The Strong Breed: The rise and fall of Africa’s great literary leaders

[Elisabeth Janaina]

The Strong Breed: The rise and fall of Africa’s great literary leaders
Posted on February 13, 2017 by Bwesigye Bwa Mwesigire
In Uganda and beyond, the political influence of writers has greatly
diminished, with different kinds of artists starting to take their
place.
Credit: Rwanda Government.

Many of Africa’s leaders at independence were acclaimed writers, but
this is no longer the case. Credit: Rwanda Government.

In an essay published after his death in 1982, the Ugandan poet,
philosopher, lawyer, footballer and novelist Okot P’Bitek wrote:

“If there are two types of rulers in every society, that is, those who
use physical force to subdue men, and those that employ beautiful
things, sweet songs and funny stories, rhythm, shape and colour, to
keep individuals and society sane and flourishing, then in my view, it
is the artist who is the greater ruler.”

In P’Bitek’s generation, Africa’s great artists and leaders often
overlapped. Leopold Senghor of Senegal, Julius Nyerere of Tanzania and
Agostinho Neto of Angola, for example, were all poets and writers as
well as founding presidents.

Similarly, the novelist Chinua Achebe led Biafra’s diplomatic front in
the war in the late-1960s. The playwright and poet Wole Soyinka has
been one of successive Nigerian governments’ most vocal critics and
once founded a new political party. Ama Ata Aidoo served as Education
Minister in Ghana. Ken Saro-Wiwa led the Ogoni struggle in the 1990s
in the Niger Delta. And Ngugi wa Thiong’o’s outspoken political
activism led to him being jailed in 1970s Kenya.

Many of Africa’s best known writers have been celebrated for their
political leadership as much as their creative works.

On this front, Uganda is no different. In the 1970s, for example,
playwright Robert Serumaga joined anti-Idi Amin political activities
and later served as Minister of Commerce. Novelist and poet John
Nagenda was appointed to the Truth Commission into human rights
violations set up in 1986 and is now a senior adviser to President
Museveni.

Renowned author Timothy Wangusa was an MP, Education Minister, and is
now a presidential adviser. And Mary Busingye Karooro, who founded the
Association of Uganda Women Writers (FEMRITE) in 1995, has been a
member of parliament since 2004 and served in several senior cabinet
positions.

The illustrious list is long. But looking across it, it’s quickly
apparent that all these individuals are either fast-approaching
retirement or have passed away. It is difficult to find any of today’s
generation of writers with nearly the same political influence as
their forbearers.

This is not for lack of international acclaim. Within Uganda’s FEMRITE
community alone, for example, the country boasts of Commonwealth prize
winners Jackee Batanda and Doreen Baingana, MacMillan prize winner
Glaydah Namukasa, Caine Prize winner Monica Arac de Nyeko, Jalada
prize winner Aujo Lillian, and Caine Prize and PEN/Studzinski Literary
Award nominee Beatrice Lamwaka, among others.

But none of these celebrated writers has political influence
comparable to the equivalent generation a few decades ago. Even
Atukunda Victoria Abigail, one writer who has actively sought to
follow in Karooro’s footsteps in aspiring to become an MP, has yet to
make it very far.

How did creative writers lose political influence?

In the 1960s and 1970s, state publishing was thriving thanks to the
East African Literature Bureau, which ensured audiences were served by
local writers in both English and indigenous languages. This was
complemented by the African Writers Series of Heinemann Educational
Publishers, which, besides their main target market of schools and
universities, also produced work for the general public.

Over time, however, the state publishing model has disappeared and
publishing has fallen into the hands of the market. This has meant
that today, contemporary Ugandan writers are mostly published by
foreign presses, which do not see African markets as their main
target.

There are a few small non-profit presses in Uganda such as FEMRITE,
the African Writers Trust, and the Lantern Meet Foundation. Meanwhile,
a few independent presses such as Sooo Many Stories and Mattville
Publishing have emerged, and many Ugandan writers have self-published.
But according to FEMRITE, to qualify as a Ugandan bestseller these
days, one only needs to sell a mere 1,000 copies.

This situation has particularly affected indigenous language
publishing, which has greatly declined. Whereas the likes of P’Bitek
made sure to publish in their local languages, many contemporary
Ugandan writers publish exclusively in English. The literary and
cultural infrastructure that produces the critical acclaim today is
also decidedly Anglophone and typically controlled from outside the
country’s borders. The many prizes that have been lauded on Uganda’s
authors, for instance, are mostly limited to works composed in
English.

While there may be advantages to writing in a language spoken so
widely across the world, English is not Uganda’s lingua franca. It may
be the official language and the one used in the education system, but
it is not the language in which business is conducted or through which
voters interact with their leaders.

Political influence is about followership, and followers will not be
attracted to people they do not know or to artists whose work they
cannot access or consume.

Send in the clowns

While writers have declined in their domestic readership and political
influence, however, there may be other kinds of artists that have
stepped up to take their place. In Uganda’s 2016 parliamentary polls,
for example, the popular gospel musician Judith Babirye and comedian
Kato Lubwama both notably became MPs (though the latter’s election is
facing a legal challenge).

This appears to be following in a broader trend across the continent
in which other creative forms are gaining in political traction. For
instance, musicians have been central to several popular protest
movements in Africa recently, such as Y’en a Marre in Senegal and Le
Balai Citoyen in Burkina Faso, while in 2009, music DJ Andry Rajoelina
ascended to the presidency of Madagascar and ruled until 2014.

It makes sense that these kinds of artists may be filling the gap left
by their literary counterparts. For example, in Uganda, musicians
today have much larger audiences than writers due to the growth of FM
stations across the country, many of which also have comedy in their
programming too.

Most of these radio stations broadcast in indigenous languages, in
which most musicians and comedians also ply their trade. Babirye and
Lubwama primarily work in Luganda, Uganda’s most widely spoken
indigenous language.

Not all musicians working in Luganda have been able to translate
influence and popularity into electoral success – Daniel Kazibwe
(alias Ragga Dee), for instance, lost the Kampala mayoral race despite
his pedigree as a veteran singer – but musicians and comedians working
in local languages seem to have been considerably more successful in
electoral politics than writers in recent years.

While free market economics led to the collapse of the 1960s-70s
indigenous publishing infrastructure, thereby degrading the production
and circulation of Ugandan literature and the influence of writers,
the same policies have had a different effect on music and comedy,
facilitating growth in those now highly popular artistic industries.

This means that whereas the age of the great writer-leader may have
passed, the political influence of musicians and comedians is on the
up. How the shift from writers to musicians will affect the quality of
Ugandan leadership remains to be seen.

Bwesigye Bwa Mwesigire is an African Leadership Centre Fellow attached
to the Department of Public Law at the University of Cape Town. He is
the co-founder of the Kampala based Centre for African Cultural
Excellence. Follow him on twitter at @bwesigye.
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