Somalia government on Monday announced the death of the country’s first female recording artist Khadija Abdullahi Ali Aamey “Dalaysâ€.
Dalays died aged 81 in Toronto Canada where she lived after fleeing Somalia following the civil war.
Singer Dalays who was born in the Baidoa in 1936 was a member of the popular Waberi Musical group that rocked the country in pre civil war era.
At age 9 Khadija moved to Mogadishu where at early age started composing poems until her breakthrough early 1950s when she saw an advertise  in the colonial era newspaper, Corriere Della Somalia seekimg a female singer for  Radio Mogadishu.
Her 1952 debut into recording songs at Radio Mogadishu triggered protest by religious scholars but her father Abdullahi Amey intervened to support his daughter and her star in entertainment begun to rise.
“Because of her resistance to pressure of tradition probably more than any other woman she established the right of women to recite the modern poem†John Williams Johnson wrote of Dalays in his book “Heelloy:Modern Poetry and Songs of the Somaliâ€.
She was the second female recording artist in Somalia after Shamis Aboko “Gaduudo Arwo†who debuted on Radio Hargeisa in 1953. Shamis died in 2017.
Last year Dalays received the Legend Award 2017 at a ceremony in Toronto Canada.
Somalis on social media poured the condolences following the news of her death praising her of patriotism and preservation of heritage of the Horn of African country.
