Music icon, Bongos Ikwue, shares his experiences with JOHN AMEH
How does it feel to be 70 years old?
I don’t feel any difference at all. I don’t know what it feels like to be 70 years old. When I turned 30, I didn’t know what it felt like. I am just living and doing my everyday thing and enjoying every bit of it.
At a point, you simply disappeared from the music scene. Why?
Well, I have not been living in any kind of hiding. I think people, or journalists, have not been reaching out enough. You are the one to go and find out what is happening. I shouldn’t go and knock on everybody’s door and say, ‘Hey, here I am; my name is Bongos’. It is up to you to find out about whom you want to find out and tell it to the people. I have been as busy as anybody can be. I don’t like to talk about myself.
How was growing up?
I attended primary school in Otukpo, Jos and Kaduna. I had my secondary school education in Zaria and my Higher School in Okene (Kogi State). Then I ended up in Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria. I think that sums it up completely. Growing up, I spent a little time in Otukpo with my parents, but moved to live with my brother, who was a policeman in Jos from 1953 to 1956. Most of my growing years were with my brother were at the police barracks in Jos. He listened to music a lot.
He woke up in the morning and played music. We had songs that came from Portugal and Britain and so on. But we only had music whenever the listener’s choice and request programmes were broadcast. So, it was a privilege to listen to music at the time. I was lucky to have a brother who would play music every morning before the sun would rise.
You studied engineering but found yourself in music. How did the switch happen?
Everybody has every kind of talent. What matters is that you must discover yourself. I bet you can play music, wrestle a little, play a little football and tell a little history. We are all capable of doing almost anything and everything. It is just that some people don’t know themselves enough. I believe in the philosophy that says, ‘Man, know thyself.’ There is nobody without a talent. Some people were lucky to have explored their talents properly and developed them. There were strong men who didn’t take up boxing as their career. They just wasted away. Some great athletes in this country never saw the daylight of a stadium because they never ran. I think some of us were lucky we could try a little of everything. Everybody’s talent is everywhere. It doesn’t matter what you read. In fact, people who went to school, who didn’t study themselves, are the people who are doomed! Academic success for me is very different from real knowledge. I think the university starts after school and this is the university of the streets. For me, that is the real institution.
Why did you abandon music at a point in your career?
There is nothing like breaking off from music or coming back to it. The Bible tells you that Jesus Christ disappeared for 18 years out of the 33 years that he lived on earth. Nobody has told us where he went to. Does anybody know? Who told you I didn’t go to somewhere to study some more? Just like The Bible didn’t tell us where Jesus went, I am not telling anybody where I went to. But I have been busy with music and doing other things more than I have ever done in my entire life. That is why I can tell you without any doubt in my mind that the new album I have recorded, entitled Wulu Wulu, has so much more quality, messages and greater delivery than the last one. Did I ever stop? No. Maybe, I went to some place. But I’m not going to tell anybody.
Was it because music was no longer financially rewarding for you?
What do you call reward? Is the definition of reward finance? For me, success and reward have meaning only when they are interpreted. There are some people who have made so much money and they have never been happy. In fact, anybody who is looking for money is doomed. Nobody in the whole world has enough money. Not one person will tell you, ‘I have enough money now’. Why are they still looking for money when they are already billionaires? I don’t see money as a reward and I have never looked for money. But I always look for work. I can have enough work, but never enough money. Work is the only thing that will change society. Suppose I have N30bn in the bank and I die? That will be a tragedy. But if I have only N500m, why not rehabilitate all the roads in my neck of the woods? But you can’t build roads by leaving money in the bank or by writing cheques and distributing the money to people. You build roads by organising the work, buying the equipment, training the people, giving an assignment and putting a timetable for the work to be done. Life is all about work; money gives credence to the expression. Don’t think of money, but think of what to do to make money.
Is it true that you went into contracts and you were building houses during the break?
I am still into contracs and building houses. I still play music and design homes. I have just recorded 45 new songs. Nobody has talked about this. I would go into the studio at about 8 pm and come out by 9 am still on my feet. This is a true story, not a fairy tale. My wife is a living testimony. This is what I have done in the last few years and it has resulted in the recording of this new album, ‘Wulu Wulu’. At no time did I leave music. I never left the limelight. I was writing songs. There is nothing like music of the times. Is there a movie of the times? No. I think what is happening in Nigeria now is that people play dance music at 6 a.m, at a time when everybody is sleeping! You wake up, it is the same type of music you listen to. Even in the office at 2 pm, the same type of music keeps playing. There is nothing like slow songs anymore. Who says people don’t dance to slow songs? If anything at all, this has given somebody like me a passion to write songs with clear meanings, music that is definitely slow, that you can dance to or listen to.
