Big men in love: African presidents are also human

The majority of African leaders, however, tied their nuptials before they ascended to office and many have decades of marriage under their belt.
Notable long-married leaders in African politics include Burkina Faso’s Blaise Compaore, Algeria’s Abdelaziz Bouteflika, Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak, Anerood Jugnauth of Mauritius and Rwanda’s Paul Kagame.

In Africa the presidency is so mystified as to attract ranging debates and endless banter whenever the public gets a sneak view of goings on at the big houses on the hill, Nation writer LEE MWITI takes a look at the big men and the four-letter word:-

Malawi President Bingu wa Mutharika’s Valentine’s Day engagement party was one to warm the heart of romantics everywhere. In a continent where public display of romance is still frowned upon, the President half-heartedly tried to keep a lid on the courtship, before discovering that love, like a cough, cannot be hidden, as an African proverb cautions.

The engagement ceremony, held in the country’s State House and beamed on live television, was however a colourful mash of both traditional and modern themes.
“Apa ndiye tafika (She is the one),” President Mutharika blushed, upon traditionally and “correctly” identifying his—and the nation’s— First Lady-in-waiting.

His sweetheart, Calista Chapola-Chimbombo, is a former tourism minister in the southern African country best known for hosting pop singer Madonna in her frequent forays to adopt children.

The two lovebirds will be wed on May 1. Both are widowed, with the President’s first wife having died from cancer in 2007.
The need to find love seems to be a universal urge and has not spared African presidents who for some reason find themselves single lonely while in office.
Indeed in many African cultures, a leader without a wife is unflatteringly regarded to as a “young man”.

Botswana leader Seretse Khama Ian Khama, in some quarters referred to as the Bachelor President, stands out for bucking this trend. It is, however, worth noting that at one point he almost got married.

It remains to be seen how long he can hold out, with many of the opinion that it is only a matter of time as the paramount chief of the Bangwato he is obliged to marry. Also, as an African president, by now he must have realised that the family man image is a necessary political credential unless you are Dr Hastings Kamuzu Banda of Malawi who maintained a mistress, Cecilia Kadzamira and you questioned his marital status at your own peril. Banda died in 1997.

Married earlier
The majority of African leaders, however, tied their nuptials before they ascended to office and many have decades of marriage under their belt.
Notable long-married leaders in African politics include Burkina Faso’s Blaise Compaore, Algeria’s Abdelaziz Bouteflika, Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak, Anerood Jugnauth of Mauritius and Rwanda’s Paul Kagame.

Senegal’s Abdoulaye Wade and Uganda’s Yoweri Museveni also weigh in on this list.
Others like Equatorial Guinea’s Teodoro Obiang Nguema, South Africa’s Jacob Zuma, Sudan’s Omar al Bashir, Djibouti’s Ismail Omar Guelleh and Libya’s Muammar Gaddafi are polygamists. Contrary to western misconceptions, polygamy is an important political credential in Africa where it projects a leader as a “man of the people.”

Two worlds
Also sight should not be lost of the any African leader is a child of two worlds, meaning their social lives must of necessity embody a conflict between Western and African values.

Togo’s totalitarian and Africa’s longest-serving former president Gnassingbe Eyadema was survived by three official wives at his death in 2005, but the actual number was said to be higher.

But the spectre of the African President marrying in office is less well documented and Mr Mutharika’s upcoming nuptials will cast more attention on this trend.

A quirk of these marriages is that many who marry in office take on wives several years their junior, with gulfs in age of as much as 40 years not uncommon. President Mutharika is 76, while his fiancée is said to be in her 40s.
Former South African leader Nelson Mandela, while definitely not your typical Big Man in the African sense, probably stands out in this interesting cast of presidents who have taken on first—or new—wives while in office.

Mr Mandela, now 81, married Ms Graca Machel, the former wife of Mozambique’s first president, Samora Machel, in 1998. Machel died in an air crash in 1986.
The Mandela-Graca wedding came two years after the statesman divorced his wife of 39 years, Winnie Madikizela-Mandela.

Graca is 27 years younger than the globally revered Mandela. The definition of the “Big Man” varies, but is mainly dependent on longevity in power, or the extent to which they tower over their countries’ affairs of the state. They almost always provide captivating tales of their marital lives, with their spouses’ escapades making for huge talking points in the streets.
For sheer intrigue value, Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe’s wedding to Grace Marufu stands out.