Ronald Mayinja, Is he a real patriot or an opportunist?

LIFESTYLE     POLITICS

Ronald Mayinja has been in the news since his performance at fellow Golden Band Artiste Catherine Kusasira's concert at the Kampala Serena Hotel a couple of days back.

His performance of the song Bizeemu which talks about the deteriorating situation in the country in front of the Head of State who was Chief Guest at the concert got many talking.

It even had his protégé in the music business whose concert it was, Catherine Kusasira cut his performance short and take away the microphone from him as she felt the song was inappropriate for the day.   

Where he started

Ronald Mayinja is one of the original members of the defunct Eagles' Production band that dominated Uganda's band music era starting from the mid-1990s to just about 5-10 years ago when local band music was pushed to the peripherals of the industry.  

In his heydays that is the 90s and early 2000s, he largely sang about love and songs like Clare ‘Keleya' and ‘Necklace Yo' endeared him to the kadongo kamu weary youthful music fans of the mid and late 1990s. But something changed about him when the new millennium kicked in.

Entering  politics

As the political tide began to shift at the turn of the millennium that is 2000-2001, political uneasiness began to develop as Kizza Besigye went about building a somewhat formidable opposition around himself.

Sighting issues like deteriorating economic fortunes in the country and failure by the Head of State to keep some of his promises this line of thought seemed to appeal to a small but growing especially youthful audience.

It is this same audience that musician Ronald Mayinja seemed to be targeting when he made his first attempts at singing social conscious music with a touch of political intonations to it even before Bobi Wine who had just burst onto the scene then grabbed this audience and made it his own. "I have always been honest and said things as they are," he said when asked about some of his song choices.

Hitting it right

Long before musicians started to be watched keenly with in the body politic, Ronald Mayinja had already hit it right with his ‘Africa' song that was very political in nature highlighting the challenges of the wanainchi back in 2006-2007 and won him the PAM awards artiste of the year probably the biggest achievement of his career.

He was also quietly cementing his place in the sub-genre of politically conscious music as everyone concentrated on singing about love and related issues. Only now rivaled by Bobi Wine and Mathias Walukagga, Mayinja started going political social conscious musically with his 2005 song Tuli Ku Bunkenke but the follow up ‘Africa' is the one that carried a more solid message.

His 2011 album Olina Kkola also carried a song called Ayi LandLord which he stated was a dedication to the Kabaka of Buganda, this song too carried lots of political intonations as it came at a time when relations between Mengo and the central government were frosty in an election year at that.    

He later released Sente Y'ekibi another one specifically targeting the corruption vice that has become part and parcel of the fabric of our society especially public service and Mayinja was not done yet.

More recently Batitizi that was done after the plight of Hon. Robert Kyagulanyi alias Bobi Wine a fellow musician turned politician was jailed over a number of allegations and Bizeemu that warranted the President's response after his performance at Kusasira's recent concert came through. 

"I had always wanted to tell the President these issues face to face and it would be unserious to a big extent if I didn't say anything when I got the chance to face the President then go back to the people later and sing about the same issues, they would consider me a hypocrite" Mayinja said in an interview after the concert.

What was a simple performance aroused responses from all sorts of artistes including Bebe Cool, Big Eye, and events promoters Balaam Barugahare plus Abey Musinguzi showing how much impact it had.

Positioning for MP Seat

It is not news anymore that Ronald Mayinja will contest for the Gomba East constituency seat in parliament come 2021 and besides the incumbent Emmanuel Kalule Sengo, has to contend with a somewhat powerful opponent in Flavia Namulindwa a much younger fellow entertainer.

But his latest show of bravery telling it to the President as it is may have just put him a step ahead of the competition that is if he is serious about contesting. Some pundits say he is simply raising his price in the game of political bargaining if he is to ever sit on a negotiating table with the powers that be while others say he has been laying substantial groundwork musically for his MP seat contest come 2021.

The former would make him a rather calculative political opportunist while the latter would make him a potent political strategist but all of that will be determined by which direction he takes and the results of the 2021 Gomba East political contest.