Jaboro right with Carlos Moore, another of Fela’s biographer
By Charles Okogene
Straight from the Nigerian Institute of Journalism (NIJ) in the 1990s, he took refuge in Kalakuta Republic, Fela’s abode.
While his mates pounded the streets of Lagos in search of job, Majemite Jaboro dug in to know more about Fela and his spiritualism. In the process and for a starter on the instruction of Fela, he changed the name that he was known with in NIJ, Stephen, to Majemite Jaboro. That was to show that he no longer has anything to do with the ‘Christain or colomentality’ name given to him by his parents.
Done with that, he was elevated to the post of one of Fela’s numerous aides to the envy of some of us who were in the newsroom writing “he said and according to her”.
And just before some of us could say Majemite, he was made the Priest of Afrikan Shrine and was everywhere Fela went.
And when Fela was arrested by the police on charges of ordering the flogging of one of his electricians, Sanwo, to death inside the Kalakuta Republic, some of us were not surprised that Jaboro was among some of his aides that the police took along with him. Young Jaboro spent months with Fela inside Ikoyi Prison while the press in its usual form made all the noise for Fela’s release. Just as this was on going, Beko, his younger brother, ensured that the accussed and his boys were left off the hook. Also in the belly of the jailhouse with Fela was Mr. T, the young man who operated a record shop that sold and played only Fela records and songs at Ikeja. Though, now defunct.
However, after their time out in prison, Jaboro, like they use to say in Warri where he hails from, spoke to his legs and escaped from Kalakuta Republic. First to his Warri country home before dusting up his passport and relocated to London where he is currently based.
While in the queens kingdom, Jaboro decided to put his experiences while in Kalakuta Republic, Ikoyi Prison and how Sanwo was clubbed to death into a book called Ikoyi Prison Narratives published by Lulu/Amazon in 2010 an said that if he knew then, what he know now, his statement at the police and testimony at the court would have been different. Well that is a bygone as whatever he knows now cannot ‘undo’ the verdict of the judge.Though, the content of the book is not the full crux of this article, the reason for this piece is to correct the impression that that nothing good ever cames out of Kalakuta.
But if you think he is the only one that went into the republic and came out a better person unlike others that sold their brains to drug, then you miss the point.
Others like France based Idowu Mabinuori that authored “Why Blackman Dey Carry Shit,” a biography on Fela and a certain Charles, an ex-inmate of Kalakuta, who documented the Babatunde Raji Fashola years as governor of Lagos State. They were able to demystify the belief that only drug addicts came out of Kalakuta Republic.
