Tanzanian diva Rehema Chalamila aka Ray C and Mwisho Mwampamba never got married. They have just been lovers. Ray C was in Mombasa last weekend and told Caroline Nyanga why their relationship may not last.
It is around midnight on Good Friday and we are seated in the lobby of the Voyager Hotel, Mombasa, all eyes set on the staircase down which the hotel’s celebrity guest, Rehema Chalamila aka Ray C, will come. When she finally struts down clad in a revealing black top, a black, flared mini-skirt and a pair of black boots with white stripes, all attention is on her. Although she tries to look relaxed, some trace of fatigue still shows on her face. The Tanzanian diva is visiting the coastal town for a concert organised by Extreme International Entertainment.
I am disappointed to see that a chick, who I later find out is called Fiderine, has replaced former Big Brother Africa housemate, Mwisho Mwampamba by her side. Fiderine is her best friend.
I’m dying to know where Mwisho is, especially after hearing rumours that the couple’s marriage is on the rocks.
"Where is your husband, Mwisho?" I ask as we settle down for the interview. "Let me clarify one thing," she says sternly, "I am not married to Mwisho or anyone for that matter and I have never had a wedding. Mwisho is my boyfriend and I don’t know where these rumours have come from." The irritation my question has caused her is clearly discernible from her voice. She explains that she and Mwisho went to Lagos, not Abuja as claimed in the press, to shoot a music video and spend quality time together. The outcome of the visit was the ‘Umenikataa’ video which features a ‘wedding’ picture of the couple. It is this picture that apparently kicked off speculation that they had wed in Nigeria.
Prior to her Mombasa tour, the local grapevine was abuzz with rumours that Mwisho would tag along. "Who gave you the information that Mwisho would be accompanying me?" she asks.
Ray C says that Mwisho had some business to take care of back at home and could not come with her. "You see, he is the sort of busy and so am I. This makes it difficult for us to be together, especially on such short notice," she says, now loosening up.
I take advantage of her chummy nature to ask the other question that is nagging me: "Are you pregnant?" She looks at her friend Fiderine and they burst out in laughter.
When she catches her breath the singer apologises for bursting out like that.
"The answer is obvious; a big no!" She then jumps up and, pointing at her flat tummy, poses: "Do I look pregnant, girl? Ni mapema sana kufikiria mambo kama hayo. Lazima nisome na kuendeleza muziki wangu (It’s too early to start having babies. I first need to go back to school and also take my music career to a higher level.")
Since she has admitted that they are lovers, I ask if she and Mwisho are planning on tying the knot. "The truth is that Mwisho is soon leaving for South Africa to do business there. I will remain at home or even head for another place. Long-distance relationships hardly work so we may end up just maintaining a platonic relationship," she says. The diva adds that although they love each other very much the fact that they have not been seeing each other frequently due to career commitments has left them in a ‘sticky situation’.
Mwisho is alleged to have been secretly seeing his ex, a female rapper popularly known as Rah P, which made Ray C take him out for a second honeymoon in Nigeria. It has also been reported that Ray C and Rah P hate each other’s guts. Rah P has released a song titled ‘Hayakuhusu’ whose video features Mwisho, triggering speculation that it is a dis song directed at Ray C.
But Ray C denies that there is any enmity between her and Rah P even in the face of reports that they don’t see eye to eye. Ray C dismisses the allegations as sheer nonsense. She blames the mass media for the "bad publicity". "Rah P and I are friends," she says laughing. "After all," Ray C adds, "she is a rapper and I’m a singer, so there’s no competition between us." She, however, concedes that Rah P and Mwisho were "close friends" long before she met him.
She denies that Rah P snatched, her man saying that the video in which Mwisho is appearing was shot about two years ago but due to production logistics the rapper could not release it earlier. She says that ‘Hayakuhusu’ coincided with the release of her ‘Umenikataa’. "It was just a coincidence that the videos were released at the same time and, considering that Rah P and Mwisho were close and also did the video together, people were bound to talk."
With the imminent departure of her love, Ray C has focused all her energies on enhancing her music career and plans to establish her own recording studio. But before that she says she wants to study sound engineering and proper song writing. Sound engineering is not a strange subject for the 23-year-old musician who started out as a radio DJ for Dar es Salaam’s Clouds FM Station in 2001. She says her music style was inspired by the songs she played on programmes like ‘Dr Beat’, ‘Saturday Nite Fever’, ‘Mid- Morning Jam’ and ‘Coco Friday Disco Night’.
After the interview, I hike a lift from Malcom of Extreme International Entertainment to Mamba Disco where we find throngs of Ray C’s fans. She grabs several glasses of wine, perhaps to cool her nerves or to boost her morale, before going on stage.
When she finally hits the stage at around 1.30am, she performs her popular hits and spices up the show with her trademark belly dance. At the end of the show at 4am revellers have been thoroughly entertained and got value for their money.
Although last weekend’s show was her first in Kenya, she was in Nairobi last June to receive a Kisima award for the Best Female Artiste of the Year award in Uganda and Tanzania.
The only musician to blend bongo flava, taarab and banghra, Ray C has performed not only in East Africa but also in China, UK and US. Her globetrotting, she reckons, has been very helpful. While on business in Hong Kong recently, she shot her latest video. "This has elevated my music career in Africa and other parts of the world.
"Mine is a different style from the rest of East African musicians. It’s modernised Afro-Indian . My aim has always been to produce something that is different from what other Tanzanians do and appeal to other sections of the world." She likes Indian movies, which have inspired her to do the bongo-banghra blend. "I have loved and watched them since I was a little kid." The themes of her songs revolve around love.
Ray C has been nominated for the Channel O Awards alongside Kenya’s Gidigidi Majimaji and Rufftone.
The musician is currently focusing on the Kenyan market. She has sold over 300,000 copies of her two albums, ‘Mapenzi Yangu’ and ‘Na Wewe Milele’.
Born in Iringa and educated in Uganda and Dar-es-Salaam, Ray C is the only girl in a family of two children. she C lives in Dar-es-salaam, where her mother Margaret Muteve is a businesswoman. Her father Yusuf Muteve passed on a few years ago. Her elder brother is married and lives with his family.
Ray C says that when she settles down, she would like to have two children, just as she sings in ‘Na Wewe Milele’.
