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Lord,
Lord, Lord Have Mercy on Sundaygar Dearboy
Monday,
January 14, 2008
By Tewroh-Wehtoe Sungbeh
"Lord, Lord, Lord have mercy on me,” raps Sundaygar Dearboy,
Liberia’s most popular musician of our time, who is
facing alleged war crimes charges that could possibly derail
his credibility and a career that came from nowhere to
suddenly reach the stratosphere.
No joke about it the guy is red hot like
chili pepper, because his music transcends ethnic and
gender lines in a country where musicians with top
hits and large followings are rare and don’t come by
easily, except for cultural icons like Anthony
“Experience Tejajlu” Seyon Nagbe and the late
Morris Dorley whose creative and original
compositions of folk songs about our daily lives –
the good, bad and ugly, can bring back memories and
can make both men and women leap from their seats to
dance or sing along.
Sundaygar Dearboy
Sundaygar Dearboy, who often sings about
the “Sixty Girls” and Liberian women
stereotypically, and at times about the civil war is a
walking contradiction. He denigrates Liberian women in
his lyrics as criminals, whores, as being fat and
dirty, and tells his listening audience that the smell
of a (Kpelle woman’s) Lappa, according to the singer
can gave a person cold causing the individual to
sneeze, which can also cause fish in River Gee to die;
but on the other hand his other song from another CD,
“O Beautiful, O Beautiful, O Beautiful Liberian Women Are
Beautiful, Beauty, Beauty” tells us how beautiful
Liberian women are as if those of us who are in love
and are ‘crazy ’ about our Liberian women don’t
know already how beautiful they are.
Excerpt
from “Lord, Lord, Lord Have Mercy on Me.”
“Listen, you see if na
Kru girls you want to marry
The Kru girl own they too
different
That Inside room that place they get the power,
When they handle you, you will
speak in tongue
When they confess Jesus Christ is Lord,
They get degree for sexual-ology,
They get professor for
knocking-ology,
They are professor in
breasting-ology
They Kru girl you see they are
so ever ready,
That those kind of name that is
sweet like maple
You see, listen, if that Loma
woman you want to marry,
You must ask the Loma woman if
she fat or she small,
Because the Loma woman so so big big butt they get
When they want walk that
serious trouble.
You see them go stop the taxi
on the road,
The driver will charge them
$250
Because at anytime when you
enter Loma woman house
You will see her sitting down
in the chair
She will send the little
children go around, to go
And buy food for her to eat,
you see
That why anytime you see those
Loma woman pass,
They will see all the small,
small children will talk
They will say big butt, short
woman, borkun tumba, big tumba,
White house tumba, borkun tumba,
they will say fufufufufu tumba
You see, if that Kpelle woman
you want to marry,
The Kpelle woman then the part
they too dirty.
They can tie one Lappa for over
6 months.
They can’t take off it just
on them all the time
When you make mistake you take that Lappa from them
You go put it in River Gee that
all the fish will die
That those kind of Lappa when
you passing the corner
When they shake it (sneeze)
that fresh cold in your nose
Sometime when we look at it we
just have to manage it
Liberia, you see is for all of
us
That one you think I lie just
ask the Kpelle girls
If that Congo girls you want to
marry,
Congo girl don’t like to play
locally
They like to play
internationally
They don’t like to operate in
Liberia at all
That oversea that place they
play their game
That oversea the place their
headquarter is
That the place they go they come they make money come
When you see the Congo girls
they don’t like operate here
They don’t even like to talk
to local boys
That American people they want
talk to
In America that place their
headquarters is
That the place the made money
they come to Liberia.”
Offensive lyrics of this kind are good reasons
why it is necessary to advise or warn Sundaygar
Dearboy to write better and less offensive music that
appeals to the public, or face the immediate boycott
of his music by the public because of the
insensitivity of the artist and the stupidity that
flows out his mouth masquerading as music.
But for some unknown reasons, however,
Liberians love Sundaygar Dearboy so much that his
concerts in the Diaspora and in Liberia are sold out;
his music is selling and copied illegally, and I
really don’t know whether the Radio Stations in
Liberia that are playing his music on the airwaves are
paying any close attention to the contents of his
lyrics that denigrates women.
I don’t know whether his fans,
particularly his female fans in Liberia and overseas
are even paying close attention to his lyrics that
denigrates them, either, or are only supporting him
because he is one of their own whose “music is just
entertainment” and not harmful as some have already
suggested when I brought the issue up recently about
Sundaygar’s offensive music.
In another song, Sundaygar sings about his
imaginary wife who was impregnated by one “General
Human Skull,” I guest an indirect way of revealing
his alleged war past, an involvement that is haunting
him today.
During Day One of the public hearing of the
Truth and Reconciliation Commission dubbed "Confronting
Our Difficult Past for a Better Future,” scheduled
to run from January thru July 31 2008, charges of war
crimes were brought against Sundaygar Dearboy by David
Saiware, Emmanual Jimmy and Paul Flomo, serious enough
to warrant our undivided attention because of the
gravity of the charges and because of the public role
this man has played as an entertainer in post-civil
war Liberia.
According to the individuals, Michael
Davies aka Sundaygar Dearboy, as Commander of Charles
Taylor’s defunct National Patriotic Front of Liberia
(NPFL), allegedly ordered 25 men to gang rape Saiware’s
16-year old sister Rita who later died, while Emmanuel
Jimmy and Paul Flomo came forth also and accused the
singer of crimes that includes rape and assault.
According to Emmanuel Jimmy, Sundaygar
Dearboy raped his then-13-year old daughter Beamondyu,
while Paul Flomo accused the singer of allegedly
burning down 14 huts in Gardour Town; Grand Bassa
County, and also accused him for beating his father in
1994. His father died February 8, 1998, four years
later.
Sundaygar Dearboy, like any Liberian who is
facing the Truth and Reconciliation Commission or any
legal entity for crimes against humanity during the
civil war shouldn’t be investigated and put on trial
in a court of public opinion, but in a court of law or
an institution like the TRC that is sanctioned to hold
hearings of this kind, because he and others are
innocent until they are proven guilty by their peers.
However, since the Truth and Reconciliation
Commission is not a court of law authorized legally to
hold hearings that could possibly indict this man and
others or set them free, it is unclear what the future
holds for Sundaygar Dearboy, whose life has seen a
sudden rise from abject poverty to fame and perhaps
fortune, but could be under a cloud of suspicion
throughout his entire life for crimes he claims he did
not commit.
One thing I know is that after the
statement-taking of Michael Davies aka Sundaygar
Dearboy’s over and whatever the outcome is, he has
to work extremely hard to restore his credibility,
must convince a lot of people that he is not guilty of
the charges, and must work very hard to rewrite and
edit his music filled with ethnic insults, stereotypes
and putdowns to appeal to a cross section of the
population.
For now, I am hoping that the good Lord
will have mercy on him for he has sinned against all
Liberian women and their loving men.
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