Fela Page 5

  Man, our parents treated us more like boarding-school students than as their own children. Yet we were their children. Every time I got beaten by either of them, I asked, “For what?” It was either for doing this little thing or that little thing. I got beaten for going against their regulations, like leaning against the wall or bending my knees while I was walking, or for talking “too loud”, or whistling, or for not lowering my eyes fast enough when one of my parents approached. It got to a point where every one of us was always afraid at the slightest sight of our parents because we didn’t know what we were doing wrong. All we knew is that they would descend on us and start beating us. Caress their children? They wouldn’t indulge in that shit-o. They called it indulgence. Hold us in their arms? Never. I remember that when I was very, very small, my father would sit me on his lap once in a while. I would feel so exalted! But my parents didn’t go for that shit. Only when I was very small, my father would stroke my hair every morning but he would never hold me in his arms. For our parents, the rule was “Spare the rod and spoil the child”. In Africa, colonial parents are never close to their children.

  Fela’s mother, Funmilayo (“Bere”) Ransome-Kuti

  (née Thomas)

  3

  Funmilayo

  “Give Me Happiness”

  My mother was a motherfucker, you know. She would flog you like a man. You know how? She’d say: “Touch your toes. Bend down.” And it was batabatabatabatabatabatabatabata …! She and my father wanted their son to be an example. So any time there was punishment, I would get the most. Man, my mother and father were so honest with their discipline, their child had to be flogged. They were the baddest parents I ever met in my life. It was systematic flogging. There was no week I didn’t take sometimes three, sometimes six floggings. Any time my mother flogged me, it was rough flogging-o: chagachagachagachagachagacha …! If I tried getting away, she would say in a severe, commanding voice: “Come back here.” And I’d have to come back.

  I remember very well the first rough flogging she gave me. I nearly died from it, man! My mother’s mother, Adejonwo, was at the house that day, sitting down in the big room. I think she asked me to do something for her that had to do with food. But you know how children are, don’t want to listen to old women, man. So since I thought she was bothering me, I told her, “Mama, leave me alone!” My mother overheard.

  “What? Whaaaat did you saaaaay?”

  Heeeeeeeyyyyyyyyy! Ohhhhhhhhh, she flogged me rough-o! Man, I’ll never forget that day. I was flogged to the bone! Ohhhhhhhhhhhh!

  Strange! But something just kept attracting me to her. I didn’t know why she was kicking my ass. I don’t think anybody kicked my ass as much as my mother. But I dug her. I liked to hear her talk, discuss. Something always made me sit with her, to listen. I vaguely remember when she started getting into politics. No, not vaguely. I remember very well, because when she was running around doing politics she didn’t have time to flog me. The more she got into politics the less time she had to beat me. So I, too, began liking politics.

  It wasn’t until around 1946 or ’47 that I began understanding what my mother was fighting for. She was organizing a big protest demonstration with the women of Abeokuta. She was protesting on the streets with the women. And they went straight to see the District Officer of Abeokuta. He was a young white boy; one of those fresh British guys who tried getting arrogant with my mother. She had gone to see him to expose the demonstrators’ grievances. The District Officer must have said something in a disdainful voice, like: “Go on back home.” To which my mother exploded: “You bastard, rude little rat …!” Something like that. Ohhhhhhhhh! What a scandal! It was something heavy at that time. And the news went around like fire, man. The Daily News, the national newspaper then, printed the story immediately. Imagine insulting the highest motherfucking representative of the British imperial crown in Abeokuta. Ohhhhhhhh, man! I was proud. People in Abeokuta talked about nothing else but that incident and “Bere”. “Bere” was my mother’s nickname. And I would just beam with pride.

  The Nigerian Women’s Union was a powerful organization. My mother founded it in the early ’40s. As I got older, she started taking me around with her in the car to her campaign meetings. You know, she was the first woman to drive a car in Nigeria, man. Eventually I got to know what she was doing because she’d take me everywhere with her. I admired her. That was when I began getting close to her a little bit. I was close but not as close as I should have been.

