Wednesday, 15 October 2014

76th birthday of Fela Anikulapo-Kuti

(Born 15 October 1938, Abeokuta, Nigeria)
Celebrated Afro-beat musician, bandleader and one of just a handful of Nigerian public figures who consistently and unequivocally condemns the Igbo genocide (as he evocatively reminds the world in his authorised biography, Carlos Moore, Fela: The Bitch of a Life, Lawrence Hill, 2009: “The Biafrans were right … That’s evident now … The Ibos were right … The Biafrans were f***ing right to secede” [47-49]), untiringly and expansive critic of regimes in post-Igbo genocide age-of-pestilence Nigeria, employing the expressive lyrics of his compositions and the operatic drive of his orchestra to assail genocidist generals and sergeants and colonels and financiers and politicians and their cohorts who control and wheel and deal in the kakistocratic lair that is Nigeria

(Fela Ransome-Kuti and the Africa 70, “Everything Scatter” [recorded: LP Nigeria, Coconut PMLP1000, 1975])
Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe

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