“…I will die just to put your mind at peace. There is no nauseating aftermath to vomit. One day, you will awaken to the morning news, and it will announce that I, Daddy Lumba, have passed on. When that day arrives, don the finest Edwin Asa Kente (an expensive woven cloth) and adorn your soul with white cloth for a joyous celebration. A man comes to accomplish certain tasks, but not all. So, Lumba has done what was appointed to him, and soon his time will come to an end… Lumba, my end is the reason I cry…” Those were the exact words he sang in “Yɛmfa ɔdɔ”(Let’s live together with love) many years ago.
That day arrived on 26th July 2025.
The man who had soundtracked every Ghanaian life for over four decades simply slipped away and left the songs behind. Charles Kwadwo Fosu, the Nsuta boy the world came to know as Daddy Lumba, closed his eyes at sixty and took with him the voice that had narrated Ghana to itself.
Thirty-three studio albums, more than two hundred documented songs, forty-three years of highlife scripture, all suddenly silent. Ghana had lost its most prolific popular musician and one of the deepest vernacular philosophers the post-colonial public sphere ever produced.
Beneath the danceable surfaces and the occasional scandalous wit lies a defining tension of modern Ghanaian life: the pain of migration, the moral peril of money, the ethics of loyalty and envy, the discipline of resilience, and the final equality of the narrow coffin. Millions absorbed these lessons without ever realising they were being taught.
Life often begins with a journey driven by necessity. Daddy Lumba knew this better than anyone. Together with his partner Ernest Nana Acheampong, he captured the immigrant’s plight perfectly in their classic duet, the title track of their debut album: Yɛɛyɛ Aka Akwantuo Mu. (We are almost locked up in a strange land).
This song speaks directly to the torture of moving abroad for “greener pastures,” only to find yourself “in limbo” or facing a “delayed destiny” because you lack the proper documents. It captures the frustration of those who have “invested all that they have to relocate abroad” but must put their goals on hold.
But even in this deep obscurity, someone always helps. Lumba taught us that the highest form of love is gratitude, immortalized in his song Theresa Abebrese. Theresa was a benefactor, a confidante, and a faithful companion who was “more than a mother and a sister” to him during his “years of obscurity” before fame arrived. This song teaches us to honour those who stood by us, while we were struggling, in the painful journey of life.
That painful journey is almost always about one thing: money. Daddy Lumba’s two great “money songs” speak to different people but carry one deep lesson. Sika Asɛm is a billet-doux to every African who has left home and is suffering abroad, while doing the lowest jobs under cold skies, far from the sun that raised them. With pain in his voice, he sings:
“After the Almighty God had created all things. He formed Black man and set him under the sun. Yet if we depart Africa and dwell in foreign lands. The grief of leaving home.The toil of lowly work. The black man vows to leave the sun’s heat behind. Yet risks death in lands of snow. Oh, it’s a grave concern, all because ɛyɛ sika asɛm, it’s a money matter.”
Then, in Sika, he turns to the friend back home who has no money and now sits bitterly calling the successful person’s wealth “dirty money.” Lumba pleads with him:
“My friend Adu, never let hunger or jealousy make you say someone’s hard-earned money is filthy. Money can lie in the rubbish, pick it, because sika yɛ hene, money is king.”
One song comforts the sufferer who is chasing money far away; the other corrects the broke person who hates those who found it. Together, they teach respect for the reward and struggle.
Even while one is still struggling and the breakthrough has not yet come, Lumba reminds us never to lose heart. The medicine for that lonely struggle is still empathy and sacrifice.
In the powerful song Ankwanoma (The Solitary Bird) he paints himself as a lone bird flying on and on, belonging to a family that no one helps, yet he refuses to give up. He will keep flying until he reaches his destination before death catches him. And then he drops one of the wisest lines:
“If you were related to the woodpecker, you would buy an axe for it, because the work it is doing with its beak is dangerous.”
That small bird breaking its beak on hard trees is every poor person still struggling. If you understand their pain, you cannot just watch; you must help carry the load. One hand cannot lift it alone.
And for everyone still breaking their beak today, still waiting for their season, Lumba himself steps forward with Anidasoɔ Wɔ Hɔ Ma Obiaa (There is hope for everyone). With these gentle words, he turned his own journey from Kumasi-Nsuta boy to LEGEND into a national prayer that still lifts millions every day.
“When you are fighting poverty, don’t kill yourself. Let every person use my own life story to motivate himself or herself… If even the ‘streetist’, the one who used to sleep on the street, can now live in his own room, then everyone will surely become great when his time comes.”
As he sang in a hopeful vein with Pat Thomas, “Ɛmmere bi bɛba” (A good time will come).
A good time will come when all these difficulties will pass away… These eyes will not shed tears anymore; they will see the moon and stars. My children will laugh… and, as a good father, I will stand on my feet again.
This promise of hope is a recurring theme in Lumba’s music, offering solace to those struggling to make ends meet.
In real life, success inevitably attracts envy, jealousy, and gossip. Lumba gave us the ultimate anthem for standing firm against detractors: Yentie Obiaa (We won’t listen to anybody). This song captures the courage of the self-determined individual. It is an empowering rebuke to critics, allowing us to focus on our path and ignore the noise. Yet, Lumba’s philosophy was not just about defiance, but superior wisdom. When faced with attacks, he didn’t wish ruin upon his enemies; he prayed for his detractors to “grow and see my success as a human being”. This is a Stoic-like discipline: accepting adversity (the “impediment to action”) and transforming it into fuel.
And in one of his most compassionate and elevated moments, he offered this gentle rebuke to unexplained hatred: “Sɛ wo kyini me a, (If you hate me).
Sɛ mennyɛ wo bɔne na sɛ wokyini me a, ɛno deɛ woboa oh (If you hate me though I have done nothing to you, then you are mistaken.)
He never raised his voice nor returned evil for evil. Instead, he placed the burden exactly where it belonged, with sorrow rather than anger. That single line disarms malice better than any insult ever could.
In the sorrowful yet beautiful song Adaka-Teaa (narrow-coffin), he confronts us with the unavoidable end. He uses a sorrowful yet beautiful floricultural metaphor:
“Woasi so frɔm sɛ nhwiren” (You blossom like a flower), only for the “awia rebɛbɔ ama woaboto” (the scorching sun to make you wither) in no time. Lumba lamented that despite the shortness of life, people still live boastfully and show off, asking: “Humankind, do you think that you will live forever, and for that reason, you have taken control of the land?”
Even Methuselah, the longest-living man in the Bible, still died. Rich man, poor man, big man, small man, we all owe death one visit. The grave and the narrow coffin are the inevitable destination that no one can avoid.
This realisation of death’s inevitability should not bring fear, but humility and love. We are cautioned not to destroy relationships in the pursuit of earthly treasures.
Finally, Daddy Lumba says, “M’akra mo” (I bid you farewell). Those who loved him, those who hated him, those who praised him, those who fought him, now he is no more. He always knew life had its limits, so he accepted it with serenity. The quarrels are over, the jealousy has ended, and the applause and the insults have both fallen silent. In the end, everything else was just noise.
