Bobi Wine, Uganda`s great black hope, was deported from Britain not so long ago for his role in the hip-hop tradition of murderous music, whose lyrics advocate the torture and murder of LGBT people. He is a vicious thug. Second, popular “celebrities” don`t have much background in politics. Do you remember someone named Trump? In fact, the best reason to believe that rappers could offer an improvement in the quality of African leadership is that their appeal often extends beyond their ethnic or religious group. Rap music in Africa, as in the rest of the world, tends to revolve around haste, street life and making money. This resonates in cities where the majority of the population lives in slums and has informal jobs for low wages. It unites people who speak different languages or worship different religions. Bobi Wine`s hits include songs like “Ghetto”, in which he sings that “we come to express exactly what the poor man thinks”. Lexxus Legal owns “Chez Nous”, in which he sings about being caught between a poorly paid job in Congo and the risk of going to Europe, only to die along the way and be stranded on a beach. Of course, not all politicians who adopt ghetto rap styles are as eloquent as Mr Wine or Lexxus Legal. Kenya has Mike Sonko, until recently governor of Nairobi, who owns a fleet of gold-plated Mercedes-Benz and likes to wear tracksuits with huge amounts of jewelry.
He claims to be fighting Kenya`s “deep state,” but as governor he was probably no better than the old rulers with their Learjets. Last year, a brilliant Kenyan documentary called Softie told the story of Boniface Mwangi, an anti-corruption activist who showed up in Nairobi in 2017. In the end, he lost – to Charles Njagua Kanyi, a dance musician better known as “Jaguar”. The Right Honourable Jaguar, as he now calls himself, has a great achievement as a politician: being arrested for inciting violence against migrants. All over Africa, rappers are turning to politics. In Senegal, a decade ago, a troupe of rappers called “Y`en a Marre” (“Marre”) attacked President Abdoulaye Wade and contributed to his defeat in an election in which he was seeking an unconstitutional third term. Then, in 2012, Youssou N`Dour, a pioneer of Senegalese dance music, tried to run for president. His candidacy was disqualified, but he later became Minister of Tourism. In neighboring Burkina Faso, another rapper named “Smockey” spearheaded the protests that toppled the 2015 coup in 2016. Three years later, in Sudan, another rapper named Ayman Maw returned from America to perform in front of protesters who gathered against Omar al-Bashir`s regime.
Fortunately, many are fed up with aging despots. Let`s hope they don`t rejuvenate instead! Before the advent of the Internet, African leaders controlled state media. On Congolese state television, Mobutu`s face rose like the sun before the news. Nowadays, the internet means that musicians have much more control in spreading their message. Bobi Wine might have managed to win his fan base to politics and organize it without the internet, but it would have been more difficult. That`s why Museveni forced Ugandan telecom companies to cut off access to social media ahead of elections two weeks ago. Had he not done so, evidence that he stole the election, such as videos of filled ballot boxes, would have spread like wildfire. The same goes for Mr Wine`s calls to protest.
This is not new. Look at the very positive role played by Caetano Veloso and Gilberto Gil in highlighting the evils of martial law in Brazil. This story had a happy ending, but only after imprisonment and exile. (Gil “London-London” from Google Veloso – the Guardian site has a good article) Today, Lexxus Legal is not only a musician, but also a kind of politician. The last time I spoke to him, he had just returned from a press conference with Martin Fayulu, who won and then stole Congo`s 2019 presidential election. M. Fayulu continued to organize demonstrations to protest the election results. And Lexxus was with him and called on young people to take to the streets. He says his main interest is always music – he has never run for office. But he explains why he feels compelled to get involved in politics. “We artists are affected by the economic situation, which makes it impossible to feed a family. We are affected by the health crisis.
We are affected by insecurity in the east of the country,” he told me. “It`s for artists, so to speak, it`s also speaking for a large part of the population.” Africa`s politics are unreal. But the idea of rap music to spread political ideas is not entirely bad. People like Bobi Wine – or Lexxus – have been enthusiastically received, also because they offer something new. However, they are not an absolute break with tradition. There has always been a link between music and politics in Africa. In Congo, “Independence Cha Cha” was a hit in 1960 when Belgium withdrew. Later, the brilliant rumba group TPOK Jazz produced songs such as “Candidate Na Biso Mobutu” (our candidate, Mobutu). In Kenyan politics, no self-respecting person fights for an election without a group singing how great he (or she) is. But the wave of musicians working in opposition to the incumbents is different.
Nevertheless, the rise of the rapper politician gives reason for hope. In countries like Kenya, politicians usually come to power because of corruption, not despite. People elect leaders they usually know to be crooks because they hope that at least if they get a president or a representative of their ethnic group, they will give jobs or stolen money to some of their relatives. Musicians may have money, but as Lexxus points out, they don`t usually make it by looting the state. They may sound populist, but populism is not necessarily worse than current political systems that reward loyalty to corrupt leaders. What it represents is the growing importance of a young, urban electorate. In almost all sub-Saharan countries, with the exception of South Africa, almost half of the population is made up of children under the age of 18. And almost all of these countries, with a few exceptions, have rapidly urbanized.
Under colonialism, Kinshasa and Lagos were outposts in the hinterland of empires with metropolises in Europe. Now they are megacities themselves. These young Africans are more globalized than ever, thanks in part to mobile phones, which are used not only to send money and WhatsApp messages, but also to listen to music. They are also frustrated. Formal employment remains scarce in most parts of the continent. I first met Congolese rapper Alex Dende Esakanu in December 2016 amid violent protests and lockdown in Kinshasa. Joseph Kabila, then president of the Democratic Republic of Congo, had reached the end of his term and policemen in navy blue uniforms holding batons occupied every street corner. I wrote a story about music in politics, and Alex, better known as “Lexxus Legal,” had a lot to say. It looks like you`ve already created an account in our VIP network of websites.
To protect your personal information, we need to verify that you really are. To activate your account, please confirm your password. Once you`ve confirmed your password, you can log in to both pages via Facebook. Please fill in the following information so that we can provide you with a better experience. Lexxus says it`s not enough to fight the government – you also need to have a platform for the government yourself. Despite his enormous personality, he wants elections to be about politics, not personality.