LAMBOI

Paramount Chief Lamboi (circa 1860-December 26, 1917) was the last ruler of the Kpaa-Mende state before it followed the fate of other pre-colonial states and was fragmented by the colonial authorities.

Lamboi was the younger brother of Madam Yoko, who had with the support of the colonial administration become the head of the Kpaa-Mende in 1884. When Yoko and her second husband, Genjei, went to live in Senehun on the Bumpe River, Lamboi accompanied them and lived with his sister for a long time. When Madam Yoko died in August 1906, the administration, in gratitude for her unflinching loyalty and support, had Lomboi elected as paramount chief of Kpaa-Mende.

By 1900 all other large pre-colonial territorial federations had been dismantled, but in recognition of Yoko’s services, the government tried vainly to maintain the integrity of the Kpaa-Mende state, although serious cracks and disintegrative forces were already apparent. A year after his election, Lamboi and his elders elected Mboyawa to be section chief of Moyamba after the death of Momoh Gulama. A year or two afterward, Lamboi was struck down with paralysis that lasted till his death nearly a decade later.

The story goes that in the dry season following the election of Mboyawa, Lamboi discovered a “witch gown” hanging on a tree at Senehun while on a tour of his “chiefdom” (as all territorial units had come to be termed during the colonial period). Such a gown is said to enable its possessor to gain power, wealth, and fame. He tried to take possession of the gown and in the process was struck with paralysis.

As he was unable to exercise his duties as paramount chief, a regent, Kpungbu Kangaju of Bauya, upriver from Senehun, was elected to act for Lamboi. The official verdict on Lamboi was that he “did not possess the capacity for ruling that his sister had.” But the odds were heavily stacked against him. He had inherited a decaying chiefdom, and his paralysis merely made worse a situation in which strong separatist tendencies were already at work, the component sections of the chiefdom having already attained a quasi-autonomy.

Even though Kangaju was a willing and hard-working man, the task of controlling the whole territory was beyond him. The district report on Ronietta for 1914 noted that the chiefdom is extremely loosely held together. It is quite anticipated that on the demise of Lamboi, many of the subdivisions will clamour for separation which, without doubt, will have to be conceded.”

On December 26, 1917, the last Kpaa-Mende ruler died, a not unwelcome event. Kangaju continued in office as regent. In 1919 an election was held, at which Lamboi’s son, Lagao Lamboi, lost to Kangaju. At the end of the year, however, it was thought best to let each of the 13 sections of Kpaa-Mende elect their paramount chiefs, probably in anticipation of administrative re-organisation in 1920, and Kangaju returned to Bauya as paramount chief.

With the passing of Lamboi, there passed away also the last of Sierra Leone’s pre-colonial states.

ARTHUR ABRAHAM