  My mother was quite heavy politically. And, ohhhhhhh, I liked the way she took on those old politicians, all those dishonest rogues. She wouldn’t have anything to do with them. None of them. Except Nnamdi Azikiwe (“Zik”), for whom she had a little sympathy. But she was against all the others, all those politicians like the Obafemi Awolowo (“Awo”) type. She even finished with Zik later on because he began playing a double game with her. It happened when she went to London with Zik for a press conference. When she returned, she said that Zik was sabotaging her. She said that Zik didn’t want progress for her at all. Awolowo? To her, he was the biggest crook. She could tolerate Zik, but not Awolowo. At the time – in 1949 – I was one of those encouraging her to join NCNC, the National Council of Nigeria-Cameroons, Zik’s party. Everybody loved Zik, because he was a nationalist. I wanted my mother to be in his party. I wanted her to win the elections. She was so popular, man! Oh, those politicians of that time destroyed the country, man. And look at what they’re doing today! They’re the same politicians: Awolowo, Azikiwe. . . .

  But in 1949 Zik’s party was a national party. The Yorubas voted for him. He won many times. He won over Awolowo. Even in Yorubaland he beat Awolowo. Awolowo’s party, Action Group, wasn’t a national party at all. I was hearing a lot about all that then. I’d always sit down with my mother when she was talking politics. I was interested in her progress. I didn’t know why she was kicking my ass, but I dug my mother so much.

  The more my mother got involved in the political movement, the worse things got between her and my father. The confrontation of my mother with the Oba (chief) of Abeokuta didn’t help either to improve things between my parents. You see, the Oba Alake Sir Ladapo Ademola II was the Chief of Abeokuta. But my mother never called him a king, as he had titled himself. She called him a chief. Her reasons are historically right because Abeokuta never had a king. Odùduwà, the ancestor of all Yorubas, founded the sacred city of Ilè-Ifè. Odùduwà had only seven children and they were the only kings of Yorubaland. They founded seven kingdoms: Ondo, Oyo, Ife, Benin and three others I don’t remember offhand. The Alake was not one of those seven kings. So my mother would never call him king. When she spoke to the press or to white people she would always say, “The Chief of Abeokuta, the Alake.” You see, Alake is a title.

  My mother was against the Alake because he was working for the white District Officer. He was a lackey of the colonial system. When the Alake declared he would collect taxes from the market women of Abeokuta, my mother decided to take their side. So she went to see the Alake on their behalf. She said to him: “How can you collect taxes from women who are selling small, small things in the market?” The Alake would collect taxes from them for his own pockets. That was in ’46, ’47, ’48. My mother said: “This must stop!” She mobilized all the women. Then they took to the streets and protested. That’s how the whole thing started. She also got all the market women to boycott sales for as long as the British colonial administration did not recognize their rights as traders. From there, it progressed to demanding more rights. It expanded to become a Nigerian opposition. At first, it was called the Nigerian Women’s Union, then it became the Federation of Nigerian Women’s Union.

  The Oba Alake Sir Ladapo Ademola II, Chief of Abeokuta

  Ohhh, those were fantastic times-o! My mother succeeded in dethroning this pseudo-king, the Alake. How did she do it? It was ingenious. She got all the women together and told them: “Now, we are going to take over the Alake’s house.” Everybod
y hated the Alake. There was a huge courtyard outside his house. So my mother said, “Let’s all go and take over the entire house.” About 50,000 women went, with my mother at the head. They went and slept there in the yard of his house. The Alake was surrounded by 50,000 women. They were everywhere, in the front, behind the house, everywhere. The Alake couldn’t get out of his own house. You know what that means? What would you do? You would flee too. And, man, that’s exactly what the Alake did. He fled to Oshogbo. My mother had succeeded in chasing the Alake out of Abeokuta; she chased him into exile. And the Alake stayed in Oshogbo for three years. It wasn’t until around 1950, ’51, I think, that he came back to Abeokuta. And guess who brought him back? It was Chief Obafemi Awolowo who brought the Alake back in 1951 when he launched his political party, Action Group, and was attempting to get the British to put him at the head of the first Nigerian government.

