Nimely Napla

Nimely Napla: Legacy of Kendeja in Liberia and the Diaspora

By Esailama Diouf

Introduction

As a young girl growing up in California, my house was always filled with rhythm, dance and visual art.  My father, former director of the National Dance Company of Senegal, and my mother, a dance diva from Liberia, met in the United States during the 1970s and together created a performing company: Diamano Coura West African Dance Company.  If it is wasn’t rehearsal at our house for an upcoming performance, or  fellow performers passing through to make costumes or musical instruments, while other folks were cooking in the kitchen, it was hosting a visiting performing company in our small two bedroom apartment for weeks at a time.

In the summer of 1984, we hosted the Liberian National Cultural Troupe (aka Liberian National Dance Company).  For more than six months, twelve young members of the Cultural Troupe shared our home, performed with us and taught us  traditional rhythms, songs, dances, folktales, instrument making, and masking and costuming of the Vai, Gola, Grebo, Kru, Krahn, Gio, Mandingo, Lorma and Kpelle peoples.  Much of these skills they learned through their own upbringings and at the Kendeja National Cultural Center. The center was  established in 1964 by the Ministry of Information, Cultural Affairs and Tourism under the direction of the acclaimed Liberian writer and folklorist, Bai T. Moore.  The late William V.S. Tubman, was President of Liberia at the time.

The method of using indigenous culture as a way to mobilize African nations and represent people of the internal and external African Diaspora was first spawned in the late 1950s and early 1960s.  Reflecting on the nationalist movement in Guinea, writer and activist Kwame Turé (aka Stokley Carmichael) stated that “culture is politics; politics is culture. The two are inseparable. In fact, politics proceeds out of culture, then turns around and defines culture.” [1]

As struggles for independence swept through West and East Africa, leaders like Kwame Nkrumah (Ghana), Sekou Touré (Guinea), Modibo Keita (Mali), Léopold Senghor (Senegal) and Julius Nyerere (Tanzania) and Tubman, and later William Tolbert, adopted the use of expressive arts such as indigenous music and dance in defining and mobilizing their nations’ people.  Influenced by movements such as the Harlem Renaissance, Pan-Africanism, Négritude, and later the Black Arts Movement (BAM), cultural nationalist movements led to African government sponsored efforts to create cultural programs and national dance companies that would serve as cultural ambassadors to the world through folk music, dance, theater and visual art.

The Kendeja Cultural Center housed the Liberian National Cultural Troupe, which performed locally and in touring events and arts festivals worldwide.  Kendeja and the Liberian National Cultural Troupe hosted numerous staged presentations showcasing the music, dance and folklore of the sixteen indigenous ethnic groups within and around the Liberian borders.  Bai T. Moore traveled with the troupe to the 1966 First World Festival of Negro Arts hosted in Dakar by President Senghor of Senegal. He later addressed the 1969 Organization of African Unity’s First All African Cultural Festival in Algiers, on the importance of culture in Liberia. The National Cultural Troupe went on to represent Liberia in festivals and events throughout Africa, Europe, the United States and in South Korea.

The popularity of cultural performances was intended to promote a distinct Liberian identity for both national and international audiences.  In these performances of music, folklore and dance held at the Kendeja Center, and by touring companies like the Liberian National Cultural Troupe, were the cultural values of a diverse yet united Liberia.  The Kendeja Center served as an interface where different social spheres (classes, genders, ethnic groupings) interacted with cultural formations (forms of expression, styles, values, habits of reception).

People from all over the world came to the Kendeja National Cultural Center to be exposed to Liberia’s rich heritage and, through the arts, Liberia’s changing nature as a society.  The Center not only served as a site for entertainment but also housed a high school and a vocational school.  Most importantly, Kendeja offered a very direct and comprehensive platform for community building, healing and reconciliation between the varying ethnic groups of Liberia as a way to create national identity.

A direct product of the Kendeja Center, Mr. Nimely Vinney Napla, former Liberian National Cultural Troupe Director,  reflects in this interview on his experiences at the Center, its importance as one of Liberia’s only historic cultural sites, his role as an ambassador of the Center, and hopes for the future. Nimely was born in New Kru Town, Bushrod  Island, to Theresa Napla and Harris Napla. He was the director of the company during their stay with us in 1984. Nimely and others taught my parents, me and many others in the United States about Liberian music and dance culture.

I never had a chance to experience the Kendeja Center firsthand, but it is people like Nimely Napla who keep Kendeja alive for the coming generations of Liberian Diaspora performing artists and folklorists such as myself.  For those who have either experienced or simply heard about Kendeja , it is a place that represented and continues to be an invaluable marker of Liberian heritage.

Home of Nimely Vinney Napla, Minneapolis, Minnesota, June 14, 2008

ESAILAMA DIOUF: Why do you think culture is important?