Don’t you think that music is developing fast in this part of the world?
Everybody plays the same beat to every song. Do you call that development? Then I better listen to you. Why would you start with dance music at 5 a.m and carry on with it? Do you expect people to dance in their offices? These people are working in offices and the music you are playing is not suggestive of anything but a party. Take a good look at what is happening to the youth. Young men wearing earrings, plaiting their hair. When they walk on the streets, their underpants are showing. Is that what you want for your country? Are you truly proud of what is happening or you are scared to talk about it when young people walk on the streets and you see their underpants? You want me to play that kind of music that will express that kind of life? Or you expect me to sit down here to say it is okay for a man to marry a man because they do it in America and England? I am different. People say if you can’t beat them, join them. But I say that if you can’t change the world, don’t let the world change you. I don’t care if you are not going to buy my new songs because I say I don’t believe that young men should wear earrings and flaunt their underpants or smoke Indian hemp before performing on stage. I don’t believe that girls should expose their bodies and call that entertainment. You call me Old School, but professors teach students; not students teaching professors.
Do you think the new school makes more noise than music?
You have just said it. But why don’t you talk about it? It is what the young boy sees that he copies. Are you going to sit at home and your 12-year-old comes home suddenly with earrings and as he walks past, his underpants are showing in his jeans trousers and you say nothing? Why are you condoning these things on our national television? For me, this is not freedom. Take a good look at China, they looked inward and became tight on their culture. See where they are today. I think too much freedom for young people can only destroy the society. They need to be guided. I believe that people should dress up properly and cover up that part of the body that should be covered. Talking about meaningful music, before the DJ starts playing, he asks himself: Is this danceable? How many people dance in their rooms every day? How many people even go to parties? You have done no surveys at all and you think that what is happening now is the modern thing. Is it really the modern thing? In America, Russia and Brazil, eight-year-olds will gather and play in a whole orchestra. In Nigeria, a performer takes his CD and mimes in the presence of the President. Yet, nobody says anything about it. A visiting foreign diplomat attends an event with the President and a young man or woman appears and starts miming. The diplomat won’t laugh; he will clap because he is trained to be polite. But he is laughing at you in his mind. When is this going to stop? Take a look at the quality of life that people who don’t smoke hemp, who don’t listen to same kind of music, live? When a man is playing loud music all the time, open his door and see where he lives. It will be disorganised all round. Is that what you want for your country? Where are your role models? Why are they doing Maltina Dance always and MTN gives out awards to dancers and all that? Where are our best mathematicians in secondary schools? Why are they not giving them these awards? Even when composers of music come on stream on Nigerian Idol, they are all trying to sing like Lionel Richie or some other artiste in America. They are doing Nigeria’s Got Talent because America says ‘America’s Got Talent’. When will this mediocrity and stupid copying without thinking stop? If you want to host a show that is competitive, get people to compose their songs, stay up there and play it. Everything they are presenting in Nigeria is a fake copy of the real thing.
How do we address the mediocrity and copying?
I am addressing it. The electronic media must stop showing certain programmes because the country belongs to all of us. There are children in our homes watching these programmes.
You mean censorship? Won’t that amount to an infringement of rights?
Some of them have to be censored! Do you want all your kids to be jumping up in your rooms with earrings? Look at what is happening to the young people of today. Those who graduated from universities of agriculture don’t have any farm. They are either working in the banks or becoming musicians. Are we not wasting our time and money setting up some of these institutions? I am a positively angry person.
After 53 years, Nigeria is still largely undeveloped. How do you feel about this?
