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Music icon and entrepreneur has had a tumultuous relationship with her father, Ronald Fenty who died on Saturday at the age of 70 years.
Despite the many challenges, personal struggles and public feuds that characterised their relationship, what stands out is their commitment to fix what is broken, reconcile and build a healthy father-daughter relationship.
The ups and downs started way back in Rihanna’s childhood with Fenty’s addiction to alcohol and crack taking its toll on his young family and contributing to his divorce.
He divorced Rihanna’s mother, Monica Braithwaite in 2002 with the singer revealing that she witnessed repeated abuse and terming her parents’ marriage as “abusive”.
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READ: Rihanna’s father dies: All about Ronald Fenty, final days, marriage & legacy
Addiction challenges, abusive marriage & violence
Fenty’s battle with crack and alcohol addiction was a reality that his family had to deal with and impacted Rihanna’s childhood and the Umbrella hitmaker has been open about its impact.
“Fridays would be scary because he would come home drunk. He’d get paid, and half of it would go toward alcohol. He’d walk in the door, and it was all eyes on him”
Not only did the addiction leave Rihanna with no option but to step up at a young age to help her mother take care of the family, but it also resulting in explosive fights that turned physical.
“He slapped me so hard. I ran home with his handprint on me,' she recalled. 'I couldn’t believe it. 'My mother saw my face, how traumatized I was ... [it] was out of nowhere.” Rihanna said in a past interview.
Rihanna finding success & suing her father
Rihanna left Barbados at the age of 16, relocating to the U.S. where she built a successful career as a musician and entrepreneur behind the Fenty brand of beauty products and undergarments.
Her fame found its way into family conflict as Rihanna accused a father of exploiting her name for financial gain and sued him in 2019.
In the suit, the popstar accused Ronald Fenty of founding a briefcase company called Fenty Entertainment in 2017 and posing as her manager.
The duo embraced forgiveness, resolving the matter away from the corridors of justice with Rihanna filing to dismiss the case three weeks before it went to trial in 2021.
Checking into expensive Malibu rehab program
Keen on freeing her father from the yoke of alcohol and substance addiction, Rihanna enrolled Fenty in an expensive Malibu rehab program.
His battle continued with ups and downs that saw him thrown out of a charity event graced by the Umbrella hitmaker over his conduct after drinking too much.
I’m sad how it ended of course, I should have never taken that first drink or any drink for that matter. I wish I had seen her of course
I feel bad because I let her down because she spent all that money putting me in rehab, [and] then find me drunk somewhere. It is not good. What can I say but I’m sorry. It’s me who f**ed up.
Clash after Chris Brown assault
In 2009, Rihanna hit the headlines after she was assaulted by her then-boyfriend Chris Brown and Fenty spoke to the press about the incident without her daughter’s permission.
Rihanna found this "really strange," having alleged that there were multiple incidents of domestic violence in Fenty’s marriage to her mother.
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"You grow up with your father, you know him, you are a part of him, for goodness' sakes! And then he does something so bizarre that I can’t begin to wrap my mind around it." She added.
She further accused him of receiving cash to provide media interviews on the incident at a time when their relationship was undergoing challenges with the pair having not talked for more than a year.
A great father: Rihanna’s verdict
His marriage may have had its challenges that led to their divorce in 2002 but Fenty was a great father to his children.
Rihanna appreciated the father he was in a 2009 interview with Oprah Winfrey in which she also alluded to their reunion after years of being apart.
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He taught me everything, and as awful as he was to my mom, at times, it didn’t compare to how great he was as a father. I had to come to terms with that, and I was able to close that gap with him.
Fenty died after a short illness at the age of 70 years.