Photo: Right to left: Dr. Shaka Ssali with President Jakaya Mrisho Kikwete of Tanzania

When the 43-year-old Kabaare Kid walked into the Voice of America in the Wilbur J. Cohen Federal Building at 330 Independence Avenue, Washington DC at the beginning of 1992, he planted his flag on the mountain top from where he influenced millions of Africans. Shaka Ssali became a household name, loved – even revered – by strangers. Many African leaders and rulers respected him. A few of them feared and hated him. Opposition politicians trusted him because of his objective journalism. Even armed rebels fighting in the forests and deserts of Africa trusted him because he gave everyone a fair hearing.  

Shaka’s first appointment at the VOA was as the English Service Editor/International Broadcaster, Eastern Africa. He oversaw the content of targeted programming for East Africa and served as an expert interviewer of news makers on regionally important stories. His ability to speak authentically about Africa, backed with a solid command of African history and politics, communicated with an accessible natural East-African English accent, made him an instant success. 

After a successful tenure as the anchor of the VOA’s Daybreak Africa on radio, Shaka conceived and brought to life a weekly television and multimedia program to a worldwide audience.  The first edition of Straight Talk Africa (STA) aired on Wednesday August 2, 2000. It was a pioneering concept that had some of his bosses doubt the wisdom of the experiment. Some expected it to fail within six months. Others pressured him to adopt a fake Euro-American accent that is loved by many native African journalists in Kampala and other African cities. For example, his bosses insisted that he should pronounce Rwanda’s capital as “Key-gaa-lee.” Shaka refused and insisted on the correct pronunciation of Kigali as “Chee-gari”. He remained authentically Shaka Ssali wa Mushakamba Omutimbo wa Igabiro rya Kabaare. 

Six months turned into six years, then sixteen, with Shaka on STA still riding high in the living rooms of Africa and beyond. His audience was huge, in the millions, and remained so throughout his twenty years as the managing editor and anchor of STA. He traversed the African continent and hosted Africans in his studios, dissecting key subjects with the relaxed approach of a fireside conversation between friends. He skillfully got some of Africa’s difficult men and women to relax enough to share what they felt, not just the usual scripted responses dispensed to fill time.

He cornered many politicians with facts that he dispensed with a smile and genuine humility. He was able to do this because he had had a solid education that he continued to nourish with constant homework through reading, research, and conversations with normal people in Africa. 

Shaka was my personal human encyclopedia, better than Google when it involved Kigyezi, Uganda, and Africa. He flattered me with requests for information and comments on his ideas and planned questions for his guests. I became better educated through the process of seeking to offer him informed feedback. Our nearly daily telephone conversations were tutorials for me, and a constant source of amazement by his unlimited capacity for recall of details. Guesswork irritated him. Facts. Evidence. Multiple sources. That was his mode of operation.

Shaka established himself in the ordinary homes and state houses of English-speaking Africa. He shifted the commentator’s power balance from American and other European expatriates in Africa to real Africans who were experiencing the events. He turned his studio at the Voice of America into a powerful Voice of Africa. Through him, Africans spoke with each other and to America and the world. 

His remarkable ability to connect with the normal person and the high and mighty enabled him to interview presidents and their opponents without compromising the core values of ethical journalism. Accuracy, accountability, humanity, impartiality, and independence were non-negotiable anchors of his work. He insisted on the truth. Facts mattered to him. He recognised that there were other sides to any story. He understood the potential impact of his words and reports. He was nobody’s mouthpiece. He readily and freely admitted his mistakes. He never set out to hate or destroy anyone. That was what made him one of the greatest journalists of our time.

He was especially careful to avoid any real or perceived conflict of interest. For example, when he went to interview President Joseph Kabila in Kinshasa, the capital of the Congo Free State, the president offered him his jet to fly him and Paul Ndiho, his VOA colleague, to various parts of the country. “Mr. President, if I accept this offer, my story cannot be broadcast on VOA,” Shaka politely declined. They took commercial flights around Congo, in rather rickety aircraft. 

Some rulers were intimidated by him, not because of his manner, but because of his fidelity to the truth in his interviews. That was the reason why President Yoweri Museveni refused to have Shaka ask him questions during a presidential debate in 2016. Yet I know, through conversations with Shaka, before and after that debate, that he would have asked the president very fair questions, delivered with a respectful tone. Museveni would have had an opportunity to sink or swim in that debate, based on his own choice regarding truth-telling and humility. In the event, the president chose to run away from Shaka and left himself open to history’s negative judgement. 

He treated some of Africa’s discreditable presidents with a fairness that was somewhat unsettling until one realised that Shaka was giving them an opportunity to save or destroy themselves. He never let them get away with lies and coverups of their failures or crimes.

I was very privileged to be Shaka’s friend and confidant. He opened his life to me, and a world that I would never have known without his help. He effortlessly arranged for me to speak with national, political, business, military, and academic leaders in Africa. To a person, including a few presidents and past presidents, they left me in no doubt that they had spared their time for me only because it was Shaka who had asked them to do so. These and other historical figures added to my knowledge and helped give me a deeper understanding of their countries’ journeys and Africa’s challenges. Some, of course, were outright pretenders to thrones to which they did not belong. 

Not all his experiences at VOA and on his travels were pleasant. We shall tell you about some of Shaka Ssali’s challenges and narrow escapes next week.

To be continued……….

© Muniini K. Mulera

Shaka Ssali: The Kabaare Kid who made good very good - Part 1 

Shaka Ssali: The Kabaare Kid who made good very good - Part 2