  Bringing the Alake back was such a demagogic move! When my mother heard the news, I remember seeing her come storming into the house. And a few minutes later, come back out, dressed as a … man. She had on shorts, like Bermudas, a man’s shirt, a beret and sandals. I swear she got dressed like that because she realized she was going to fight men. It was her way of saying, “It takes a man to fight another man!” But the Alake came back anyway. . . .

  My mother, she was something else! Tireless, man! After the Alake, she shifted her fight- to getting the right of suffrage for Nigerian women. And she won that one too, because women did cast votes in the first elections in Nigeria during colonial times. An amazing woman, my mother! In the early 1950s she became the only Nigerian woman – and perhaps the first African woman ever – to travel to the USSR, China, Poland, Yugoslavia and East Berlin. In China, she met with Mao Tse-tung. I don’t know who she met in Russia. You see, at that time she was one of the vice-presidents of the Women’s International Democratic Federation (WIDF). Remember that was at a time when it was considered a crime to travel to the so-called “iron-curtain” countries. So, in 1955, upon returning from her trip to China, her passport was seized. Abubakar Tafawa Balewa was then Prime Minister. Nigeria was still a colony but under a régime of “internal self-government”. Then, some time in the early ’60s, she was awarded the Lenin Peace Prize. I don’t remember well, but I think they gave it to her in Lagos.

  But there is something I do remember very clearly. That’s when my mother took me to meet Kwame Nkrumah. Ghana was already independent and Nkrumah was President. Nigeria wasn’t independent yet – and still isn’t. That was around early 1957.* She had met with Nkrumah many times in her life. But on that particular day she took me with her to see Nkrumah. You know, if my mother wants to see somebody like that and she takes me, it means she’s going to see a friend. Nkrumah was her friend. At that time he would come now and then to Lagos in his yacht on holidays. I remember his yacht being anchored somewhere in Lagos harbour. He was wearing a white shirt and trousers, man. Nkrumah told my mother he didn’t want to see anybody; that he hadn’t come for any official visit; that he didn’t want to see any minister, nobody at all. Not even Tafawa Balewa, the Prime Minister. He had come to meditate. But he had sent a message to my mother, saying that he wanted to see her. When she got there they started joking. My mother said teasingly:

  “Ah, you come to Nigeria and you don’t want to see your brothers here.”

  “I don’t deal with corrupt people,” he answered.

  My mother looked at him and smiled.

  Nkrumah went on: “They are slaves to the people in England. You know that.”

  He was smiling while saying it. Man, he was so cool. My mother thought a lot of him. But she never spoke much about him to me. He was her friend, a very good friend. Nkrumah! Man, I’ll never forget his face.

  4

  Hello, Life! Goodbye, Daudu

  Nobody was more in a hurry than I was to become an adult. Adulthood meant freedom, man! Freedom at last to do whatever I felt like. And what I felt like doing most was having fun, enjoying myself. So the older I got, the happier I got. At least outside of my house. I was glad to finish primary school and be somewhat out of my father’s reach. I began feeling like a different person in secondary school. A total extrovert. I was in the forefront of entertainment in school. I’d run around, always joking, laughing, making others laugh. I was easily the most popular boy in the school.

  I’d given myself a nickname just for fun: “Simon Templar”. But before that I’d called myself “El Paso Kid”, a real colonial nickname. Then one day I changed it to “Simon Templar”. You see, at the time I had read this novel – The Saint – whose main character was named Simon Templar. This guy was very, very clever. In fact, he impressed me as being so clever that one day I went into the classroom, straight to the blackboard and wrote: “Don’t call me El Paso Kid any more. I’m now Simon Templar.” Ohhhhh, can you imagine how stupid I was then, man? I was so full of complexes, you know. But all of that was great fun. After the horrors my father had put me through in primary school, I was entitled to some fun.

  In school I remember we had a newspaper and there was a club formed around it. That was always the system of schools. So I decided to form a club too. Guess what I named it? The “Planless Society”. I was sixteen then and was in Class Four. The rule of the club was simple: we had no plans. You could be called upon to disobey orders at any time. Disobedience was our “law”. We’d take my mother’s car, for example. We loved the night, man. We’d go to Lagos, nightclubbing. Oh, wow, I was finally getting a taste of life, the real life!

