Looking for a Guitar God? Check out Jacob Nguni!

It was a Sunday morning. I had just come back from church. Breakfast was cooking and I was in that frame of mind. I just wanted to kick back and lazy through a rare relaxing day off.

My phone rang. The number was unknown to my database and posted to the screen without a name. I wondered a split second if I should take the call. Then I did. To this day, I’m blessed for taking that call.

The voice at the other end was in no hurry to identify itself. He wanted me to guess who was calling me. You know that kind of loving torture, tried on you by mostly intimate friends you have not seen for a while and are reconnecting with after many years or months of “long time, no see, no talk.”

The voice tried to mimic mine, digging deep into the owner’s chest to find low notes. After I failed many trials at identifying who was on the line, the voice self-identified: “this is Jacob Nguni”, the voice said. At first it did not hit me, as I let out: “who? You say na you who?”

Then, a tsunami of memories hit me as my slow brain finally connected… the music of Rocafill Jazz, the dance moves of the 1970s, the “apaga”, “patte d’elephant” and “salamanda” shoes came flashing back.

Later that day, after the call – the one that would start a string of frequent calls “just for see how wuna dey” – I talked about how I loved the Rocafill Jazz growing up. I remembered hearing over Radio Cameroon – there was no TV in Cameroon then – that they had been received by the Queen of England… How they had met Grand Camarade Ahmadou Ahidjo in person!

I recalled also the many times when as a Bishop Rogan student I hatched those big fat lies, and told my father with a straight face about just coming back from Benediction late on Sunday evenings, whereas we had spent the evening at the “Come One, Come All” Tea Time that was hosted for Njinikom youngsters at the Congo Bar. There we danced away to everything… songs like Nairobi, Mario, but especially the music of Prince Nico Mbarga.

The “Big Brother” I’ve Lost Needless to say how humbled I was that the man whom I would only call by the name “Big Brother” honored me with a call, to introduce himself and start a friendship that I have been blessed to have and now will sorely miss. While the name was imprinted in my mind from “Music System” and the voice soon became very familiar – because, as I indicated, “Big Brother” Jacob Nguni called often and stayed as long on the line as you wanted – his face remained unknown to me.

So, imagine my embarrassment when a few weeks later I ran into him in the offices of another “Big Brother” – Chief Bongam – in downtown Silver Spring/DC area. He recognized me the moment I opened my mouth to say hello. Not so, me! I struggled with trying to put a name to the face, but the more I tried to find the name the more I panicked about finding out later that I have no justification for not knowing the person. I only recognized who it was after he greeted as he always did with me on the phone or on email.

“Le Beau” was all he had to say for the jigsaw puzzle of who this elegant “toujours jeune” gentleman was. Like a diesel engine, as they say in Cameroon, my slow brain woke up. I tried to apologize as profusely as I could for not making him out, but “Big Bro” Jacob insisted there was no need to apologize.

In the months that followed – too few by any measure given how soon he has left this world – our friendship and brotherhood strengthened. We spoke more frequently on the phone and for longer periods.

The Medical Doctor Jacob Nguni Every time we spoke, I felt I had just been to medical school and back. Grand Frere Jacob was one patient who had so dominated his illness that the cancer he carried knew that he did not “hap time” for it. Cancer could not stop Jacob from doing Jacob. He had so wrestled the disease to a standstill that it no longer bothered him how the fight would end or when it would end. For anyone who know this warrior, “Big Brother” Jacob Nguni had long ago called the bout against cancer in his favor.

It was not only cancer. I know only few people who could win a battle of any kind against this extremely intelligent man. And the shortlist of those who could defeat him in a debate included no one on Camnet or Cameroon Politics, where “Big Bro” Jacob had a way of “teaching each of his opponents a lesson of their lives”. Once entangled, he only let you go when his opponent suffered a bloodied nose or after the knock out punch had been delivered.

Those he loved knew what the French mean when they say, “qui aime bien, chatie bien”. He made sure those he loved dearly knew he stood with them. That much I know that my sisters, Mesumbe in London; MsJoe out of our West Virginia; Joyce out of upcountry New York, and I put myself in that category of “les bien aimes” knew how spoilt we were to have this “big bro” on our side.

