Great summary of the life of LAPIRO de Mbanga. I thought perhaps some aspects were missing in the write-up. The writer did not mention why LAPIRO was in jail recently. I heard that the Cameroon Government put him in jail. Was that true ? And if so why ?
On another perspective, the case of LAPIRO is a reminder that the cause of change is not about a man, but it's about our shared convictions as a people.
LAPIRO became famous and successful for the most part because he embodied the cause of change in the 1990s. He had become a symbol, a representation, a mouth piece for the voiceless, the hopeless, the forgotten. He was only respected and loved because he was seen as being part of something bigger than himself, and not necessarily for any personal achievement of his own, for a guy who admits dropping out of school very early. He probably may have misunderstood that the fame, the success, the popularity he earned was not about him. But that it was about a cause, a conviction that animated the popular consciousness at the time. He was only successful because he had embodied the cause and not because of any personal merits of his own, even as we grant that the guy is a good singer and only perhaps an average dancer. But it was about something bigger than himself and not him as a person.
Only LAPIRO knows his own mine. But I am thinking, his ego may have tricked him into believing that the cause for change was about him. He may have thought that he too, like the indomitable lion in chief had become invincible. He may have thought that he too has attained the ranks of the "super man" like the very same people he had been criticizing. And in so doing, he became the culprit of the very same cause he once championed. The lyrical witch hunter had become the hunted. And as a result he ripped the anger he sowed in the minds of the people. The very same people he once sang and danced for. Sounds familiar ?
LAPIRO de Mbanga, I like the guy and I wish him well. The teachable moment here if any, is that the cause of change you once championed was not about you. The ingenious lyrics you so artfully shared with us had become a medium through which the peoples' frustration could find expression and solace. You had become part of something bigger than yourself. It is the cause that you embodied that made you into who you became. It was not about you, but it was always about the cause, it was about the frustration of the people, it was about the people and not you. The cause of a people is always bigger than any one man. The collective will of a people has far more energy and synergy than you think. You only became famous because you tapped into it. However, your instincts for instant gratification, --compounded with the trickeries of your own ego--, may have gotten the best of you, at the expense of the principles you once championed and stood up for. Hope you have learnt something from the experience.
Peace be with you, and I wish you well.
www.africa-wakeup.com. A great source of inspiration to the problems we face.
From: Mishe Fon <mishefon@yahoo.com>
To: "camnetwork@yahoogroups.com" <camnetwork@yahoogroups.com>; "cameroon_politics@yahoogroups.com" <cameroon_politics@yahoogroups.com>; "accdf@yahoogroups.com" <accdf@yahoogroups.com>; "ambasbay@googlegroups.com" <ambasbay@googlegroups.com>; "mankonforum@yahoogroups.com" <mankonforum@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Tuesday, October 30, 2012 11:15 AM
Subject: [camnetwork] Lapiro de MBANGA and Political Vision in Contemporary Cameroon
Lapiro de Mbanga and Political Vision in Contemporary CameroonPublished by the International Journal of Language Society and Culture under the Penmanship of…ENONGENE Mirabeau Sone …Ercepts:The popular singer himself sees his primordial role as the liberation of Cameroonians from the tyranny of an "irresponsible and insensitive" government and his songs as powerful metaphors of popular mu-sic which is a hybrid of western instrumentation and local rhythms and lyrics. This music is enjoyed by both higher and lower classes. Its wide reach and particularly its grassroots appeal make it a powerful medium for political activism.The importance of popular music as a powerful and flexible vehicle for political communication explains why the landscape of popular music in Cameroon is vast and is peopled by such popular musicians as Petit Pays, Longe Longe, Ben Decca, Saint Bruno, Lapiro de Mbanga, and Prophet Afo Akom etc.But, for purposes of this paper, I will limit my analysis to one artist, Lambo Pierre Roger Sandjo otherwise known as Lapiro de Mbanga who to my mind is not only a highly acerbic critic and articulate commentator but also one of the most eloquent, the most prolific and, therefore the most representative of popular musicians in contemporary Cameroon. The acronym Lapiro is an abbreviation of his names: La (Lambo) Pi (Pierre) and