Singer Mzbel was recently accused of bleaching by her long time nemesis Diamond Appiah, who mocked her with a picture showing her ‘bleached’ ankles.

But Mzbel, in a recent interview, has not shied away for the accusations, although she says it’s something from her past as a child growing up in Jamestown.

Speaking on Class Fm, the mother of one said that growing up in Jamestown, bleaching was quite fashionable and therefore, anyone growing up also indulged in it.

“I grew up in Jamestown where, at a certain age, if you don’t bleach your skin you don’t know what’s up.” she said.

“If you don’t have a child so they can have an outdooring on the street, you don’t know what’s up. So by the age of 14, you start buying cream. And they only bleach their face. …It was like a trend and once your face is bright, it’s OK. So I have tried it before, I have tried skin bleaching because then, that was the thing there and all my life I grew up in Jamestown until I was done with high school,”

But having grown up, she said she realised the adverse effects of bleaching, and thus started campaigning against it when she became a celebrity.

“So, when I finally became a celebrity and I saw the disadvantages of these things, I started preaching against it, but unfortunately when you start bleaching and you stop and you do not use the right product you end up having some damages to your skin. So to be able to keep them away you have to continue always and you don’t want to end up having only a white face, so you have to do the whole body and it becomes like a part of your life,”

“So, whenever I have the opportunity to go to Jamestown to do charity work, we talk about teenage pregnancy, safe sex, skin bleaching, and I always use myself as an example. I tell them: ‘The amount of money you will have to use to fix yourself after you get the damages is not a joke,’” she added.