According to reports, Rihanna’s father, Ronald Fenty, died at the age of 70.
According to TMZ, Ronald passed away in Los Angeles after becoming ill. Ronald passed away on Saturday morning following a “brief illness,” according to Starcomm Network, a radio station in Rihanna’s native Barbados. Family members are currently in California. Ronald’s exact date of death and cause of death are still unclear.
Representatives for Rihanna were contacted by DailyMail.com for comment, but they did not respond right away, Rihanna’s relationship with her father has been turbulent, and at one point, they became caught up in legal issues.
In 2009, four years after her first song, she disclosed that she hadn’t spoken to her father in over a year, bringing the tense relationship into the public eye.
“I’ve been the one trying to reconcile with him forever,” she said during an appearance on Ryan Seacrest’s Kiis FM radio show, per The Hollywood Reporter.
“I haven’t heard from my father in over a year. I try though, I reached out to him. I did my part. Now it’s on him.”
He ’embarrassed’ her on her tour, she claimed at the time, and they had a falling out.
“He disrespected some people on the bus and I didn’t like that, so I kind of just let him go back home,” she said.
At the time, the pop diva also expressed her “upset” at her father’s interviews after she was beaten by her ex-boyfriend Chris Brown.
“He kind of did something that was really upsetting. He turned his back on me and went to the media,” she continued.
“He got paid to talk about stuff – all these little interviews he was doing after the whole situation in February.”
“I hadn’t spoken to him and he was speaking as though we did. It was so disappointing to me.”
She filed a lawsuit against her father in 2019 for utilising their last name for his business, Fenty Entertainment. She accused him and his business partner of acting as her agents in the lawsuit.
It is thought that the two reached a settlement after she withdrawn her complaint in 2021.
Ronald has a history of heavy drinking and has fought crack cocaine addiction.
As a child, Rihanna saw her father violently attack her mother, breaking her nose once, she told Oprah.
Then, in 2008, Ronald’s intoxicated behaviour on her tour bus led to her being sent home from her North American tour.
Before they got back together, Ronald claims that Rihanna froze him out for two years.
The musician secretly sent Ronald to a $58,000 Malibu treatment centre in 2013 to keep him out of jail after he was caught while visiting California.
However, Ronald was kicked out of her Diamond Ball in 2014 after he got drunk and stumbled on the red carpet, upsetting his daughter.
Despite their subsequent reconciliation, he left California without seeing his daughter on that trip.
Rihanna even bought a big house that he lived in, despite their later legal issues.
Ronald and his ex-wife Monica Braithwaite, whom he divorced in 2002, had three children together, including Rihanna. They have two boys, Rajad and Rorrey, in addition to the Grammy winner.
Kandy, Samantha, and Jamie are Ronald’s other three children from other relationships.
A picture of Rihanna’s brother Rajad Fenty pulling into Cedars-Sinai Medical Centre on Wednesday was released by TMZ. Although she was not photographed, his sister Rihanna is rumoured to have also been in the car.
Rihanna and Ronald seem to have stayed friendly despite their disagreements.
Ronald commended Rihanna for helping him after he had the coronavirus at the start of the COVID-19 outbreak.
“My daughter Robyn was checking in on me every day,” he told The Sun at his home in Barbados April 2020, referring to the pop star by her birth name.
Ronald claimed that Rihanna helped him as much as she could from her American residence.
“I thought I was going to die to be honest. I have to say, I love you so much, Robyn,” he told the outlet.
“She did so much for me. I appreciate everything she has done.”
Ronald had not yet used the ventilator, which the pop star had even bought and sent to him in Barbados.
Ronald told Page Six in 2022 that he was “ecstatic” to hear that Rihanna and her partner A$AP Rocky were having their first kid. The couple is currently expecting their third child, which Rihanna revealed at the Met Gala.
“I’m so happy that I jumped for joy. I’m still so excited,” Fenty told the outlet.
“Rihanna always said that she wanted children, she loves kids. She always takes care of her cousins’ kids…she’s going to be a good mom,” her father said.
Speaking on the phone from his Barbados home, the famous father described Rocky as “a very cool guy” after meeting him when his daughter brought the rapper home in December 2020.
“I like him,” he added, before revealing that he got the news of Rihanna’s pregnancy a day before she and Rocky (born Rakim Mayers) went public with her burgeoning tummy.
“I just got the news from her last night, and she sent me some photos,” he said. “I’m just over the moon. She’s beautiful inside and out.”
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