Ro (Roger) which he caps off with Mbanga in order to identify with his place of birth. In an interview with The Sun newspaper, Lapiro intimated that he was born in Mbanga in 1957 of mixed parentage:"My mother is from Douala/Aboh. Aboh covers Miang, Mbangsen Bonalea (which is the district headquarters). My father is from Bametcha in Bangoua Sub-Division, Nde Division in the West Province of Cameroon. Two of them met here in Mbanga and I don`t Know what happened.'In spite of his rich and comfortable background, Lapiro alias Ndingaman drifted into delinquency in his early life. He made friends with streets urchins and together they engaged in pick pocketing and other petty crimes. Like most juvenile delinquents in urban setting, his misdemeanors landed him in prison.The time he spent behind bars gave him the singular opportunity to experience at first hand the deplorable and precarious living conditions of the wretched of the earth. It is therefore not surprising that when he took to popular music in later life, his major concern was with the plight of the down trodden. His songs celebrate the resilience while exposing the rapacity and voracity of authority figures. Lapiro`s artistic fold rest on two solid foundations.The first is the thematic preoccupation which encompasses such burning issues as national integration, galloping unemployment, abject poverty, ethnocentric marginalisation, economic exploitation and, of course, political chicanery. The second is his medium of expression which is commonly known as "Mboko talk", a strange linguistic concoction o Douala, English, French and Pidgin English spiced with his own coinages and neologisms.The wind of democratic change which swept through the African continent in 1990 ushered into Cameroon a new political era governed by the rule of law. It also helped to shape Lapiro`s musical agenda by creating a favourable socio-political context in which he launched his masterpiece selling album,"Mimba We". Lapiro reached the apogee of his music career in 1992 as one of the principal proponents and spear-heads of the famous "Operation Ghost Town".The turbulence and imbroglio which characterized that political activism helped to propel Lapiro into Cameroon`s Music Hal l of Fame.Then suddenly and inexplicably, the virulent and vitriolic voice of the fearless and intrepid Lapiro de Mbanga went silent. His fans comprising the deprived and politically endangered could not understand what was happening. Had their cynosure ran out of steam or out of inspiration? Had he been bought over or better still, had he over-stepped the bounds of political decorum and become the unwitting victim of executive censorship? In other words, had he taken too much for the owner to notice?Whatever the case, it did not take long for his votaries to know that their idol had committed the monumental political error of publicly endorsing the regime of President Paul Biya, a regime which to them was made up of predators who encouraged widespread injustice and acquisition of ill-gotten wealth under the veneer of peace and political order. They immediately censored him by boycotting his public performances and forcing him into a precipitous artistic limbo where he vegetated for almost a decade.He resurfaced on the popular musical scene around 2001 with the same flair and ardour only to discover that he had lost his popular appeal. His "little people" of Nkoululu, Mokolo, and Marche Central (some of the most popular places for the unemployed) no longer believed in him.Lapiro retreated to his hometown of Mbanga where he found refuge and time to chew the cud. About seventeen years in Musical and popular limbo, and in retrospect, he tries to defend himself:"I am the only one and nobody else, who started pointing and criticizing the government actions viz-à-viz the population. This gave me the stature of a Politician even though a singer. Everyone knows what transpired in 1990-1992 and the story of Lapiro and all the talk that Biya and Fochive (the then director of secret police) gave me money to change my position. Seventeen years later, the truth is here. Do you think that if I was a traitor the people of Mbanga could have made me their chief? I am not a chief because my father was a chief. I am not a chief because Biya and his government decided to make me chief. I am a chief because the people of Mbanga chose me to be their chief".Apart from music, Lapiro de Mbanga has other preoccupations. He is a politician who campaigned for the position of the Mayor of Mbanga on opposition Social Democratic Front(S.D.F) in the municipal elections of 22 July 2007 in Cameroon but he unfortunately lost the position to the ruling Cameroon Peoples Democratic Party (CPDM). As he puts it, the people of Mbanga haveconfidence in him because of what he has done for them:__._,_.___
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