I really do not know what people like about the late Afrobeat musician, Fela Anikulapo Kuti, apart from his music. But whenever I say it in the public, they call me names as if I am not entitled to my opinion. I wonder why Nigerians still talk about him every day like he is still alive. He died in 1997.
I do not fancy certain things about his person. He married 27 wives, he was too confrontational, he made marijuana (weed) famous in Nigeria, he didn’t like to wear clothes, he forgot that no one could fight the government and come out normal, and he wasn’t afraid of death. But it seems all these qualities and more, made him a special kind of being, ‘abami eda.’
I suspect that God deliberately took him away at the age of 58. Perhaps, if he had stayed more years on earth, he would have led a revolution. What Fela could have instigated is better left to the imagination. He was like a god in a way. He set up a nightclub in the Empire Hotel, known as the Afro-Spot and later changed it to the Afrika Shrine. He performed regularly and officiated Yoruba traditional ceremonies in honour of the nation’s ancestral gods. He also changed his middle name to Anikulapo, which means ‘he who carries death in his pouch.’
Fela knew what he wanted early in life and nothing could stop him from achieving those goals. While he was sent abroad to study medicine like his two brothers, Beko and Oludotun, he chose to study music at the Trinity College of Music, London. He mastered how to play saxophone, keyboard, trumpet, guitar and drums. He decided to sing in pidgin language so that his music could be enjoyed by all and sundry.
To many people, he was more of an activist than a musician. His influence on the society was stronger than that of a head of state, who was regarded as the number one citizen. And when Fela died in 1997, more than one million people attended his burial ceremony.
‘Zombie’ in 1977, an attack on the Nigerian soldier, was a hit and infuriated the government. During one of the many attacks, 1,000 soldiers were said to have stormed Kalakuta. He was beaten and molested, while his activist mother, Funmilayo Ransome- Kuti, was thrown out from a window. She sustained injuries that she never recovered from till she passed on. The republic was burnt; Fela’s studio, instruments and master tapes were destroyed.
Yet, Fela did not panic. The official inquiry claimed that the commune was destroyed by an unknown soldier. His response to the attack was rather dramatic. He took his mother’s coffin to the Dodan Barracks in Lagos, the then head of state, General Olusegun Obasanjo’s residence and wrote two songs, ‘Coffin for Head State’ and ‘Unknown soldier,’ to taunt the Nigerian government.
No musician of today can lay claims to a bit of Fela’s fearlessness. The likes of Burna Boy, Oritse Femi, W4, D’Banj and a host of others have tried to imitate his style of music, but none of them have attempted his lifestyle.
While he was not afraid of death, artistes of today don’t want to die. They have tasted fame, wealth and different women, and they want things to remain like that. They would rather remain silent than to speak against the hands that feed them or people who pay their bills.
Unlike Fela who derived pleasure in opening up the rots of politicians and the system, the new crop of artistes will jump at any opportunity to be on the payroll of politicians. They dine and wine with government. And at state functions too, they are special guests.
