Lambo Sandjo Pierre Roger

Lambo Sandjo Pierre Roger (7 April 1957 – 16 March 2014), better known as Lapiro de Mbanga, was a Cameroonian singer who is noted for his 1985 recording of "Pas argent no love" and for being imprisoned in 2008 after criticising Cameroon president Paul Biya in the song "Constitution constipée" ("Constipated Constitution").

Music career For several years, Lapiro's music career took him to West African countries like Nigeria and Benin where he recorded his first single that made no headway. He returned to Cameroon and then quickly moved to Gabon where he did his first popular song "Pas d'argent, no love" with Haissam Records. He returned in 1985 to Cameroon, where he proceeded to compose and record what Index on Censorship has described as "a long list of biting texts on the socio-economic realities in his beleaguered country." His first song in this regard was "No Make Erreur".

Nicknamed "the guitar man," Mbanga became "the idol of the downtrodden and forgotten workers who people the slums and bus stations of Cameroon" and "the spokesman for the youth of his country." His hits of that period included "No Make Erreur," "Surface de Reparation" "Kop Nie," "Mimba We," and "Na You." He was regularly censored by the Cameroonian government.

Imprisonment

In 2008, Mbanga criticised Cameroon president Paul Biya in the song "Constitution constipée" ("Constipated Constitution"). The song denounced the proposed amendment of Cameroon's constitutional clause, which limited presidents to two seven-year terms. The Cameroonian government banned "Constitution constipée" from the airways, however thousands of Cameroonians students used the song as an anthem as they rallied and rioted in the streets in February 2008 in protest against the proposed constitutional change, which would allow Biya to run for a new term in 2011. Mbanga was released from prison on 8 April 2011, one day before the official end of his sentence.

Post-imprisonment In a July 2011 interview, Mbanga described the prisons in which he had been incarcerated as "rotten" and insisted that he had never encouraged young people to damage and steal other people's property. "I've never done anything of the sort. Instead, I did everything to prevent that from happening." He called his trial "Kafkaesque", saying that his fate had been "decided in advance," despite the utter lack of evidence against him.

On 13 July 2011, in Lille, France, Mbanga returned to the stage for the first time since his release from prison. During the summer of 2011 he also played in Lausanne, Brussels, Paris, Barcelona, and at various venues in the United States, Canada, and Britain.

In late 2012 it was reported that Mbanga was seeking a publisher for his book Cabale Politico-Judiciaire Ou La Mort Programmée D'Un Combatant De La Liberté (Politico-Judicial Cabal or the Planned Death of a Freedom Fighter).

In 2013 Mbanga's case was reopened before the Cameroonian Supreme Court. The Supreme Court in June 2013 annulled the TGI judgment and ordered a retrial.

Personal life In 2014, Lapiro died of cancer in Buffalo, New York.