Q: So it is Funmi, the dancer, the one who’s expecting a baby who is favoured?
A: Yes.
Q: But you used to be a favourite before?
A: Yes, before. But not again. Now I’m a favourite of Fela.
Q: So it’s you and Funmi?
A: And Alake, Najite. And Fehintola.
Q: That means that there are five favourites. Do the others get jealous?
A: Yes.
Q: What happens when you fight among yourselves?
A: When we fight, hit someone, we pay 10 naira. For abuse, we get punishment, like wash house.
Q: You take turns in your sleeping arrangements with Fela. How does that work?
A: We take turns. My day is Monday. Kike too is on Monday. Aduni and Najite are on Tuesday. On Wednesday Ihase and Funmilayo. Adeola and Lamiley on Thursday. Remi and Aduni on Friday. Lamiley and Alake go again on Saturday. On Sunday, Kike and Najite who go sleep with him.
Q: So there are four who sleep with him twice a week and six once a week. What about the other five.
A: Yes. He calls the others any time he likes. ’Cause when we are on tour, he calls them. It’s he who calls them.
Q: If he doesn’t call you for a week, ten days, do you have to wait?
A: Yes.
Q: What do you like about Fela?
A: I like his eyes.
Q: What do his eyes say to you?
A: The eyes say love. And I like his hands too, even when he beats me. His hands have something very, very beautiful. I like watching him when he eats. I watch him a lot.
Q: What don’t you like about Fela?
A: I don’t like his girls. I don’t like his way of working; he works too much.
Q: You say, you don’t like his girls?
A: I don’t like them because they don’t realize we’re their sisters. They don’t realize our friendly ways to them.
Q: You mean Fela’s daughters?
A: Yes.
Q: You mean they don’t get along with the queens?
A: Yes.
Q: You think he favours his daughters?
A: Yeah.
Q: What is he to you, a husband, a brother, or what?
A: He’s a brother to me.
FUNMILAYO
“Give Me Happiness”
Funmilayo has a proud, unapproachable bearing. Dark brown in complexion. Large, melancholic eyes and high cheekbones. Her cool, rather haughty attitude detracts from her softly-sculptured face. Not often found in the company of the other queens, Funmilayo is the first of those who married Fela in 1978 to bear him a child.* She is one of Fela’s dancers.
Funmilayo Onilere was born in Lagos, Nigeria, on 28 August 1956, of Yoruba parentage. Her father is a businessman in the shipping and forwarding line, while her mother is a clothes trader, both of them from Ikorodu, Lagos. Sent to a secondary boarding-school, where she completed her studies up to Form Three, she left school around 1971 and returned home. Unable to get her into a day school, her parents wanted her to go into trading with her mother, but she refused and left home. Not long afterwards she met Fela.
Q: Where did you go when you left home?
A: I went to a friend’s house and from there we went to Fela’s house. That was in 1972.
Q: How did you know about Fela?
A: I know about Fela before, but I didn’t know if I can stay in his house.
Q: But why did you go to Fela’s house?
A: ’Cause that my friend, she was living there, before me. She was living with Fela.
Funmilayo
Photo: André Bernabé
Q: Is she still with Fela?
A: No. She left Fela when the house burnt. Her name is Lady Ranco.
Q: And when you went up to see Fela for the first time, what did you tell him? “I want to come and live with you?”
A: Yes. So he asked me some questions. He asked me which job I want to do. So for some years I didn’t do anything. I was just a disc-jockey. Playing music in the house. Then after I joined the dancers.
Q: But when he asked you what work you wanted to do, what did you answer?
A: I didn’t tell him anything ’cause I didn’t know how to dance.
Q: Did you love him then?
A: I wasn’t really talking to him. I was just living in his house.
Q: When did you start loving him?
A: Around ’74, ’75. [She looks bored.]
Q: Yet, between ’72 and ’75 you used to make love to him. Not so?
A: Yes, but. . . . [Answer inaudible.]
Q: You didn’t love him particularly? Is that what you said?
A: I love him, apart from making love. Since I’ve been in his house, I love him.
Q: Were you at Kalakuta when they attacked the house? Did the soldiers beat you? Did they wound you?
A: Yes. On my head. I had my hands broken. And they naked me. Then they took us to their barracks. We are the first people they took. Because when Fela left the house we are still inside the house. The house got fire in front of us.
Q: How long did the attack last?
A: About two hours. For two hours they were attacking, beating us ’cause they couldn’t find Fela.
Q: Where was he?
A: He was in the other house. The Lebanese house. I didn’t see him, or some queens and some boys. I didn’t see them throughout the attack. They all scattered.
Q: Were you taken to Kiri-Kiri, or to hospital?
A: Myself, I didn’t go to Kiri-Kiri. I was in the hospital ’cause I was still not well. I was wounded for my head and my hands. [Looking sad.] I like to stay with him. . . . Maybe, I don’t know, if they didn’t burn Kalakuta, I could have gone. . . . [Looking down.] Gone. I don’t know. Maybe I could have left too.
Q: But why is it that you stay because they burnt Kalakuta? I don’t understand.
