African Mambo-Sambo prompts grey hairs in Parliament
Imprecise quote of Finance Minister Kalliomäki led to poetry of colonial era
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By Pekka Vuoristo
A mysterious African figure named Mambo-Sambo has caused plenty of extra trouble in Parliament over the past few weeks.
The unfamiliar character burst onto the scene the week before last. Minister of Finance Antti Kalliomäki of the Social Democrats wanted to remind Parliament about "the famous poet in world literature, Kipling, who recommends treading carefully when proceeding on such a path of reforms and great societal development, or otherwise, as he says, 'Mambo-Sambo will destroy you' ".
Mambo-Sambo lurks in uncontrolled developments in spending, was the Finance Minister's interpretation. The figure immediately took on a life of its own in the Parliament chamber. The grey economy, the government’s poor employment policies, and even poverty were all suggested as the place where Mambo-Sambo hails from.
This clear issue was then muddied by Timo Soini of the True Finns, who suspected that they were dealing with the English concept mumbo-jumbo, which according to him means "nonsense and poppycock".
When Kalliomäki a moment later criticised some policies of the Greens, he received support and encouragement from Soini: "Mumbo-jumbo". But Kalliomäki corrected him: "It is not Mumbo-Jumbo, but Mambo-Sambo."
You hear quite a few things in Parliament, but this discussion led to some hustle and bustle in the Parliament’s Registry Office. Its task is to document all discussions in an exact and understandable way for future generations, and for this reason its officers often need to do some background research regarding obscure speeches delivered by MPs.
Sambo! Jumbo!? What were they supposed to write down in the transcript? There seemed to be no point in the bickering of Kalliomäki and Soini, either. And no poem by Rudyard Kipling that would have shed light on the mystery was to be found.
What was unearthed instead was a poem entitled The Congo: A Study of the Negro Race. It was written in 1913, not by British author Kipling (1865–1936) but by American Vachel Lindsay (1879–1931).
The poem presents Mumbo-Jumbo, God of the Congo, who threatens unwary travellers with some kind of curse. This action is called "hoo-doo", meaning the conjuring up of bad fortune or cursing.
But what about Kalliomäki’s version? And Soini’s? Teuvo Räty, one of the secretaries in the Registry Office, took it upon himself to handle the concluding stages of the investigation.
He managed to come by a translation of the poem, made in 1953 by Ville Repo. It was originally published in Parnasso, and in an anthology in 1992.
"Walk with care, or Mambo-Sambo, God of the Congo, will put a spell on you", the translation of the poem warns. There is no threat of destruction, as Kalliomäki recalled, but of witchcraft, just as in the original English version.
Kalliomäki told Räty that he once had the poem as a recording, read by elocutionist Yrjö Jyrinkoski. And Räty learned from the Finnish Broadcasting Company (YLE) that a recording published by Otava in 1967 included the poem in question, read by Jyrinkoski - and also a poem by Kipling, which helps explain Kalliomäki’s mistake.
The Finance Minister, who is interested in poetry, stated on Thursday that he heard the poem for the first time when he was still a grade-schooler and Jyrinkoski toured schools performing. According to the minister, by connecting Mambo-Sambo to the financial demands of Parliament, he was practicing some literary freedom and humour.
Räty’s cousin Paula Bojarsky, who teaches English in the U.S., informed him that Mumbo-Jumbo is a masked ritual figure of the Western Sudanese Mandingo tribe. The name stems from the Mandingo words mama, which means ancestor, and djambo, which means showing off.
According to Bojarsky, Mumbo-Jumbo was evidently introduced to the English language by missionaries who translated the concept, meant to be frightening, into mockery: it then came to mean superstitious nonsense.
So Timo Soini was also right, even though he himself says he is not familiar with the poem. But what is most important, the mumbos and mambos are now in their correct places in the Parliamentary transcripts.
Helsingin Sanomat / First published in print 13.5.2005
PEKKA VUORISTO / Helsingin Sanomat
pekka.vuoristo@hs.fi
