Yunhouse has a cast of rich Characters

Meet them below

CYRIL NAIKULE: Cy
 

CYRIL NAIKULE: Cy [mostly pronounced see-why otherwise sii-wai] as he is known to everyone in Yunhouse, is named after a Welshman who was a guest at his naming ceremony (c1890). The Welsh namesake had been a chef in the service of an uncle who swapped from selling slaves to selling spices to the same English trading company that facilitated -with multiple treaties – The Pacification Of The Natives in Cy’s colonised home country. Cy discovers much, much later that the same English trading company, in a gentleman’s agreement with his uncle, has sponsored his education in London.

Cy’s European education began with German missionaries but finishes in an English school because the Berlin Carve-up inserted a national boundary bang in the middle of his ethnic domain. This is one childhood experience, Cy claims, that set his African Brain Cell in perpetual motion of anger. Cy’s numerous escapades as the Angry Man Of Africa are widely publicised and they are the live wires of the story of Yunhouse.

His initial encounter with the co-anchor of Yunhouse, Lekwot Abaka , is to pick a fight because he is nauseated by an article Lekwot contributed to the maiden edition of the primaeval African journal – The Africa Picture [No spitting!]. Instead of a fight, the two bond into a partnership that becomes the foundation on which Yunhouse would stand.

Cy organises many protests against the manifestations of The Pacification Of The Natives. He coordinates the race riots that greet the lower court ruling against the Africans in The First Battle For Yunhouse. He leads the march against inclusion of Africans in their World War II. He expresses personal opposition to WW II by running in the streets during bombs raids in London. Fearing for his safety, fellow Berliners organise a voyage back home to Africa. On his native soil, he tries unsuccessfully to stop young Africans from being recruited to fight for the English Crown. He organises the same young Africans to demand payment for their sacrifices in the European war. He opposes the imposition of Clan Tax on his people. He returns to London to present his peoples’ case to the British Government. The Colonial Office’s dossier on him make the bulk of the evidence for the opposition’s case in The First Battle For Yunhouse.

Cy’s autobiography, The Chips On My Shoulder – Being An Epistle To The Africans In London, is regarded as the Spiritual Manifesto of Yunhouse. His memoirs, Something To Write Home About, inspires the young African research journalist who is the Narrator of The Yunhouse Story. Cy dies (c1994) while working on the case against the takeover of Yunhouse by rival Africa Adventurers Club.

LEKWOT ABAKA

Uncle Lekwot to all Yunis and every person who has anything to do with Yunhouse. Also known as the Cool Head Of Africa, in contrast with his life long companion, Cy – the Angry Man Of Africa. Both heads clinch at their first meeting into a kind of thermocouple generator that would power the Yunhouse African dynamism for nearly a century. The Berliner Cult is inaugurated at his residence in Camden Town, North London, thereafter he would chair all critical Yunhouse meetings until he is voted The Man Who Has Chaired More Meetings On Africa Than Any Human Dead Or AliveWhat a pity! is his signature intervention from the Chair in the heat of discussions on The Africa. Lekwot is Paramount YunChief till his death (c1999).

OGESAYI MAWE

Fellow Berliners fondly call him My-Way, a pet name he acquired when, at the first Berliner Cult initiation rites, he pledges to dedicate his legal studies to bringing Colonialism to book. Internationally, he is The Scourge Of Colonialism, being the only Berliner Cult Member who survives colonialism’s firing power to become the first president of his liberated country. He made Yunism an ideological brand worldwide.

Mawe’s dream project is for his country to grow enough kola nuts to dominate the world stimulant market. The tea and coffee lobby of Europe and America not only shoot down his dream but had him overthrown by his own army. He is marooned in a remote and unknown Pacific Island from where he writes widely publicised stinkers to all those who betray Africa. Hence the legend of The One And Only Wandering President whose shadow continues to loom large in Younhouse.

Mawe returns to Yunhouse shortly before Lekwot Abaka’s death. He successfully leads the campaign (The Second Battle For Yunhouse) against the amalgamation of Yunhouse with rival establishment of The Africa Adventurers Club.

MNAMA KEMP

Known throughout his life as Big Mnama. He was a cute looking toddler spotted on the lawns of a Colonial State House by an English aristocrat visiting his cousin, the Governor General. Mnama was adopted by gubernatorial fiat. He is given everything his foster father could give, including a ring with the family heraldic crest. He attends famous English public school, followed by Oxford University, where he rounds up his natural history studies with a thesis on The Life Of The Mosquito. He meets Cy on the campus of London University where he is researching the confirmation of what a study of mosquitoes had taught him as a formula for interpreting nature in action, namely: In every death, there is a new life, and vice versa. He has a six-foot-six persona that enchants many around him. He speaks very little, even at The Berliner Cult meetings. No one is certain if he ever uttered We shall never be pacified!. But he finds The Berliners to be good for a laugh. And he tells his father so. His father confirms that it was unfair for The Berliners to be evicted from their Camden Town flat simply because they enjoy good laughs at their meetings. Lord Kemp wills his Hampstead estate to Big Mnama and his fellow Berliners. The will is challenged by Big Mnama’s niece, and The First Battle For Yunhouse ensues. Also, Lord Kemp’s death induces a crisis for the English constitution: could Big Mnama inherit his father’s aristocratic title or not?

 

The Africa Picture [No Spitting!]: This first ever pan-Africa news magazine is aunched in the second decade of the twentieth century from the publishing stable of The World Chronicle [WC] whose publisher had an uncle who sat as a British delegate at the 1884 Berlin Conference. The publication is originally conceived as a medium for Englishmen and Englishwomen to cross-fertilise their ideas and experiences of Africa. The publisher does not have African readership in mind. Yet the magazine becomes a must-read for Africans living London. The magazine is, without any doubt, the ultimate – if not the only – chronicle of The Pacification Of The Natives. Palaver Hall Library of Yunhouse has copies of all the issues of the magazine.

