Local Divas Go Man-Bashing

Nov 27, 2002

There were no songs of emancipation or self improvement, it was all about love, sex and infidelity
By Kalungi Kabuye

THE sisters really did it for themselves on Sunday afternoon at Gaba Beach— and told off men in the process. It was a matter of Ugandan women openly frolicking in their new-found sexuality and telling the world about it.
Dubbed ‘Ladies Choice,’ or ‘Abakyala Si Mere’ in Luganda, the show was meant to bring together some of Uganda’s greatest female singers and show what they could do. Instead, it turned out to be a session of male-bashing. And any man who went onto the stage had to wear a dress.
So, was it any surprise that one of the songs that got the loudest and longest applause was Sylvia Kyansuti’s Okunsunansuna?
Most of the songs were not about female emancipation or affirmative action. Nobody sang about greater job opportunities for women, or said it loud against domestic violence. No. It was about love. Not the emotion, but the physical act. And the largely female crowd loved it. Julie Ssessanga’s beautiful rendition of Wassanyi Serukenya’s memorable 1960’s classic Nyonyintono, a soulful song about two star-crossed lovers— a princess in love with a commoner— drew hardly any attention. Some women behind me actually said it had no meaning.
Everybody loves and respects Afrigo’s Joanita Kawalya, but her song Tony, about a woman complaining about a wayward lover, just received polite applause.
What the crowd wanted to hear was Irene Namatovu telling a former boyfriend that she has found a new guy who is better than him; who dresses better, has more money, behaves better, and is even better than him in bed! That got all the women roaring. It made the men glad that KADS Band’s Titi did not turn up. What would have happened if she sang her latest song Sseggwanga? It would have left the men with serious insecurity problems.
Most of the people in the crowd were most probably listeners to so-called ‘vernacular’ FM stations and liked that kind of thing— and the performers were those whose music is played on those stations. Otherwise, where were the likes of Titi, Pros Kankunda, or Juliana Kanyomozi? Was it an accident that everybody sang in Luganda except Rachel Magoola and Kyansuti, who sang in Lusoga?
Kyansuti was the one of the first performers on stage. She definitely does not sound the way she looks— what must have been all of 100 kilograms of her. But she started off the man-bashing right on cue.
Before her first song was halfway done, she had some guy on the floor of the stage with her foot planted firmly on his chest. Any surprises that the crowd livened up after that? By the time she did Okunsunansuna, it was all over for the men.
Phoebe Nassolo did some of the crowd’s favourites apparently; stuff that seems to go on forever without change. Mariam Ndagire followed in the same vein. Then an obviously ageing Carol Nakimera took her turn. She chose those very forgettable Lingala numbers with dance routines that seemed not to have changed since Wenge Musica did their Ndombolo number a few years ago. Maybe someone should advise her to go easy on those physically demanding moves. It does not seem right for such an elderly face to be performing what amounts to a fertility dance.
Marion Mulinde was next, and it was still about laavu. Is there a Luganda word for romantic love? Because this was not the love being sung about, but something else. Nobody sang about walking hand-in-hand under the moon, or dancing in the rain without a care. The only difference was Harriet Kirumira, who sang about long distance love, something common with the increasing Uganda diaspora. Then Namatovu came in with her story about finding a new and better man, with greater prowess.
Rachel Magoola did her new hit song Voto, and her old one Obangaina, but it was someone called Queen Florence who brought the house down. She started off singing in the traditional kadongo kamu style, but then all of a sudden it had changed to Ndombolo, complete with some young and very energetic ‘queen dancers.’ And so went the show that was to show that women ‘are not food.’ Ends

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