have never heard of, named on the competition’s own site but absent from its parent company’s corporate materials, appears to sit behind at least part of the deal.

For any artist entering a brand-sponsored competition promising a “record deal” as the prize, the practical questions are the same ones this record could not answer for Ayo Benzi: which specific legal entity signs the contract, what rights it takes, for how long, and whether the number quoted in the marketing is the number that ends up in the agreement. A contract is not obligated to match an advertisement, and nothing here suggests Ayo Benzi’s deal is unfair to him specifically. But an artist who cannot get those questions answered before signing is in a weaker position than one who can, regardless of how many zeroes are attached to either currency on the way in.