Conclusion

The colonial system and its remnants in post-colonial West Africa were something that Fela constantly spoke out against. However, as a product of that system in his own right, he needed to spend time away from Nigeria to think outside of it and gain the full understanding needed to dismantle it. The colonial mentality, or the notion of abandon one’s culture for that of the colonizer’s, was something that Fela experienced on a first-hand basis. However, it wasn’t just something Fela had to deal with, because the colonial mentality was an everyday reality for the Africans of (post)colonial Africa. Most countries during the time period continued to operate under systems developed by European powers. Not only did these systems serve to exploit the everyday African people, but it also served to erase major aspects of African culture such and religion and social customs.

Those with power and influence on the continent embraced these European systems and the colonial mentality because they were now the major beneficiaries of this system once European powers left the country. This effectively made Africa a place that was inhospitable for the development of African ideas, because those in power were only interested in the ways of the West. Fela himself was raised in a high-class African family a benefited from the colonial system. His early music reflected these sensibilities as he rarely talked about social issues in his early music and he struggled to find success with the masses of his home country. He had to break out of that mindset, in order to, become a revolutionary icon.

The major turning point in Fela’s life and ideological trajectory began when he left Nigeria. While in London he began to understand the importance of having an African identity, because he learned that Englishmen would never receive him as English even if he completely assimilated into the culture, they gave him. While in America he was able to benefit from experiencing the American black power first hand. Not only did he benefit from reading revolutionary works of African American revolutionaries, but he saw revolutionaries be outspoken against large apparatuses of power. He saw that these black revolutionaries in America were attempting to dismantle a system that was inhospitable to black thought and he was able to re-contextualize their movement and apply it to the things that were happening in Nigeria. He realized that (post)colonial Africa did not support the needs of Africans because it was not made for Africans. When he returned to Nigeria, he used his music to preach and speak out against the colonial system and the rich and powerful Africans who upheld it. His music became synonymous with ideological confrontation and he became loved by the people of Africa and the world. The Nigerian government constantly tried to suppress his voice through arrests and beatings, but this only made his music more oppositional.

Fela’s musical and ideological transformations do a lot to show how culture and environment can affect one’s creative process. Early in his career Fela wasn’t making politically oppositional and did not assert Africaness, but it wasn’t because he didn’t believe in his culture or people. He did assert these things because he had never been taught how. The colonial mentality was so detrimental to African thought that even the most revolutionary Africans could not think through it until they left Africa where the mentality was firmly rooted. Erasure was the most powerful tool that could be used to hinder Fela and other revolutionary Africans from calling out the system. Fela’s childhood was rooted in the colonial mentality, and he was being groomed to be English, therefore he couldn’t think critically about being African. This lack of understanding about Africa left Fela without the framework or understanding needed to breakdown the very system that affected his life even if he wanted to. As he traveled and experienced a political awakening, his understanding expanded, and he couldn’t help but fight the system. No amount of arrests or beatings would stop him. As Fela became more in tune with the culture that was taken from him through colonialism, his music and ideology grew more strong and oppositional.