NIMELY NAPLA: Culture is important to me because it’s the way of life. Without culture there is no place. Culture is what people really learn a lot of things from.  Without a background, you don’t know where you’re going. Culture is what we’re supposed to preserve for the young and new generations that will be coming up. It’s history. We have to teach our youth so that when they get older they can pass it on, too.  So, I think it’s very important for the country. That’s why a lot of Liberians today don’t know the importance of culture. I can say they’re almost losing the culture in Liberia. If we’re not careful everything will be lost because our heritage will be gone.

The late Bai T. Moore, the late Jengaba Johnson, those were the ones that preserved the culture of Liberia during those days.  Bai T. Moore was one of the people that helped to found the Culture Center, Kendeja.

ESAILAMA DIOUF: How was the Kendeja Center named?

NIMELY NAPLA: President Tolbert called it the Liberian National Dance Company; that was the name of the cultural center. But the Kendeja name came from the town where Kendeja was. There were two different towns.  One town was called Kene town and the other one was Kenema. They were Vai towns. When they founded the Cultural Center, they wanted to use another name.  So Bai T. Moore changed the name to Kendeja, which is Vai for the welcoming of the people. Kendeja is a town derived from the two different towns.

ESAILAMA DIOUF: How were the first two ethnic groups chosen to represent Liberian culture and how were the other groups incorporated?

NIMELY NAPLA: Bai T. Moore was Vai.  And the late Mother Dukuly, Wilhemina Dukuly, was a Christian lady who had a dance company in Liberia called the Jungle Dance Group.  She was Vai. I think they talked to her and since she had Vai girls already performing in her group, they just moved them into the Cultural Center. That’s how Kendeja began with the Vai people.  And then came the Gola people, because Bai T. Moore was Vai and had influence with the Gola people, he went to Bomi and got some Gola boys from the secret bush called the Poro Society.  The Vai people had the female dancers and the Gola had the male dancers.

Bai T. Moore then said we had to include other ethnic groups instead of just the Vai and Gola in order to represent Liberia.  So they went to another town called New Kru Town. They got a lady from there called Fine-Fine Kala - the late “Fine-Fine Kala”, to look for some girls from New Kru Town. She was able to gather some girls and carry them to the Cultural Center. That was the Kru people. And then every time President Tolbert went to the various counties in Liberia to talk about government business, they always welcomed him with traditional dances.  And while sitting and watching the people dance, he would look for the best performers and tell the people in that county about the Cultural Center. So he chose the best performers from that particular county and transferred them to Monrovia to the Cultural Center. That’s how they brought most of those other groups from the different counties to the Cultural Center.

ESAILAMA DIOUF: How was the Kendeja Center involved in keeping Liberian culture alive?

NIMELY NAPLA: Kendeja was a place that the President wanted because it came a time they used to have this thing called the Inauguration in Liberia.  They used to have people from all over the different counties come to central Monrovia at the Executive Mansion; people performed, showed their talent. There came a time I think when the late Bai T. Moore and Jangaba Johnson with the President thought of having a particular place where they could preserve Liberian culture. They wanted this so that when visitors or other presidents came to the country they could show our culture, the way of life of the Liberian people, instead of them taking these people all the way into the interior. At least they wanted to preserve and have a little place next to central Monrovia so they could carry tourists and people from all over the world when they came to Liberia, to present to them what we had as our culture. So when they founded the cultural center, the first groups of dancers were the Gola and Vai people. And then after that they brought the Kru people. After the Kru, then later they started bringing the Bassa, Kpelle, Gio and the Loma.  The Loma people came last. And that’s how they preserved the culture at this particular place called Kendeja.

When I heard that they took Kendeja away and sold it to build a 5-star hotel, it really broke my heart. I didn’t like that. But I think if they can revisit that decision and bring the Cultural Center back over there, it will help the tourism industry because they would have a  5-star hotel there and they would have the cultural center next to it, so when tourists come to the hotel they can go next door to see a presentation of Liberian culture instead of them hoping to have a new place far away from that area.  Because that place is a historical area, so at least let them keep it right there and bring Kendeja back to the same ground.

ESAILAMA DIOUF: Can you give us your fondest memories of Liberia and the Kendeja Center?

NIMELY NAPLA: As a youth I grew up at the Cultural Center in the National Dance Company of Liberia.  When I got there I didn’t even know how to dance, I was learning how to dance as an apprentice under a good friend of mine called Sekou Kamara.  He’s a Gola boy, his name is Mbengi, and my other friend’s name was Kona.  So all those guys helped me learn how to dance, and I was put in the Liberian National Dance Troupe. I remember that in the National Troupe, most of the time when they did different dances and other things I was always curious to learn them.  Then I decided to have my own group from the Liberian Nation Dance Troupe, so I founded a group called “Tenego”.

