Singer stirs few in native Somalia

For the few who know him in Somalia, he is a "crazy" refugee, but many have never heard of K'naan: a hip-hop artist whose hit song Waving Flag is the official World Cup anthem.

Born Keinan Abdi Warsame in 1978 in Mogadishu, the Toronto-based rapper who fled the war-wracked Horn of Africa country at the age of 13, has worked up crowds across the world during the World Cup Trophy tour.

The football anthem, from his album Troubadour, is a stomping rendition packed with resounding percussions and rhymed with a reggae riff and was also recently reworked for the Haiti earthquake fundraiser.

"He is great but I can tell you that nobody knows about his greatness in Somalia, where he is taken as someone who lost his culture to the West," said Mohamed Adan Tarabi, a 25-year-old football fan. "If you Google his name you see thousands of results, which prove his prominence, but in Somalia I've never heard anybody listening to his songs."

Largely under the control of hardline rebels, Somalia has been cut off from the entertainment world owing to the imposition of strict sharia, or Islamic law. Watching movies, football or listening to music are banned and transgressors can incur drastic penalties such as public flogging, chopping of limbs or even death by a firing squad.

"I heard about a Somali man being selected to sing in the World Cup, but I have never seen him," said Hasan Adan, a Mogadishu teenager. "I was only told by a friend that he is an English rapper like those blacks in the US."

Those who know K'naan have great admiration for him, but are restricted to secretly watching his clips online for fear of being caught.

"I'm really a big fan of great K'naan, but I'm disappointed that I cannot freely watch his songs here in Mogadishu," said Fadumo Moalim Hasan. "But if the Shebab guys find me, I could face punishment."