Lingala dictionary · browse all

lamuka

la-MU-ka

wake up / rise / get up (also a Congolese political rallying cry)

French: reveille-toi / leve-toi (aussi un cri politique congolais)

Lamuka — the imperative "wake up" or "rise." Said by a mother at dawn to a sleeping child, by a friend nudging another out of a daze. But Lamuka also carries a national weight no Congolese forgets: in 2018 the opposition coalition that united Martin Fayulu, Moise Katumbi, Jean-Pierre Bemba and others took this single word as its name. "Lamuka!" became the cry painted on walls, chanted in stadiums, and whispered between strangers — "wake up, Congo." For the diaspora it is a word with two mornings inside it: the one that ends the night, and the one a country is still waiting for.