Frozen in time: Miriam Makeba’s ‘house of exile’ rots silently

Miriam Makeba became a very popular singer in the United States where she collaborated with Harry Belafonte and together they won a Grammy award. However her American experience turned sour, when she married the Black Power activist, Stokely Carmichael. It was during the Civil Rights movement and the militant radicalism of the Black Panther Movement […]

Miriam Makeba became a very popular singer in the United States where she collaborated with Harry Belafonte and together they won a Grammy award. However her American experience turned sour, when she married the Black Power activist, Stokely Carmichael. It was during the Civil Rights movement and the militant radicalism of the Black Panther Movement of that period in 1968. Makeba came up against the anger of the American establishment and although she was not banned as the racist South African regime did, America attacked her by cancelling her recordings and concerts. She chose to move on.

Miriam Makeba was invited to live in Guinea by President Ahmed Sekou Toure, who was one of the leading radical voices in Africa at the time. She accepted the offer, including the offer to speak at the United Nations General Assembly as Guinea’s delegate. She used the opportunities to denounce the apartheid policies in her native South Africa. She had honourary Guinean citizenship but continued to travel extensively around the world, charming audiences in many countries with her remarkable artistry and the politically pungent content of her songs. One of the most memorable performances of this period took place in Nigeria at the Gala Night of the World Black and African Festival of Arts and Culture, FESTAC, in 1977. Miriam Makeba lived in Guinea till 1986 but left after the death of her daughter.

Most people seemed to have forgotten this phase of the long exile of MAMA AFRIKA; I did too. But we stayed a night at the Hotel Fouta, which is the oldest hotel in Guinea, in Dalaba. Dalaba is one of the most beautiful places in the Futa Djallon. It is surrounded by breath-taking rolling hills that are covered in heavy fog early in the morning and at night fall. The air is also very pure and it is no wonder that Dalaba used to be a place of holiday for the colonial governors running the entire French colonial regime in West Africa! The clemency of the weather will attract any cultured individual, and it was at Dalaba, that Miriam Makeba spent the years of her Guinean exile. We saw a house in ruins which we were mistakenly told was the residence Miriam Makeba occupied but a local man assured me it was not the house. Mariam Makeba’s house was in another direction not too far from the earlier place.

Even though it has been left to deteriorate, the residence still oozes the majesty that must have suffused it when the great artist lived there and the choice of location could only have been deliberate because what one saw as you woke up in the morning are the beautiful rolling hills and the greenery which enveloped the hills. We moved around the house wondering if anybody guarded it at all. A few minutes later, a man came to join us; he said he guarded the place. He also agreed to open the door so we could enter. It was like being caught in a time warp, because so many of the things were in place just as Makeba must have left them: there were spices in containers in the kitchen; books on the bookshelf and the bed were still in place in the main room as well as items of furniture, even flower pots. The guard said things had largely been the way Miriam Makeba left them except that a few items were removed when she died.

The motifs on the walls and the roof were representative of the aesthetics of the Futa Djallon and the intricate patterns represented the works of master crafts men. These motifs or their variations were also on the roofs and walls of the Hotel Du Futa as well as the colonial residence which was in partial ruin in another part of Dalaba. Sadly, while the internal state of the residence was still in a fair shape, the external walls and roofing were deteriorating fast and unless somebody takes the decision to reclaim and renovate the building, it will completely fall into pieces. And that will be a pity, because in its own unique way, Miriam Makeba’s ‘House of Exile’ is a very significant slice of the recent cultural and political history of Africa.