Pro-Putin rapper Timati has provoked a major backlash over a music video about Moscow's mayor, who oversaw the recent crackdown on protesters. The popular rapper has later removed the music video, where he praises Moscow authorities, after it received almost 1.5 million dislikes on YouTube

Pro-Kremlin rapper #Timati has provoked a major backlash over a sycophantic music video about Moscow's mayor, who oversaw the recent crackdown on protesters. Now a YouTube clip of police violence, with Timati's song as a soundtrack, has reached 100k views https://t.co/Fj7iYD4NDH — Matthew Luxmoore (@mjluxmoore) September 10, 2019

Timati, a 36-year-old rapper known for his support of the Russian President Vladimir Putin, posted the video, titled simply “Moscow”, shortly before elections were set for city parliament on Sunday, causing mass protests. Timati, who is ranked the seventh wealthiest Russian celebrity, made the video featuring another rapper, Guf.

Whatever reaction Timati thought his new MV would get, this wasn’t it. Russian audience is woke and done with bullcrap. Not the next PR for him. pic.twitter.com/sAya4CAZOd — Katja / Катя (@SchlagerKaty) September 10, 2019

“I don’t go to rallies, I don’t bullshit,” the song goes, in reference to weeks of protests in Moscow after the authorities barred opposition candidates from running in the polls. Lyrics in the music video praise the Russian capital as a wealthy city that has become “world standard” and “doesn’t hold gay parades.”

Russian rapper Timati makes a song that is pro-government, and the Russian internet resoundingly tells him that they hate it. The only thing worse than a Timati song is Timati shilling for Mayor Sobyanin. https://t.co/PC6MBVBygS — Danny Anderson (@perezagruzil) September 9, 2019

The music video, which featured sweeping images of Moscow’s best-known landmarks, recorded the highest number of dislikes – 1.48m – for a single video on Russian YouTube. It also entered the top 30 most disliked music videos worldwide. It had 85,000 “likes”. Timati denied allegations that he had been paid by the government to record the track. He said he had pulled it from YouTube to stop “the wave of negativity”. “Today it’s trendy to complain about the government, but I have my own opinion,” he announced on social media.