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Congo RDC |
SOCIAL CONDIT.
«To say that a Zairian can sing is a tautology, a pleonasm,
because being
Zairian means by definition being able to sing».
(Eric Vincent, French
singer)
Modern Congolese music (rumba-soukouss) is the order of the day almost everywhere throughout urban Africa. Unfortunately, in our country this art-form no longer provides a living wage. It has been stated that, «only music will be able to defend the honour of Zaire as a whole when the wind of democracy from the 1990s, with its concomitant of socio-political troubles, carries away and smashes everything in its path». Now that the socio-economic fabric of society is falling apart everywhere (unemployment, the national currency in perpetual freefall, mining and farming production suffering), the musical sector is coming to the fore and artistes have launched their work on the international stage.
Despite this, music is one of the areas, investors and successive governments are the least interested in. Will this regime change its tune? So far, no regime has improved the musical infrastructure, or installed a cultural promotion policy worthy of the name. There isn’t even a copyright law.
Happy to sing and dance
It doesn’t matter. In the face of the extended crisis across all sectors, young people have thrown themselves wholeheartedly into music, creating numerous bands, all with one fixed idea: To go to Europe and bring back to their own country expensive clothes and cars in order to shine in society.
To those who think that music seems to be a refuge for those who have failed in their studies, musicians make the retort: «What good are certificates if they provide no opportunities, and what’s the point of being a bureaucrat if you have to wait for months to get even a fraction of your salary?»
While the government is trying to relaunch the mining sector (at least in areas of the country it still controls, since other seams have been found under the feet of the rebels and the enemies of the country), the same music is played and heard in all these areas, as if to emphasise the unity between all the aggressors.
Is music a new opportunity for the development of Congo and of Africa as a whole? As long as there is investment in it, as Wemba, a Congolese star hopes: «we, the artistes, cannot be both judge and jury. African business people have to join with us in order to set up an infrastructure that suits us, like Tamla Motown, the black American music company» (which launched the Jackson Five, Stevie Wonder, Diana Ross, etc).
This idea is shared by Daniel Cuxac, music producer and film-maker from Senegal, living in Côte d’Ivoire: «The first priority is the political will to develop the African musical scene. Then we, producers and artistes together, must organise ourselves into sub-regional groupings».
These job creators are fortunate
While waiting for funding, musicians are trying to develop their own ways of earning their living, and are creating new and original jobs.
The «Atalaku» or cheer-leaders — With musical phrases bawled out over a wild guitar background, the «Atalaku» provide the rhythm and accompaniment for dancing. Their cheer-leading is intended to create a public craze for a song, even though it has no message. Several dances originating in Kinshasa have thus spread throughout the continent in the last few years and have even reached the diaspora. Their effectiveness is shown by the preference given on the Africa 1 and RFI radio stations to the hottest and liveliest Congolese songs.
The presenters explained: «It’s what our listeners want more than anything!». There are still plenty of job opportunities therefore in the Atalaku sector (the meaning of this term is still rather vague). They are the auctioneers of Congolese music, and never miss a trick for their group.
Propaganda attachés — This is also what amounts to an auction in the music business. Competition forces music groups and their leaders to try to get a high profile in the press. They use some of their fans as press attachés for this, even though they aren’t trained in the communications business. They learn by trial and error. Their florid style is intended to «put down the enemy» and cast his idol from the pedestal.
Koffi Olomidé, a famous Congolese musician, rebels against this: «I’m against these people who are now known as “press officers,” who use the media to mislead public opinion. They are actually self-promoting and kill our music which cannot develop simply on the basis of useless polemic». But Sankara de Kunta himself is happy. Press officer for the Wenge Musica band, he’s been with his group on a European tour! This is a «first» in the short history of this new occupation. «Every trade has its value. I chose the right field!», he enthuses. This kind of propaganda has already been imitated in Brazzaville, in the same way as the Atalaku cheerleaders, whose services are now in demand by some artistes from Gabon, Côte d’Ivoire and obviously from Congo-Brazzaville.
«Libanga» system — In Lingala, «libanga» means «stone». So, «throw his stone at someone», is a new dialect expression in the musical world, meaning «mention his name in a song». This practice is currently all the rage, because it’s good news for both the artistes and for the people whose names are mentioned, as well as their intermediaries. For ages, the musical repertoire of both Congos has been peppered with the names of individuals. For musicians, this is a sign of friendship, of recognition or reward for a benefactor. But for the last ten years, the system has grown, and the reasons for it are no longer simply moral, but more lucrative.
The large Congolese community in Europe, who wanted to be remembered by their relatives and families back home, started it. And the musicians were used as «spokespersons», remunerated with money, expensive clothes and other services less openly admitted. The practice has snowballed in the last few years, involving clients living in Kinshasa, the provinces, Brazzaville and Pointe-Noire, as well as in countries further afield such as Angola, South Africa, Gabon, Cameroon, Côte d’Ivoire, Senegal, etc. You only have to listen to these Congolese records to be convinced.
The challenge, for clients of «libanga», is to make themselves popular. The most ambitious of them use it to relaunch their businesses, with the attractive reputation of being «the one the stars praise in their songs». At the end of a tour the performers leave with their pockets full. It doesn’t really matter if their sponsor hasn’t paid up.
Consequently, this flourishing market is enhanced by a new partner, the agent. This may be a relative of the musician, responsible for finding «candidates for throwing stones», or maybe the other way round. The artistes thus compete with the media, because they by-pass the general advertising market. Indeed, some small advertising companies prefer the flexibility of musicians to the inflexibility of the traditional media when it comes to the business of advertising!
At the moment, the «libanga» phenomenon is spreading into the theatre, where the same format recurs. A Kinshasa paper asked the question: «advertising theatre or theatrical advertising?».
For their part, the audiovisual media have been saved by the system, but in an unofficial way: the «libanga» client greases the palms of a presenter or an engineer so that their name and business are mentioned during the broadcast. This procedure evades the strict controls that apply to commercial services in the audiovisual sector. Here too, like neighbouring Congo-Brazzaville, is the rest of the continent also going to «throw this kind of stone»? Some Cameroon, Gabonese and Ivoirien performers have already tried.
Congo RDC is aware of the overwhelming, strategic position of its music. It only needs to invest in it to produce a real musical, tourism-attracting, economic industry. As young Yannick Ntinu, a secondary school pupil and trainee electrician stresses: «If our country had a real musical infrastructure we would beat American music hands down!»
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