I have a two-line philosophy: The only sin is laziness and the only religion is work. I don’t care what anybody says. I could sit down with you for 300 hours and talk. When I get up, it is just talk. But if I spend five hours working, you will see the result. You believe that God has empowered you with an intellect to solve your problems, you solve them through work. Why are there no trains in Nigeria and they want to create jobs for people? If there were trains running, they will be manned by humans, running all the way from Port Harcourt to Sokoto and from Maiduguri to Lagos. Truth is that I do not envy our leaders. Maybe it is time for us to look at the system we operate. I won’t claim that if I become a leader tomorrow I am going to do any better. To do better, we must stop and go right back to a system that can grow. We got too many things into our heads and became too prayerful as a people. Before Africa can make progress, religion must be banned. The banning of religion will not take God out of existence, but it will take distractive people out of our lives. Can you imagine how many times people go to places of worship in a week? They go to listen and contribute nothing. They don’t even raise their hands to ask questions. It is a university you never graduate from for the rest of your life. The amount of waste in terms of human power is much, if you quantify it. I need the government to become bold and take religion out of itself completely. Why pay for people to go to Jerusalem and Mecca? The Jews who collect this money in their country invest it there, don’t they? Roads and schools can only be built by money, not prayers. Why are you giving people money for air tickets to go and pray in Mecca or Jerusalem when you can use it to build roads? I am not criticising the Nigerian leadership, but I am criticising the system. We must clean certain things in the system that are endemic. No religion has a consequence on its people on earth. Love your neighbour as yourself. If I don’t love my neighbour, no Holy Ghost is going to arrest me. If I fornicate every hour, no Holy Ghost is coming to arrest me. I will still go to church and return home. I will neither be blacklisted nor put in front of people as a criminal. So what is the use? Then they say God is a forgiving God. That means I can fornicate for as long as I like and God will forgive me. But the empowerment of the law in society is what we need. If the law says you should not commit fornication and you breach it, you will be arrested and punished. As I speak, the Jews don’t believe in Jesus Christ. But the white man has told me that I will go to hell if I don’t believe in Jesus. What about the Jews, who not only don’t believe in Him, but killed him and still are not repentant?
You seem to know the solutions to Nigeria’s problems. Why aren’t you actively involved in politics?
I don’t think that I can get one vote if I go into politics. If I want to be the president of Nigeria and I promise the people that there will be no poverty, there will be no bad roads and there will be constant power, many people will clap for me. But anybody can make such promises. On the contrary, if I become the president, my brother may not see me because I will have to get the work done. I don’t envy leaders. We are not giving them a chance. If you send a proposal that will make a lot of sense, the people between you and your President may read it and decide to put it aside for a while. It is a very difficult society because of these ingredients. When a people believe that prayers can solve all their problems, they have failed. You have a chemistry examination to write and you are praying to God to make you pass. Haven’t you turned this God into an Indian talisman? God already solved our problems by giving us the intellect. You can only solve your problems by yourself. The Nigerian problem is that we are too gullible and made to do everything that we don’t even understand. The white man came and are made our people slaves and the latter built mansions for them. Yet, they told the slaves that their own mansions would be in heaven!
What is new in your latest 45-track CD?
There are two great songs in that album. I tried to do something about what I am positively angry about. Positive anger proffers solutions to things, but negative anger just destroys. One of these songs is calledMustapher and Christopher. If I am a believer in one God, then I can only be a believer in one religion. The song is telling Muslims and Christians to let love grow among humanity. At the end of this song, I say Mustapher and Christopher will live together as one. This is one song that I believe should be sent to all the schools in this country. It is a song of unity. The title track is called Wulu Wulu. That is a song I sang with my daughter, Omei. The quality of the song is obviously better than previous ones. It is a better production in terms of musical arrangement and composition, more professionally accomplished than what I have done in the past. I have no expectations about the album. It is up to people to decide. If I don’t sell a copy, fine. If I sell two million copies, I am fine. I am a believer in disappointment and I am a believer in whatever you call it, success. Opposing forces must counter each other for there to be equilibrium.
One of your old songs, Mariama, has generated much controversy.
The song was dedicated to Peter Stratton and his wife. They were British. He was an engineer who worked with Hamdala Hotel, Kaduna. When he saw me sing that song on television, he called RKTV Kaduna and they gave me a job to sing on the rooftop of Hamdala Hotel. So, the first band that I formed was called Bongos and the Roof-toppers; because we were playing on the roof-top. When I did the album, I dedicated the title track to Peter Stratton and his wife because he loved the song. Mariama was the song. There is nobody in this world called Mariama. We have Maryam, or Mary or Mariam. But this is Mariama. From the outset, I fashioned the song after Harris Belafonte’s style. He was the one who used to sing that kind of song. There is nobody called Mariama.
Did it bother you that people were interpreting the song in different ways?
Interpretations will keep coming. I have died three times and I haven’t died at all. People even think that I am married to a white woman. My wife is not white. People just speculate and it makes a lot of sense not to answer them.
What more are we expecting from Bongos Ikwue?
I don’t know. I know that only work brings results. I don’t believe in luck, but I believe in preparations. They say when preparation meets opportunity, something happens. I will always prepare. If there is a contest today in Otukpo and they are looking for the best guitar player, the best guitar player won’t come from the moon. It will come from somebody who has been rehearsing eight hours every day. You cannot just go on stage and become the best mathematician; you have to have been doing your mathematics. So, when there is a maths competition, the winner will be the one who has been preparing. There is no luck anywhere. I don’t know what to expect tomorrow. For me, today is the birthplace of tomorrow. My only dream for tomorrow is to put in my best today in everything I do.
Punch Nigeria
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