Rapper Wiz Khalifa took a few moments during a South American trip to visit the grave of murderous drug lord Pablo Escobar. He posted photos of the tombstone with flowers and what appears to be a joint on Instagram — and a picture of himself smoking at the graveside.
Colombians were not impressed.
Medellin Mayor Federico Gutiérrez lashed the 29-year-old Pittsburgh rapper — who performed a concert in Medellin last week — as a “scoundrel” and demanded an apology, the BBC reported. “It shows that this guy has never had to suffer from the violence inflicted by these drug traffickers,” said Gutiérrez, who added that Khalifa should have left flowers for Escobar’s victims. The mayor said Khalifa won’t be welcome back in town unless he apologizes, the Pittsbugh Post-Gazette reported.
Khalifa also posed for an Instagram shot in front of Escobar’s former home.
Twitter and Colombian newspapers joined Gutiérrez in piling on the rapper for his drug-lord pilgrimage.
Escobar and his Medellin cartel are believed responsible for as many as 4,000 deaths before Escobar was killed in 1993.
Bogota newspaper El Espectador blasted Khalifa’s “gaffe” and said it “reopened the profound pain that narco-trafficking has left that city.” The newspaper’s editor was gunned down in 1986 in an assassination linked to the cartels, and El Espectador’s office was bombed in 1989 by the Medellin cartel, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette noted.
Khalifa hasn’t yet responded to the outpouring of anger.