  Oh, how I loved the feel of driving! I remember the day I taught myself to drive my parents’ car. I was only twelve and a half years old then. There was only one car; my parents shared it. I wanted to drive so badly. I told my mother to teach me. She said she would when I got to be sixteen. But that was too far away for me. So I’d always watch them. I watched what they would do. I watched their legs. And I’d ask them questions, like, “What is this or that for?” Then one day, when I was alone with the driver, I begged him to let me drive the car. He said, “OK.” Man, I couldn’t even see. I was so small. Anyway, I released the clutch and the car bounced forward. Shit, I’d forgot my foot was on the accelerator, so the car was just going zzzzzzzzzzz. The driver shouted, “Press the brake!” I pressed the brake and the car stopped in a big jerk, man. Oooooooooo. I was fucking scared. I was shaking man. I didn’t get in that car again for two years.

  Then when I was fourteen I got a bit braver. One night when everybody was sleeping I went to the garage. I kept thinking of the brake. “Brake. Brake. Don’t forget the brake.” I went out of the garage gently in first gear. This time I wasn’t gonna make any mistake. I went into second gear, then I pressed the accelerator, gently. The car was going slowly under my control. I said, “Fine.” But at that point my mother leaned out the window. She was surprised:

  “FELA! Who told you to drive that car? Come upstairs here!”

  I got out and went upstairs.

  “Who told you how to drive the car?”

  “Me, Mum,” I answered.

  “You NAUGHTY boy!” she said sternly.

  And would you believe it? That was the end of it. So from then on it was nothing but good times.

  Coming back though to our “Planless Society” and the fun we had. The club was our own way of commenting on the society we were living in. So a lot of students were attracted to it. Our club developed to the point where we started a newspaper: The Planless Times. We would pass around copies – to the teachers first. We were only a few members. I can give you their names: Shiji Sowetan, who is now an Attorney-General and Solicitor-General in Nigeria; Dapo Teju-Osho, who owns a big factory, a big company in Nigeria now; my brother Beko, who’s now a doctor; Bumi Sowetan, a business boy, running around town now; Akin Shogbamu who’s now a doctor in Lagos; and Beekersteth, a boy with an English name; and there was me. It was marvellous, man. Ohhhh, we were doing our thing, The Planless Times.

  At the end of the year, we h
eard that the Principal wanted to bring a new prefect. We heard about it underground. So we brought out a special issue which carried two protests in it. We printed 500 copies. That caused a riot in our school. When the police came to our school we fought, man. That was part of the things we did in school at that time.

  It was during those days that I met the most important guy in my whole life: Jimo Kombi Braimah. But he’s always been called J.K. for short. It was in 1954 that we first met. I was sixteen and he was nineteen. Was it on one of my trips to Lagos that we met? I don’t remember. J.K. even thinks we met in 1955 instead. So he doesn’t remember either. But, man, we hit it off right away. It was quite a natural attraction. Nothing forced. We just started doing things together. We used to meet in Lagos. Since those days, J.K. and I have become inseparable. And today – after thirty years of friendship – I can say that J.K. is the closest person to me, except my wives.

  The funny thing about J.K. is that he was boarding at the school in Ijebu-Ode where my father had been the Principal some years before. Even funnier is that he had been assigned to the Kuti boarding house, named after my father. You see, Reverend I.O. Ransome-Kuti had become a sort of legendary figure. J.K. knew everything about him: his terrible beatings, his disciplinarianism, his fucking obsession with colonial education. . . . Everything. So, in a way, J.K. had also lived under the roof of the Ransome-Kuti family. Isn’t it strange how the roads of people cross?

  Once we had met, we just stuck together. We would hook up in Lagos and go around town together. J.K. was then a singer and he introduced me to the musical world of Lagos. Both of us were struggling through secondary school. (We graduated more or less the same year: 1956–7.) But we always found time to have a lot of fucking good fun!