Rita (left) and the late Bob Marley -File photosADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia (AP):
THE WIDOW of the late reggae legend Bob Marley said yesterday she was determined to honour his wish for burial in Ethiopia, but did not say when the body might be moved from his native Jamaica.
Rita Marley first announced the reburial plans earlier this month, leading many in Jamaica to protest angrily that it would rob the Caribbean island of its national heritage.
"We have no time set for the reburial of Bob Marley in Ethiopia, there is no rush for it," Rita Marley said yesterday. "It will happen in due course."
"It was Bob's dream, and the family shares that dream," she said. Bob Marley was a devout Rastafarian, a faith that worships Ethiopia's last emperor, Haile Selassie, as a living god based on the prophecy by Jamaican civil rights leader Marcus Garvey that a black man would be crowned king in Africa.
Rita Marley has said her late husband would be reburied in Shashemene, where hundreds of Rastafarians have lived for decades since they were given land by Selassie. Shashemene is about 155 miles (250 kilometers) south of Addis Ababa.
A month of celebrations in both Shashemene and Addis Ababa are being planned for February to mark the 60th anniversary of Bob Marley's birth.
