Reuters/Dakar
Some of Africa’s top musicians launched yesterday an alternative Ebola appeal song to Band Aid’s new recording of Do they know it’s Christmas with proceeds also going to fight the virus that has killed more than 5,000 people in West Africa this year.
Despite reaching number one in the UK charts, Bob Geldof’s Do they know it’s Christmas song has been slammed by critics who say the rewritten lyrics, including Christmas bells that clang “chimes of doom” and a world of “dread and fear/Where a kiss of love can kill you”, are an insult to Africans.
By contrast, Africa stop Ebola, sung in French and local languages including Malinke, Soussou, Kissi and Lingala, uses a mixture of rap and melodies that are distinctive to West Africa, to urge people to take Ebola seriously and go to a doctor if they are ill.
Recorded by Malians Salif Keita, Oumou Sangare and duo Amadou and Mariam, Guinean Mory Kante, Congolese Barbara Kanam and Senegalese rapper Didier Awadi among others, the song also warns people to wash their hands, avoid shaking hands with others and to refrain from touching dead bodies.
Tiken Jah Fakoly, a renowned Ivorian musician who has rallied other artists to raise awareness about Ebola, said he was touched by TV images of people in quarantine in the worst-affected countries Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea.
Fakoly said of Band Aid 30: “I praise Bob Geldof’s initiative and he has raised a lot of money, but we must try and avoid stigmatising Africa as a continent that needs pity.”
According to the song’s producers, 3D Family, “Africa stop Ebola” has sold 250,000 copies since it’s unofficial release earlier this month with all proceeds going to medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF).
President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf yesterday hailed Liberians’ efforts in fighting the country’s worst ever haemorrhagic fever outbreak, telling them: “Ebola was chasing us, today we are chasing Ebola.”
The head-of-state has welcomed a dramatic drop in new cases of the virus.
She urged citizens to redouble their efforts to achieve a target of zero new cases by Christmas as she addressed a ceremony to welcome a Dutch aid ship bringing medical supplies from several European countries to Monrovia.
“A few months ago Ebola was chasing us, today we are chasing Ebola. Right now our people are out there doing contact tracing. Communities are taking responsibility and they are taking ownership,” she said.
“They are going in every home to see who is sick so they can take the sick to the treatment centre. They are going to see those who have been abandoned so they can see what they can do for them.
Sirleaf warned, however, that she had seen signs of complacency such as residents no longer stationing disinfectant hand-washing stations outside their homes as new cases around the capital dropped.
Concerns about a renewed spike in Ebola cases in Liberia surfaced yesterday, after health officials reported 22 new cases in a single week in Bong County.
The reports came one week after the WHO announced that Ebola is no longer rampant across Liberia, noting that “case incidence appears to have stabilized over the past four weeks”.
The resurgence in cases was likely caused by patients in the town of Taylor-ta, who ignored quarantine rules and infected residents in the neighbouring towns of Bomota and Gbatala, according to Jusu.
The Dutch Navy’s ship Karel Doorman carrying humanitarian, relief and medical supplies at Freeport in Monrovia, Liberia.