A: ’Cause some of us have left. We used to be many more than this. So some left. Maybe, they thought Fela has finished. But not me. I stay with Fela because I like his music, his ways, and I like moving with people.
Q: Moving with people? You like to live in a group? Is that it?
A: Yes. [Looking very sad.]
Q: But what are the things you don’t like about Fela?
A: About Fela? … [Long pause without answer.]
Q: You have told me what you like with Fela. Now can you tell me what you don’t like?
A: I don’t like the way he is cheating me. [Breaks down crying.]
Q: Cheating you? He cheats you? How?
A: Like this morning when I went for the box. . . . [Sobbing.] Since yesterday he say I should collect the money from him; but I couldn’t see Fela. Then he sent me to his senior wife. And me, I don’t know, as we all have got married to him at same time I don’t know how to talk to his senior wife. But Fela say I should collect money from her.
Q: You have problems with the senior wife?
A: All of us is like that. Sometimes she gets annoyed. Sometimes, she is cruel with us. As for me I don’t know anybody. . . . [Weeping.]
Q: So you have problems with the senior wife?
A: Not actually; but I don’t like Fela to be sending me to her. I like Fela to solve the problem himself.
Q: You are the first one of all the queens to be pregnant with Fela’s baby. How do you feel about that?
A: I feel happy. But they don’t make me feel happy. [Weeping.]
Q: But it doesn’t make you happy?
A: THEY! … [Sobbing, unable to talk.]
Q: Oh, you mean the queens? You mean they are all jealous of you? You feel it really, eh? Why do you think they are jealous?
A: They show it. . . . [Starting to cry again.] They don’t like me. . . .
Q: They are jealous that you are pregnant with baby for Fela, not them?
A: [Silence. No answer. Deep sobbing.] … Yes!
Alake
Photo: André Bernabé
ALAKE
“Chosen to Be Taken Care Of”
T
he perfect hostess. Warm, friendly and generous. She will make you feel at home at any time. Lively, affable, Alake loves recounting stories. Quite obviously, she enjoys life to the maximum. Graceful and self-assured, she projects elegance and stylishness. Above medium-height and fleshily round, her deep velvet brown is offset by sparkling, expressive eyes which shine even more when she smiles. And it is rare that she isn’t either smiling, or laughing with that deep, husky voice which makes her one of the five talented singers of Fela’s group. At present she studies astrology in her free time.
Born on 14 June 1956, in Ibadan, Olubokola Alake Adedipe is of Yoruba parentage. From a polygamous family, her father has five wives, with there being fourteen children in all. At the time of her birth, Alake’s father (originally from Ijebu) was a lawyer but later became a High Court judge in Lagos. Her mother was a nurse’s assistant who later went to London to become a registered nurse, then returned to Ibadan in 1971 to continue her nursing career. With this background, Alake attended elementary school in Lagos and secondary school at New Era up to Form Five. She was to continue her education in Lagos, but this did not materialize nor did she take the West African School Certificate exam. Consequently, Alake left school when she was seventeen years old, meeting Fela in 1973.
Q: And what happened then? Why did you leave school?
A: When I came to Lagos to study there was no boarding house, so I used to go from house to house. Then Yeni, Fela’s first daughter, was in my school, Form One. Before then, you know Fela is popular in Lagos, the youth love his music; he was a bit ideological then. It was my half-brother who first took me to Fela’s nightclub where Fela was playing. Then I started liking the music, making my family buy me the records, and I’d listen to the records and everything. So when I was in New Era I used to go with my friends to Fela’s club.
Q: You started going to Fela’s club in 1973?
A: Yes. I was still in school. Friday and Saturday I would go to Fela’s gig then.
Q: So you meet Fela in the club?
A: Yes. I like his music. I like his ideology. From then I used to come to his house, but my father didn’t know about me going to Fela’s gig and coming to his house. My father knew through my junior brother. You know he revealed the thing in the house. That day I’d been in Fela’s house so before I came back to the house they’d planned for me that I choose Fela or I choose my father. [Laughter.] My father is very strict. Then in Nigeria they didn’t like colonial children going to Fela’s; they think that Fela corrupts the youth and all sorts of things. People going there smoking hemp. In Fela’s house they rape girls, all sorts of untrue rumours, untrue things. My father is judge then. So we start to make discussion that either I take Fela or I take him. He told me he would stop paying my school fees.
Q: And what did you decide?
A: You know … me … in my family, I’m so different from all the other children because all of them are so colonial. It’s only me, you know, that don’t behave like them. All my friends they just got married. I don’t move as these children, my brothers, their friends, they move around in the bourgeoisie, but me I love all the people because I don’t like the way they (the bourgeois) treat the workers, the common people. I don’t like it. But I can’t do anything about it. Like in my family, the driver, the servants, they treat them badly. Even the way my stepmother treats our house, I don’t like it. You should see it. You know I don’t believe in that kind of thing, so I told my father that unless he explains why he doesn’t like Fela – ’cause I like him – and if he doesn’t want me to stay in his house I can choose where I’ll stay. He didn’t want for me to leave the house and he didn’t want me to go to Fela’s house. There was nothing he could do then about my movements.
Q: So what did you do?
