A singer who was jeered while performing the American national anthem at a hockey game in Canada over the weekend is being invited back for another try.
Wheelchair-bound Agasha Mutesasira, 26, was subjected to boos during her rendition of the Star Spangled Banner before Sunday’s game between the Vancouver Canucks and the Detroit Red Wings.
Yet the hostility was not directed at Agasha or her performance. Instead, Canadian fans at Vancouver’s Rogers Arena, which holds nearly 20,000 spectators, were the latest to voice their displeasure after US president Donald Trump hit their country with tariffs last week.
Trump ordered 25 percent tariffs on Canadian and Mexican imports and 10 percent on goods from China from February 1 onwards, a move which has sparked major trade war fears.
A number of Canadian sporting fixtures have seen disgruntled fans boo the US national anthem over the past as a result, including at another hockey game in Ottawa, while Canada’s anthem was booed by American fans in Nashville.
And after insisting she didn’t take the reaction personally, Agasha revealed in an interview with TMZ Sports that she has been offered the mic again by Vancouver.
A wheelchair-bound singer who was booed while performing the US national anthem at a hockey game in Canada is being invited back for another try
‘The Canucks team was very appreciative and very impressed by how the situation was handled,’ she said. ‘And yes, they’re very much looking forward to having me back at some point.’
The musician also explained that her hands appeared to be shaking during the performance because of a tremor related to her injury, and not the boos that were raining down on her at Rogers Arena.
‘I was given an adequate warning by the Canucks team, the production team and everyone there,’ Agasha added about the jeers. ‘I even had one of the singers who often does the anthem message me.
‘There was a lot of preparation given to me, so once I heard them I knew it wasn’t personal and I was just still very honored and excited to complete the anthem.
‘It all made up for it at the end, everyone cheered and it was very sweet.’
In response to Trump’s move, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said the country would hit back with 25 percent tariffs against $155billion of US goods; including beer, wine, lumber and appliances, beginning with $30bn taking effect Tuesday and $125bn 21 days later.
Trudeau warned US citizens that their president’s tariffs would raise grocery and gasoline costs, potentially shutting down auto assembly plants and limiting supplies of goods such as nickel, potash, uranium, steel and aluminum.
Canadian fans were voicing their anger with Donald Trump hitting the country with tariffs
Several Canadian sporting fixtures have seen fans boo the US national anthem in the last week
He urged his own citizens to forego travel to the US and to boycott US products.
Meanwhile, the Premier of Canadian province of British Columbia, David Eby, called on residents to stop buying liquor from US ‘red’ states and remove American alcohol brands from government store shelves as a response to the tariffs.
Trump’s levies – on products such as computer chips, steel, oil, gas and cars – ‘will bring a tremendous amount of money in for our country and bring a rebirth in American manufacturing’, he said. Canada is America’s biggest foreign supplier of crude oil, followed by Mexico.
The 78-year-old put tariffs at the center of his election campaign, citing an era more than a century ago when tariffs were a cornerstone of US trade policy and revenue.
