Inspired by Lucky Dube in St.Kitts and Nevis

“Freedom fighter standing on a mountain, in a foreign country, trying to send a message to his people…” Lucky Dube

The music blared from the mini-van’s tape player, as it got to Sandy Point... “Stay!” I said, asking the driver to stop. The vehicle stopped, I stepped out, and gave my fare to the driver asking him who the singer was? “Lucky Dube!” he replied with his thick Kittitian accent. That was my first introduction to the great reggae singer from South Africa. The year was 1991 and I was on the Island of St.Kitts, in the Eastern Caribbean. Living in St.Kitts connected me to the rich culture of the Caribbean and the West Indies, a culture that has taken in Africans, Ameri-Indians, Indians, Chinese, Lebanese, European and everything in between. In the one year that I lived and worked there, I played football for a second division club, taught pre-youth and youth classes, ate mangoes, skinips, drank coconut juice, Ting and ginger beer and enjoyed salt-fish, goat water and Johnny Cakes. All along, in this journey of discovery, were the songs of Lucky Dube that spoke about the human struggle for justice, search for peace and the individual’s spirit of triumph and failure.

Later on when I went to George Washington University, in Washington, DC, Lucky Dube’s music kept me company during the difficult days of writing the long term papers and the days when negativity overtook me. From Washington, I went to Ghana. At the time if you liked Lucky Dube, Ghana was your country, his music was played everywhere, If you were sitting in a tro-tro (a mini-van), on a bus going to Accra,  Kumasi, Takradi, Tamale, Kintampo, Bolgatanga, in a bar, restaurant or a chop bar, walking down the street you heard Lucky Dube. He kept me and millions in Ghana and around the world inspired.  

Years after I had returned from Ghana, driving on 495 in northern Virginia going to work, listening to the radio, the news came that Lucky Dube had been murdered in his home country of South Africa! Like millions around the world I was shocked and saddened by his death! How can someone kill a human being like Lucky Dube?!!

Seven years after his death, sitting here in Accra, I remember that bus ride to Sandy Point as the song blared from the tape player;

“All he dreams about is the freedom of the nation,

When every man will be equal in the eyes of the law;

As he closes his eyes

For the last time he said again!”