A: So I packed out of the house. I came to tell Fela that my father had sent me out of his house and I don’t know where I will stay.
Q: And what did Fela say?
A: Fela asked: “Do you really want to leave your father, or shouldn’t you go and talk to your father or find some of your relatives to talk to him?” I said I would do that later, but that that night I should have some place to stay. So Fela sent me to J.K.’s house.
Q: Oh, he didn’t keep you in his house?
A: No.
Q: Had you made love to Fela by then?
A: [Very long silence.] Yes. [Whispered.]
Q: So he sent you to J.K.’s house?
A: Yes. So I packed all my things to J.K.’s house. So I was staying in J.K.’s house and fom there I used to go to school.
Q: Oh, you kept going to school?
A: Yes, I was still going to school. They paid already for that term so I was still going to school. When I started going to school my father planned. . . . You know, my father is working for the government, so he had some CID on me, coming to school to watch me. You know, sometimes I’d just be in class and I’d hear my name, the principal wants me. They were just giving me all sorts of troubles, so I went to see my uncle. I told my uncle everything. You know, my uncle is on my father’s side. He said he wasn’t the one who borned me and the only thing he can tell me is to go back to house and keep away from Fela. And I told him I can’t keep away from Fela. If they don’t want to take Fela, me I’ve taken him.
Q: You’re still living at J.K.’s house?
A: Yes, I was.
Q: You were in love with Fela then?
A: Yes, I was.
Q: So you had made your choice?
A: I’d made my choice.
Q: And when did you move to Fela’s house?
A: During then, I used to come to Fela’s house; sometimes I’d sleep there. But I’d packed all my things to J.K.’s house.
Q: Had you started singing or dancing?
A: No, I was just there with some other girls.
Q: And when did you start living there?
A: The same year. About a month later. Because J.K.’s house is sometimes so boring. You know, there’s just his wife in the house and me. So when the boys left the house it was boring, you know. I’d just eat alone.
Q: Then you started living in Fela’s house in 1973? So you were one of his girls up to ’77. You went through the horrible thing in February 1977?
A: Yes, I was there for everything.
Q: How was that attack?
A: Ooooooh.
Q: Fela told me that several of the girls were raped.
A: I wasn’t among those who were raped, but it was true. And I even saw one being raped.
Q: You saw them being raped?
A: They stripped me too, naked! They removed all my pubic hair. They were messing us. You know, we were the last batch to be taken. I was with Fela. . . . When they came, they started burning the house, so we had to move to the second house, the Lebanese house behind our house. We were there when soldiers rushed upstairs and took us one by one. They stripped the women naked then; they would just tear your clothes off, your pants, start messing around with you.
Q: The soldiers?
A: Yeh, they did all that. They broke my head too. They did many things. They even. . . .
Q: They cut your head?
A: Yes [angry]. They knocked my eye out!! I saw the man who did it!! And anywhere I meet the man I’ll recognize this man. I knew there were many but two of them messed much with me, because one … [deep laugh of pessimism] … started sucking my breasts. Anywhere I see the man I will recognize him. There were two of them.
Q: Did any of your sisters get raped?
A: I saw one of them. But there were many it happen to. Many. Some of them have left. Many of the soldiers were drunk. You know when you cock a gun …. that’s what iron they used in some women’s vaginas. YES! Iron and bottles [screaming]!!
Q: You’ve been with Fela since 1973. What attaches you to him?
A: I don’t even really know … so many things! You know, the kind of life I’m living with Fela is so different from the kind of life I’ve been living with my family. In
my family they’re very, very colonial. No freedom of speech. No freedom of movements.
Q: Would you say Fela is your new father?
A: Yes! Just father, husband, everything, everything you can think of. Because in his house I have my freedom. I’m free to do what I like. He has never forced me to do anything with him or with anybody. It’s just like … you know, the kind of home I’ve been hoping to have and I’ve got it.
Q: What do you want in life?
A: To have a child for Fela. Then to go with child to village for a year or more to rest. For in the village is where I can learn about the African traditions which are being lost.
Adejonwo
Photo: André Bernabé
ADEJONWO
“We Are All Looking Up to the Crown”
With large, deep, warm eyes that are in perfect harmony with her highly pronounced cheekbones. Adejonwo’s softly chiselled features make for a striking appearance. Of medium height and slight build, she has that kind of self-assured, slow and swaying gait of someone who enjoys living at her own pace. Of consistent disposition, she projects an inner calm and is always ready to engage you with a frank, warm smile.
Adejonwo Iyabode Oguntiro was born on 14 August 1955, in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, of Yoruba parentage. Her father is a retired Postmaster-General and her mother a seamstress and clothes trader. She attended secondary school up to early Form Four, and it was when she left to begin making her own living that she met Fela.
Q: How did you meet Fela?
A: I have been hearing of him for long. So, one day I was with about three others, going to work. I saw them (Fela and his group). They were going to court. So he sent somebody to say that he likes me.
Q: How did he see you?
A: We passed his house. He was in his house coming out. We were going to work. I didn’t go in that very day. I decided to go after he had forgotten my face; forgotten everything. So I decided not to go into his house that day.
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