(HERALD) Traditional leaders deserve respect
Traditional leaders deserve respectBy Mabasa Sasa
IN 1969, Chief Rekayi Tangwena, probably one of the greatest traditional leaders in the post-First Chimurenga era, remarked: "I am married to this land. I was put here by God . . . and if I am to leave, I must be removed by God who put me here."
The Tangwena people, like many other groups scattered across the plateau, lived in the mountainous area of Nyanga on Zimbabwe’s eastern border with Mozambique for years before the Moffats and the Rudds of this world cast their greedy eyes on our land.
At the time Chief Tangwena rose to international prominence, Ian Smith, fresh from declaring UDI was desperate to stifle the nationalist liberation struggle in the bud and one of his methods was to use the traditional leadership in opposition to the people.
This was indeed a strategy that dated back to Cecil Rhodes’ own infamous indabas at the Matopos Foothills in the 1890s that led to the end of the First Chimurenga.
From that time onwards, it was not uncommon for the racist regime to summon chiefs for "consultations" during which massive military displays disguised as "entertainment" were staged as a means of cowing the traditional leadership into submission.
The real battle was for the control of the land and the resources that come with it.
The whites, very much in the way Charles Mungoshi, describes their mentality in Waiting for the Rain viewed everything as "mine, mine, mine!" and were not predisposed to sharing any resources.
Traditional leaders were to play a huge part in the colonisers’ quest to wrest all resources from their rightful owners and in this respect the people of Tangwena were no exception.
Chief Kanga, viewed as a Smith puppet, died in the year of UDI and Rekayi, then domiciled in Bulawayo, journeyed back home to assume leadership of his people at such a trying time.
A good source of information on the struggle of the Tangwena people as championed by Chief Tangwena, who is rightly interred at the National Heroes’ Acre, is Dr Chido Matewa’s book, Power Comes From the People.
Interestingly, this tome is dubbed an "autobiography" when in actual fact Dr Matewa is writing in the first person narrative about her father the late Rev Stephen Matewa and his experiences as a child of the Tangwena at a time Smith was actively enforcing his kith and kin’s mentality of "mine, mine, mine".
The book explains that Rhodes had taken most of the Nyanga area as his personal property and the Rhodes Nyanga Hotel stands where his private residence once stood.
On his death, most of his properties were transferred to a Board of Trustees, which in turn sold some of the land to the BSAC and later still this ended up in the hands of the Anglo-French Company.
This included the land of the Tangwena, which eventually ended up in the hands of the Gaeresi Ranch Company.
"Mr Charles Hanmer, one of the directors of the Gaeresi Ranch Company, came to settle on the farm. He had his house at Troutbeck. In 1948 his brother, William Hanmer, came to settle on the farm.
"When he erected a fence between him and the Tangwena people’s homesteads, they were puzzled but brushed it aside.
"When they were finally approached and told to vacate the land they were stunned.
"The Anglican Church, through its priest-in-charge in the area, tried to persuade them to move. They refused.
"Rekayi Tangwena, who had been working in Bulawayo, retired and settled at home. The tribe was locked in a succession dispute after Chief Kanga’s death. Rekayi was appointed as Chief but government refused to recognise him."
Rekayi had been exposed to nationalist politics during his travels and had been a member of the Youth League, the ANC, the NDP and Zapu and it was thus no surprise that he spearheaded his people’s cause with gusto.
Though the Smith regime refused to recognise him, his people stood by him throughout all the ensuing clashes and Chief Tangwena in turn vowed that he would never accept any form of bribery to forsake his people’s cause.
Julie Frederikse, in None But Ourselves — Masses vs. Media in the Making Zimbabwe of Zimbabwe, quotes Chief Tangwena saying: "The Smith regime told me that my Chieftainship was not welcome. They said, "You must go, for this land was bought by the whites".
"They said, ‘You are no longer a chief, but a self-styled chief, because you are troublesome’.
"They took from me that chain that made one look like a donkey, that Smith used to indicate which of the Chiefs were his donkeys so they would not go astray.
"I didn’t mind because I didn’t like to appear like a donkey."
As expected, the reaction from the elitist Press was ballistic. The Tangwena people were called criminals, pariahs, uncivilised retrogressive louts and all manner of adjectives deployed against those who dare to do or say anything that goes against the wishes of those who control the imperialist media.