That did not mean he spared the rot. He spotted errors in my grammar and did not take roundabout ways of correcting me in the middle of the Matango Bar.

He wondered loudly on the World Wide Web why I called him “Big Brother” but had the word “Big” in inverted commas. Am I not, indeed, big brother did you, he once asked? I mumbled some explanation to the effect that I did not want the word “big” to mean big as in “big” in size – hefty of built. He let that one slide, as he did many debates he did not care to win.

I know he truly cherished the debates he could have sparked try the often rich intellectual contribution of a “petit frere” of ours: Ekinneh out of Boston. First time he told me, I wanted some of the glory. “He is from Birocol, like me” I bragged. He ignored my suggesting that other schools did not measure up to Birocol.

Proudly Saint Joseph’s College Sasse! “Grand frere” Jacob was very proudly Saint Joseph’s College Sasse and Ekinneh it was again that got him to defend the colors of his alma mater. Ekinneh had suggested in one of his postings that mission schools were second choice options for most students or brilliant students leaving primary school.

That is when the star of Roccafill Jazz told of his Sasse colors. When I joined him in agreeing that schools like Sasse and Birocol were “top of the top list one” colleges, he called me and asked if, indeed, Birocol was as good as some of us make believe, perhaps.

I knew he wanted to make sure he won that debate, too. I was keen on hearing more about his life as a musician. He talked to me about Prince Nico Mbarga and the “good old days”. He spoke fondly of the last few days they spent together in a hotel in Ikom, the Nigerian town just inside the border crossing into “Naija” from the twin Cameroonian and Nigerian border towns of Ekok and Mfum.

He explained that it was his last days with Prince Nico before he died in a car crash on the way back. He spoke of it as if it happened yesterday and I could hear him sob quietly, the first time he recounted the story to me. He spoke two more times to me about it and I realized it had to be therapeutic for me; so although I realized that it pained him to rehearse it, I let him talk, aware that it was another way he had chosen to mourn his dear friend and brother and band leader.

This unfolded on the phone so I never saw his face, overshadowed by sadness. I think the only time I saw him display those unrestraint feelings of painful grief was when he was standing over and looking into the casket and the face of his dear brother, Lapiro de Mbanga at Buffalo.

Praising Others Was His Gift He met the younger of my three sons (Roosevelt) on the occasion of Lapiro’s funeral and spoke to him about his father (me) in words so full of praise that I could have turned blue if I was not black. I kept trying to get him to stop and the more I tried, the more he carried on, insisting that my son must know he has to do far better than both of us combined. “We count on you”, he told my son.

At the funeral service for Lapiro in church, I saw “Big Brother” Jacob Nguni weep. After service when I went up to him and said my condolences, he asked questions of the Heavens and the earth. How could Lapiro die so soon? Do you see what that your government does to people in prison who have done nothing, he asked me, not really expecting me to reply.

He wondered about more. Like, how did Lapiro decide for his remains to be cremated? How could Lapiro cut in line, going to his rest ahead of people like him who have suffered cancer much longer? He wondered what Lapiro’s subjects must think of their chief and reasoned that because a chief disappears, not dies, it is perhaps just as well. Then he mused about how death must not strike him before he has finished a book he said he was working on with Dr. Joyce Ashutantang. I asked where he was with that book and he simply said it was coming along just fine.

As I mentioned, during the church service, his eyes welled up in a river of tears, especially when Lapiro’s widow eulogized her husband from the pulpit at the sanctuary.

At the wake keeping ceremony, he talked of how Lapiro had changed the world; how Lapiro had changed him and changed music; and how much their friendship meant. Later that night, he told me for the first time about a bit of his life growing up in Fiango, Kumba. I tried to connect with him by advertising myself as a “K-Town Boy” myself with my roots of my adoption in that town planted firmly in Fiango, I said.

United by K-Town Where did you live in Fiango, “Grand Frere” Jacob asked me. I mentioned that I lived with our in-laws: the Nguty’s. I did not think he would know them, but that was an assumption you make if you do not know that Jacob knew a world of people.

