In 1994, Mulamba was honoured at the African Cup of Nations in Tunisia. On returning to Zaire, he was shot in the leg by robbers who mistakenly assumed a former sports star would be a wealthy target. He was sheltered by Emmanuel Paye-Paye for eight months' recuperation. During the First Congo War, Mulamba's eldest son was killed and in 1996 he fled to South Africa as a refugee, alone and destitute. He went to Johannesburg and then Cape Town, where he was taken in by a family in a township. In 1998, a minute's silence was held at the African Cup of Nations in Burkina Faso after an erroneous report that Mulamba had died in a diamond mining accident in Angola. By then Mulamba was unemployed and drinking heavily.