Face to face with the Congo

By mid-1961, I had left the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation to become editor of the Ghana edition of a general-purpose magazine called Drum. It had the reputation of being frivolous in that it always had a very beautiful girl on the cover. Also, its most well-read section consisted of social – and sexual – problems served up by readers for solution by an all-knowing agony aunt called ‘Dolly’.

I was determined to give it new, more serious content and cover some of the important events that were creating a political cataclysm all over Africa. So, when the Ghana armed forces, having realised that the murder of Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba had rendered its presence in the Congo a nonsense in the eyes of many Ghanaians, invited the magazine to go and report on what the Ghanaian troops were doing there, I jumped at the chance.

Together with a brilliant photographer called Christian Gbagbo, I accompanied an excellent troupe of dancers, the Heatwaves, who were to entertain the troops. The creator of the Heatwaves was a lovely choreographer and dancer, the late Beryl Karikari, who was later to become my wife. Its band was led by a fantastic tenor saxophonist called Rex Ofosu.

l looked forward to the trip enormously because apart from the chance of gaining a fuller understanding of the socio-political situation in the Congo, I hoped to be able to enjoy Congolese guitar music, whose bug had bitten me a few years earlier. I caught the bug from a friend of mine, the late Germain Mba, a nephew of the first president of Gabon, Leon Mba.

Germain was then working for the magazine, Jeune Afrique, based in Paris, and he had come to Accra to try and get the Ghana government to publish publicity material about Ghana in an edition of the magazine. I was pointed in Germain's direction as someone who could write some of the Ghana articles for him, and he invited me to the terrace of the Ambassador Hotel, in Accra, for a drink one afternoon. When I got there, I found him enjoying one of the fabulous club sandwiches for which the Ambassador was noted, and he invited me to have one. I didn't need a second invitation.

Whilst we were eating, he tuned an enormous, battery-powered Grundig multi-shortwave radio that was standing by his chair to Radio Brazzaville. And out poured some heavenly guitar music. I learnt later that he had tuned it to the Listeners’ Choice programme of Radio Brazzaville, which played every afternoon the favourite music of millions of listeners stretching all the way from the two Congos, to Gabon and Cameroon, and as far west as the Ivory Coast and Dahomey (now Benin). Only we in English-speaking West Africa were being leap-frogged by the magical music strung from the fingers of ‘Franco and the OK Jazz’, ‘Dr Nico and African Fiesta’ and other fabulous Congolese guitar bands, which had captured all of francophone Africa.

The Congolese music simply slew me at first 'sight', and ever since I have been an aficionado who, the moment I arrive in Paris or Brussels, seeks out a music shop that sells Congolese music. I always leave the shops poorer than when I arrived. One day, in Harare, I had the best of both worlds – the Congolese band Pepe Kalle came and played live in the hotel where I was staying.

I can still remember enchanting tunes of the 1960s like ‘Linda Linda’, ‘Independence cha cha cha’, ‘Si tu bois beaucoup’ and ‘Maria Chantal’. All these were sung in Lingala, a language I didn’t understand. But the music was so good that the lyrics became an irrelevance.

I recently found Maria Chantal again, on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sZNgSsI3teo.

My current favourite Congolese band is Soukous Stars. The band is unique because it has succeeded in seamlessly breaking the barriers between Congolese soukous/rumba music and West African hi-life. It has produced excellent numbers in Ghana’s Twi language, which can be found on a stupendous, amazing disc – Ghana Success Medley – found at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_tDMSkmLrUM&feature=related.

Soukous Stars has topped this by also producing a fine version of ‘Sweet mother’ by the late Nigerian singer, Prince Nico Mbargo. It has thus cemented its unassailable position as the only really Pan-African band of our era. Its version of ‘Sweet mother’ is at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tvAuQJGs1b4&feature=related.