Of course, he knew old man Nguty – whom he described as a gentleman “hors categorie”. He spoke of how my eldest cousin, the late Bochong Francis Isidore Wainchom Nkwain had come from up-country Kom to steal away and marry one of the hottest ladies in Fiango. He mentioned how his own mom sold merchandise, including “country fowls” which Mr. Nkwain would buy on his way home from his then teaching duties for the preparation of the Kom delicacy, “khatie-khatie”.

I told him how in K-Town as a student I thought of myself as one of the tough, rough ones. Then, without waiting to hear more, “Jacob spoke to me about not having “fights” with certain people on the Internet. In the light of his own many fights, I was afraid of age otherwise I would have asked why this kettle was calling the pot black.

He was serious and he cited names of persons he thought I should ignore or at least never “palapala” with.

Even as he flung Internet blows, he instructed me about the importance of reconciling with certain people he felt I had made the fight too personal and disrespectful. After all, he said, referring to one particular Camnetter, this fellow is your in-law and now you owe him not only the goats due to in-laws, but also apologies. I resisted at first but later caught up with the wisdom of his advice and acted on it.

The Cameroonian community is doing well to mourn this “Grand Frere” as a true king. Nothing will be payback enough for what he did for others, saddened by death.

Jacob knew how to “cry die” and to “salute man for die”. I can witness to the help he always was. I will never forget the resolve, sacrifice and energy he brought to honor the memory of his friend, Lapiro, during an event in Silver Spring shortly after the funeral at Buffalo. He was not bothered, even when nearly everyone turned their back on him and hoped the event would flop. It didn’t.

That night as I believe Washington will do again next weekend, an amazing Cameroonian lady songwriter and singer took on the form of Lapiro on stage.

Needless to say that she brought Langley Park down! After Jacob himself had ran his fingers across the face of a guitar, he came off stage to join Ebini Christmas and I at the bar for a drink. No, that would be inaccurate. He joined us to chat. He did not drink. I think I never ever saw him drinking.

The image of “Big Brother” Jacob Nguni that has continuously played in my mind’s eye since he passed was that of him at the wake for Mr. Nkwain at Upper Marlboro. When he learned that his sister from Fiango… when he heard that the widow, Mrs. Nkwain was retiring for the evening, Jacob Nguni crossed the hall, took the microphone from our brother and co-MC, Ben Fonlon, and offered his condolences in song.

“Make you no think too much ooooh! Make you pray for God, Ih go better!” were the soothing words he sang to Mrs. Nkwain. The hall responded in song and with applause. Then, Jacob was gone. He had done his part.

The monument that is Jacob will be remembered for the history-making band he belonged to, but also for the intellectual contributions he brought to an online Cameroonian “Matango House” on the Internet.

If he was with us, he would certify – as the Internet Guru of Gurus – that I am, indeed, writing tonight from Dar-es-Salaam, Tanzania – unable, as it is, to attend his viewing and wake in person.

I know I have sisters and brothers who will “cry die” with their own hand and mine as well. Thank you! Please, do. Even as we mourn, we must celebrate because Jacob has returned to his Maker. As he used to say, borrowing from the now ex-Nigerian First Lady, “Dia ris God oooh!”

In God’s kingdom tonight, a truly home, sweet home song is playing. In the song titled “Home be Home”, Jacob Nguni played the guitar like the “God of the guitar” he was. He should also be remember for the intellectual he was. He did not only play music. He played with words, too, like only a true wordsmith – and they are not many – can.

“Big Brother” Jacob was not only a musician. He was a well rounded intellectual. He was one of those musicians who had boom in their head… the type of musicians whom Prince Nico Mbarga referred to “Mister and Misses”.

Somewhere in Heaven tonight, Lapiro has welcome his brother Jacob and just for the sake of thanking God for bringing them home to their eternal rest, the two have started playing “Home be Home” and the Angelic Choir is responding like there is no tomorrow.

Rest in peace, “Big Brother” Jacob!

Boh Herbert is (former) veteran CRTV anchor. He writes from Washington DC