I named Tenego the Junior National Troupe, and the government acknowledged that group as the Junior National Troupe.  So, I was director of the Junior National Troupe, then later on I got appointed as Stage Director and chief dancer of the Liberian National Dance Company.  There came a time, ‘79 going to the ‘80s, I was appointed director of the second national dance company in Bomi County, and they sent me over there, and then later on they came back and told me that they had a group that was coming to the United States in 1984, May. They asked me if I could be the director for the National Troupe and bring that group, because they said I had a lot of knowledge and experience in the National Dance Company, so they granted me that position.  I took that position as director of the National Troupe and came to the United States. Since then I’ve been here.  And those are some of the things I remember in Liberia, performing, traveling all over Africa; I enjoyed all of that. Yep.

ESAILAMA DIOUF: What was the atmosphere like at that time for the arts in Liberia?

NIMELY NAPLA: For my time, we talking about beginning 1974 when I first joined. The atmosphere was so good! The Liberian National Troupe was well taken care of and treated very well by the late President William R. Tolbert Jr. He used to really make sure that the National Troupe came first because he was all about culture.  He really loved his culture. That is the man that we really miss up to today, because we know that if he was alive the National Cultural Troupe was going to be at the highest standard today. They always say God’s time is the best. They took him away, so, I miss that part.

ESAILAMA DIOUF: When did the National Cultural Troupe first come to the United States?

NIMELY NAPLA: 1977. It was for the bicentennial in Washington, DC.  During that time, Jimmy Carter was President of  the United States.

ESAILAMA DIOUF: What kinds of activities were offered at the Kendeja Center other than music and dance?

NIMELY NAPLA: At Kendeja they just did not teach you how to dance.  We had from elementary school to high school, a woodworking shop and sewing shop.  The carving and sewing I learned, I learned it from the Cultural Center.  The Cultural Center made me who I am today.  Even though we were going to school, I learned a lot also with my hands at the Cultural Center. We also had outside students who lived in the surrounding area who came to the Cultural Center to go to school, because the Cultural Center was the only school close to where they lived.

Some of us who learned everything from the Cultural Center like me and Naomi Johnson are here now in the United States, still teaching and performing what we first learned at the Cultural Center.  Here in Minnesota I have the Nimely Pan African Dance Company and Naomi has Diamano Coura West African Dance Company in Oakland, California.  Long time ago Naomi went back to Liberia; she did a lot of study at the Cultural Center, and when she came back to the United States she brought a lot of the Liberian dances, so her company uses those dances and preserves the culture of Liberia also.  So me and Naomi are the main ones preserving the culture of Liberia today here in the United States.

ESAILAMA DIOUF: What are the next steps to rekindle Liberian culture and cultural programs?

NIMELY NAPLA: To bring culture back to Liberia, I can see myself one day back in Liberia.  Yet, everything in Liberia now has changed.  They want to modernize everything, and it’s too fast. Every ethnic group has their way of doing things, yet the young people today in Liberia want to change everything and are doing it their own way.  So one day hopefully, if I ever go back to Liberia, I would love to help the National Troupe bring some of those traditional parts of the cultural back.  I still have videotapes from the days when I was a youth performing with the National Cultural Troupe and the ones from 1984 when I first came to the United States. I can present them to some of the members that are there, their children that are there now, so they can see what Liberian culture used to look like in those days.

ESAILAMA DIOUF: You mention that you feel that the representation of Liberian tradition has changed too much too fast, yet in the development of every culture, shouldn’t change be anticipated or expected, particularly in a country like Liberia where war has ravished the country for more than 20 years?

NIMELY NAPLA: When the war came, most of the youth migrated to different African countries - Guinea, Ghana, Senegal, Togo, and some of them stayed there for ten years, fifteen years.  And then when Liberia was getting better, some of them went back to Liberia, they brought dances from some of those other places and incorporated those dances into the Liberian traditional dances and called it Liberian dance.  N. If you bring dance from Senegal to Liberia, you should preserve those people’s culture and say look, this is what we learned from these other countries, but this is Senegalese dance. Don’t call a Senegalese dance Liberian dance, do not call a Guinean dance a Liberian dance. So do the Mandingo dance and call it Mandingo dance, do not call Mandingo dance Bassa dance or take a Mandingo step and put it into a Vai dance and say that’s a Vai dance. No.  Because the traditional people of the Vai have their own dance, just as the Gola people have their own dance.