JOHN O'GAFLA

A corpulent, ginger-haired Englishman Jwho was employed by The World Chronicle [WC] to play God over The Africa Thought as disseminated in two thousand-and-thirteen weekly editions of The Africa Picture [No Spitting!]”- Something To Write Home About. He edits the primeval African journal for nearly half a century, from the eve of World War II till he attains the status of The Man Who Has Written Africa More Times Than Any Human Alive. He is introduced to Yunhouse by Big Mnama where he is resident till his appointment as full-time journalist. He has a glorious career that earns him knighthood from the English Crown as well as recognition as the Number One Africanist. He is the founder member of the first ever batch of The Africa Correspondents, an informal pints gang of real ale enthusiasts in Fleet Street which metamorphoses into The Africa Adventurers Club. He dreams of the amalgamation of Yunhouse with The Adventurers. A daunting task, given the fact that Sir John personifies the Yunhouse/Adventurers divide when, as resident of Yunhouse, he could not bring himself to voice the Yunhouse war cry: We shall never be pacified!

THE AFRICA ADVENTURERS CLUB

Members of the Adventurers Club do not call themselves Africanists. But everyone else does. Founder, John O’Gafla, is happy to be known as The Number One Africanist. The other members (mostly White Englishmen and Englishwomen) say. The Adventurers is a place to meet and discuss Africa objectively which, the members believe, is not possible in Yunhouse atmosphere that continues to ring with We shall never be pacified! The Second Battle For Yunhouse is provoked by attempt to amalgamate the two London establishments of The Africa.

AFC - AFRICA FREEDOM COUNCIL

A political movement that germinates from a public lecture by a Cambridge University Don at the Adventurers Club. The Professor gets branded William Wilberforce II (after the famous Englishman who campaigned against enslavement of Africans by Europeans) for arguing that colonialism oppresses Africans’ fundamental human rights and therefore offensive to English sense of justice. AFC launching is a grand ceremony attended by dozens of African tribal chiefs who voyage to London in a vessel specially named SS FREEDOM… “The AFC launch was the grand finale of The Pacification Of The Natives, an iniquity that we have only just recently declared as crime against humanity.” [Something To Write Home About]

SIR EMMANUEL NKUNGONO

A talented church organist who is sponsored by the missionaries to study music in London. He is a Berliner – a foundation member of Yunhouse. He volunteers to spy on the Africa Freedom Council (a looming threat to Yunism) by faking public defection from Yunhouse to The Adventurers. He founds his country’s AFC Chapter on the platform of which he gets elected as the first president to whom the colonial administration hands power. He is knighted by the English Crown. He does not go back to Yunhouse. He remains the ultimate traitor to the Yunhouse cause.

PROFESSOR DONATUS DO-REMI

An African social scientist whose incessant writings on Africa is syndicated in many countries and languages. Probably the first African to formally accept the appellation of Africanist. He is the only known African with formal membership of The Africa Adventurers Club. He is elected President of The Adventurers, and he undertakes to unite Yunhouse with The Adventurers. His ambition provokes The Second Battle For Yunhouse.

BERYL FAIRBANKS

The devoted Yunhouse Secretary whom everyone knows but who hardly talks to anyone. The young English lady from Shropshire is sightseeing at the English Parliament in Westminster when she is swept – literally! – off her feet by the tumult that greets the Law Lords’ verdict that Yunhouse rightfully belongs to the Africans. Her scrapbook of newspaper clippings is the only extant record of the day when the one and only African colony outside Africa is promulgated. Seated in the electrified atmosphere of unimaginable jubilation, she humbly asks if there is anything she can do. She is asked to take notes. And she begins to take notes. The notes become the full record of the multitude of Yunhouse resolutions with which Yunists aim to dismantle the Colonial yoke. She sits in a permanent position at the right hand side of the Palaver Hall Chairman (Uncle Lekwot). The full record of the proceedings of Palaver Hall is Beryl’s creation. Four decades later she is voted The Secretary Who Has Typed Africa More Times Than Any Secretary In The Whole World.

PALAVER HALL

Here, discussion on any subject can be slated – as long as it is about The Africa. Sessions continue round the clock. Discussants are known to camp here for weeks while seeking Yunhouse resolutions that can bring relief to minds ensnared by Colonialism. Arguably, The Venue Where More Audiences Have Gathered In The Name Of Africa Than Anywhere Else On Planet Earth.

YUNTOK

Also Yun-talk. Or Yunhouse talk. “The figure Yof thoughts about The Africa. Not really a character but it should be. You can all it the figment of our imagination of The Africa. It is surreal. It is the medium in which our thoughts flow. Also ourishment for our soul. That’s how we communicate. That’s how we live: seeing, smelling, hearing, touching, tasting The Africa” – Something To Write Home About.

AFRINC

Purpose-built African Computer_Designed And Used Exclusively By Non-Africans. It is based in Liechtenstein. Yunhouse authorities obtain the Printout of its database. The Computer’s bowel contains everything ever printed in The Africa Picture [No Spitting!]: “Over six decades of Africanistic fabrications, explications, prognostications, implications, etcetera, etcetera, about the Dark Continent and its dark-skinned peoples” [Something To Write Home About] Evidently The Computer database includes everything there is to know about Yunhouse – and more. It is on the enemy side in The Second Battle For Yunhouse.