Kalakuta Republic Museum: Where Fela speaks

Yes, Fela Anikulapo Kuti, the weird global King of afro beat   promoter and pioneer is dead. Yes dead. Fela who was born on 15 October, 1938 and died in August 2, 1997 and was buried and by now his bones would have decomposed by the elements underground.

However, though dead physically, this Fela  stays alive and speaks loud and clear in his house, located at No 3 Kemisola Street, Ikeja, which is the 3rd Kalakuta Republic.

It is in this two-storey building with a pent house where his body was interred and which has now been turned  to Kalakuta Republic Museum in 2012.

The name Kalakuta was adopted by Fela in remembrance of his the name of his cell when he was in Kirikiri prisons.

Those who were not alive then and could not feel the vibration of a single man who fought the Federal Government and oppressors of the masses with music can have the opportunity of feeling him and experience his lifetime’s pursuits, tribulations, accomplishments, adventure and musical war.

From the pyramidal  shape of his mausoleum and his  fearful Chief Priest’s picture attached to the front   house overlooking his burial site with one of his inspirational quote “ The secret of life is to have no fear” all conjure an eerie

tells you that the  spirit of the man who has death in his pouch is alive.

From the ground floor to the second floor, the museum contains over 2000 personal effects and property of Fela both in solid , material and intellectual which tell the story of a great man with a rare revolutionary spirit which has not been exhibited by any other person after him.

It also tells and showcases Fela’s simple life style going by the simplicity of his bedroom with a mattress on the floor, a deep freezer used to store ice cream, a saxophone and his dresses.

Fela had special passion for shoes which are handmade and of local material branded in the dress code that fancied his passion.

The Museum also tells going by the big cooking pot, mortal, pestle, tells us how Fela catered for many people.

His attempt at offering himself for political emancipation of the common people of Nigeria was preserved in a room where Fela personally typed the manifestoes and programmes of his Movement of the People’s Party. The typewriter is there as left by him.

His toilet has a little touch light which he used whenever NEPA which he did not spare in his criticism struck.

The Museum is not only a celebration of Fela, but a perfect immortalisation and stoking of a strong spirit of emancipation, revolution, and rebellion against injustice, progressive activism, resistance to evil and oppression and revival of hope for the hopeless.