We had a whale of a time in the Congo, giving music and dance shows in the places where the Ghanaian troops were encamped – Luluaborg, Lake Makemba and Mwene Dittu, among others. We had flown to the Congo in a Royal Air Force plane with no proper seating facilities and it was quite an uncomfortable journey. But once there, we forgot our discomfort and enjoyed ourselves. The plane stopped at Leopoldville to refuel, but the airport looked desolate and I couldn’t find any records of Congolese music to buy.

Now, we had been told in Accra by Colonel Gerald Plange, the public relations officer of the Ghana Army, that we would be supplied with UN uniforms so that we would be seen as peacekeepers and not be mistakenly harassed by Congolese policemen. Indeed, after we had been booked into the Immokasai hotel in Luluaborg, I discovered that the Congo, under civil war conditions, wasn’t exactly the ideal place to be. When I turned on the water tap in the bathroom, it was muddy water that came out! What a shock. I changed rooms, but the experience left a sour taste in my mouth.

The uniforms we had been promised weren’t forthcoming either. When I asked about them, I was directed to the Officers’ Mess, where I was told to ask for the quartermaster. The guy, a lieutenant, came over.

‘Hallo’, I politely introduced myself, ‘I believe you have some uniforms for us?’

He looked me up and down.

‘Uniforms? Are you a soldier?’ he asked.

‘No. I am a journalist, as I just told you! Colonel Gerald Plange told us in Accra that you’d give us uniforms with UN insignia, to give us official protection.’

‘Are you a soldier?’ the quartermaster repeated.

‘NO!’ I shouted back. ‘I’ve just explained…’

‘And I’ve just told you that if you’re not a soldier…’

At this point, just when I realised there was going to be a hot argument, I suddenly saw the quartermaster’s face change. He braced up and stood to attention.

Then I heard a sharp, clear voice bark to him from behind me, ‘Don’t argue with that man! Buy him a drink!’

And the owner of the voice had passed us and gone on his way.

The quartermaster yelled, ‘Yes sah!’ and saluted.

The voice belonged to a smallish, fair-coloured man whom I later got to know was Brigadier Joe Michel. He was the most senior Ghanaian officer in the Congo and in charge of all our troops there.

After Brigadier Michel had left, the quartermaster asked me what I’d like to drink, but I had become irritated with his robotic approach, and made my way back to Immokasai. I was sure I’d survive without a uniform. I just made sure that my outings were carefully synchronised with those of the larger group. I longed to have the confidence to strike out on my own and sample Congolese life, but I didn’t think it was worth the risk.

I was right to be cautious for once. A small DC3 plane in which we flew to a Ghanaian camp about an hour from Luluaborg was surrounded by Congolese soldiers – led by a woman in cloth! They refused to allow us to disembark, and kept us prisoner on board the aircraft for about an hour. As the cabin of the aircraft got hotter, we began to panic. The Ghanaian officers talked and talked and talked, but the Congolese wouldn’t budge. Then, finally, after we'd almost given up hope, they allowed us to disembark. They said the Ghanaian troops had not pre-warned them that we were coming, so our soldiers had flouted their authority! Obviously, communications between our troops and the Congolese 'authorities' on whose patch they operated left much to be desired.

But when the music and the dancing began, some of them came to watch. They joined in the dancing when Rex Ofosu played cha cha cha music with which they were familiar.

One Sunday afternoon, Brigadier Michel invited us all to lunch at his quarters. He served us Ghana fufu with chicken and groundnut soup. I was so surprised when I saw exquisite home food in so unfamiliar a setting that I am afraid I rather piled my plate a little higher than I should have done. I saw Brigadier Michel watching me, but he said nothing, great diplomat that he was. I was thus very sad when Brigadier Michel was tragically killed a few months later in a mysterious aircraft accident on an airstrip in Northern Ghana.

(To be continued)

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* Cameron Duodu is a writer and commentator.
* Part two of this article is available to read here.
* Please send comments to editor[at]pambazuka[dot]org or comment online at Pambazuka News.