Jasmina Anema lost her battle with acute leukemia at the age of six on January 27th, 2010. She’d had a lot of help, including a strong effort from popular singer Rihanna. Rihanna has been an active supporter of DKMS America, the world’s largest non-profit marrow donor center, for a long time. She was vigilant, and very public, in her efforts to locate a donor for Jasmina.
Now that Jasmina is gone, her mother, Thea Anema, is questioning Rihanna’s intentions. A recent tweet from Thea’s account read, “It has been a month since Jasmina’s passing. Still not even a card or a text message from Rihanna. Did she use my child for a publicity stunt?” Though the message was deleted almost immediately, it’s gone viral. Anema later tweeted that: “Apparently there are some negative blogs out there. For the record, Rihanna has been nothing but really nice!!!” She then contacted People Magazine to clarify that she hadn’t actually written the accusatory tweet. ”Friends have been helping me with all kinds of stuff and many know the passwords to my personal email, the Caringbridge site and also twitter. Although I did not tweet this particular one, I do wish that Rihanna had responded to me on Jasmina’s passing. It would have meant the world to me.” Anema says she didn’t mean any harm, she was just grief stricken and hurt that the celebrities who had paid so much attention to her child when she was dying didn’t have time to acknowledge her death. In fact, the only people she says reached out to her after the child passed were the Obamas.
Rhianna may not have reached out to Anema, but she did tell acknowledge Jasmina publicly at Super Bowl celebrations in Miami. ”She was a very free, fun spirited little girl, full of energy, always happy, always energetic,” the 21 year old singer told the Associated Press. ”I always remember she wouldn’t sit still. She was always running around, always had a smile on her face.”