The Umtali Post of November 4, 1970 screamed, "There can be little sympathy for the Tangwena tribespeople who are behaving like stubborn fools and threatening to defy the laws of the land . . . Today, more than 1 000 Tangwena are reported to have gone into hiding in the Inyanga Mountains, ‘living like baboons’.
"No one wants to see them living like baboons in the mountains or dying from starvation or anything else . . . If the present situation continues or worsens, it would not surprise us to see more people in court and they may not all be Tangwena tribesmen."
Post Fast Track Land Reform Zimbabwe has seen a similar upsurge in the number of elitist media reports attacking traditional leaders for standing up for the rights of the people they have been granted custodianship over.
Zimbabwe’s Chiefs have largely stood solidly behind the revolutionary Land Reform Programme much to the chagrin of a cloistered media that would rather have the traditional leadership abrogate their responsibility by siding with Rhodesian remnants who not too long ago were declaring "not in a thousand years".
The privately-owned media reactions to Chief’s support for land tenure reform have striking resemblance to what the Rhodesian regime said during the stand-off with Chief Tangwena and his people.
Numerous attempts have been made to draw parallels between rural folk and baboons living in mountains over the past few years.
Where the Rhodesian Press openly supported white over black, today’s urban-based private Press supports elitist sectarian interests over those of a majority residing in rural areas and understand the importance of land more than city slickers who have always reaped their vegetables from gardens called Bon Marché and TM Supermarket.
All too often, these sections of the media rather unconvincingly claim to be representing the "suppressed voices" of the rural folk.
In an interview with this writer in January 2004, social commentator Dr Tafataona Mahoso said, "Unless it is the people who come forward saying they do not like what their chiefs are doing we can not say they are not representing their people. No social analysis has been carried out to prove these claims."
He also, rightly, pointed out that Zanu-PF’s stance on key political, economic and cultural factors tallied with that of the people represented by the Chiefs and the people they represented.
"Let’s give some respect to our chiefs. They are not infallible but neither are they stooges. Do you expect them to support an agenda that airs its calls for electricity cuts by Thabo Mbeki against Zimbabwe through the BBC?" Dr Mahoso asked.
At the recent Zanu-PF extraordinary congress, the President of the Chiefs’ Council Chief Fortune Charumbira reiterated that there was no way on earth, in heaven or in hell for that matter that the traditional leadership would side with stooge elements regardless of how much they insulted them.
In May 2004, speaking on the sidelines of a gathering of Sadc traditional leaders in Livingstone, Zambia — but then in his capacity as secretary-general of the Zimbabwe Council of Chiefs — he said much the same thing when asked why they were openly supporting Zanu-PF.
He said, "If they are grateful to the ruling party for bringing development to the rural areas, why not allow them to do so?"
And that is the question the opposition and its friends in the media should ask themselves: what have they done to endear themselves to Chiefs and the people they lead?
Like Chief Tangwena decades ago, do not expect the traditional leadership to act like your donkeys!
Labels: CHIEFS, LAND REFORM, ZIMBABWE
posted by MrK @ 10:05 PM
1 Comments:
Ba Pimbimano twapona no bapati besuu.
Level of submission applies to the degree of faith one has put in practice.
In secular educationthere is grading of qualifictions ,craft,diploma,degree,doctorate masters etc from lower to higher levels.Now in practice of faith there are varying levels of resistance.Their higher the the resisance their lower one submits him or her self.in is normal for an ordinary person to begin with high resitance but should be wise enough to analyse and quickly arrive at the truth.Normally knowdlege about God is suppose to be universal or mandatory just like knowledge on health matters.Every one must know health basics .Every person must know basic about God.Levels of submission is the amountof resiponse one applies against the established and well known truth.All world religions do define each other in detail either false or valid.It iis up to each human being to search what each religion says about the other.This is called searching for truth.For example judaism did qualify christianism even ancient religions like zoroasterism or star gazers they even traced a star and maked the end of zoroasterism and upgraded themselves to cchristainity those who resisted were judged acordingly.See www.farsnet.com under wise men.When you read 1Corithian 2:11-16 you will certainly get description of how man gets knowdlge from God and how that no man can judge a spiritual person.
A further reading in the same book in 1Corinthians 3:1-2 will vindicate to you the existence of these faith submission especially the levels of maturity.
Eagle@zambia.co.zm
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