I know that in the interior part of Liberia there are still some of those people keeping their culture, but when you come to central Monrovia, there’s where you have the mixing up of the dances.  I haven’t gone to Monrovia since ‘83, but people that have been there and that call me and are bringing videotapes that I watch and on YouTube, most of these things they say are from central Monrovia.  And Central Monrovia is where we have the National Troupe.  And I saw the National Troupe people there mixing things from these different countries saying it’s Liberian dance. No, you don’t do that.  You have to do the right thing. Keep the culture alive, keep the culture going.

ESAILAMA DIOUF: Would you say right now there is no home for Liberian culture?

NIMELY NAPLA: There is no space, no center for Liberian culture.  They promised the former Kendeja people that are now scattered all around a space, but I think the President made a big mistake. I don’t know if it was her or whosoever she put in charge of this particular project.  As a government they should have looked for a location and built the place first, let people know and then relocate the group so they can see the facility where they were going to. Don’t just get them out of the place, say y’all have to go, we’ll find a place for y’all later.  It don’t work for people. Most of those people lost touch, some of those people left; people gone different places now. This will make the people to feel discouraged and they will go into something else. There will be no Liberian culture tomorrow.  They’re losing everything.  This five-star hotel, we know everybody wants to see a five-star hotel, we want to see people growing, they want employment and other things, but not like this.  Not like this.

ESAILAMA DIOUF: Do you feel that the development of culture is a priority for the Liberian government?

NIMELY NAPLA: The interior people will always have their culture, but that particular Cultural Center space is a historical place.  Especially last year when the President came here in August and we-the Nimely Pan African Dance Company-performed for her, with all these thousands of guests from all over the world, Africare was honoring her.  What hurt me was that she didn’t acknowledge us at all. As a President when you get up, at least acknowledge your dance company, especially those of us from Liberia. Tell them thank you.  In the middle of her speech she was saying some good things about Liberia, and we raised a song to tell her thank you, and that’s the time she turned to us and said thank you.  Those were the only words she said.  She didn’t even say anything about Liberian culture, even though we know Liberia’s just coming out of a war. She tried to concentrate on the economic and other development of Liberia, but at least she should have still acknowledged your people right there.

ESAILAMA DIOUF: Do you feel that sometimes when economics is the focus, culture and the arts get bypassed as a part of national development?  For instance, we can look right here in the United States when we look at arts in education. When schools are having financial difficulty, the first programs that are cut are the arts programs.  We can expand this on a national and governmental level to say that people do not look at culture as being a part of national development.  Do you think that is the case right now with Liberia and why the historic site of the Kendeja Center was sold?

NIMELY NAPLA: The purpose of developing culture was not involved in the decision to sell that land, because when I go back I will have no Cultural Center to go back to. Culture and tourism used to bring a lot of money to Liberia.  I remember there used to be sometimes twenty to thirty buses, tourists from Germany, England, United States, China. Buses used to come through the tourism office to the Cultural Center and we had a big amphitheater outside and we would perform for those people. It was good revenue for Liberia. So, if they can incorporate the historic site and the five-star hotel and build a theater that is Kendeja, I would be happy. The Cultural Troupe can always come there to perform for tourists and guests that come to Liberia and we can still preserve that little space there and say it’s the Cultural Center, even though it’s five-star hotel slash Cultural Center. That would be good development for the government.

To my Cultural Center people, as Jesse Jackson said: “keep hope alive”.  There is always hope. They should not turn their backs; they should just keep the hope that something will happen.  And one day I wish myself luck to be in Liberia to help my fellow friends.

 

Further Reading

Ballmoss, Agnes von and Bai T. Moore. “Address by the delegation of the Republic of Liberia.” Organization of African Unity: All African Cultural Festival: Algiers symposium, July 21st-August 1, 1969. Algier: Société Nationale d’Édition et de Diffusion,105-112.

Asante Welsh, Kariamu. ed.  African Dance: An Artistic, Historical and Philosophical Inquiry. Trenton, New Jersey: African World Press Inc., 1996.

Fanon, Frantz.  The Wretched of the Earth. Trans. Constance Farrington. New York: Grove Press, 1963.

Keita, Fodeba.  “African Dance and the Stage.”  World Theatre 7.3 (1958): 164-78.

Moore, Bai T. “Confrontation of Negro art with the West.” Colloquium: Function and significance of African Negro art in the life of the people and for the people, March 30-April 8, 1966. Présence Africaine 2 (1971):235-242.

Moore, Bai T. Liberian culture at a glance : a review of the culture and customs of the different ethnic groups in the Republic of Liberia. Ministry of Information, Cultural Affairs & Tourism: Monrovia, Liberia, 1979.

Société Africaine de Culture. 1st World Festival of Negro Arts, Dakar, April 1-24, 1966. Colloquium: Function and significance of African Negro art in the life of the people and for the people, March 30-April 8, 1966. Paris: Présence Africaine, 1968. 

[1] See Stokley Carmicheal, Ready for Revolution (2003): 702.