The Royal Highness with the shaman

NOMSA NDLOVU
Correspondent | Friday April 13, 2007 00:00

He is the spiritual eye through which the gods advise when spells of doom are cast by witches to the king and his tribe. He can witch-hunt with his knobkerrie and seditsi. The Shikati believes that without the presence of Sanyedi, he would have long succumbed to the evil traps of his enemies. The Shikati is a giant of a man. On Good Friday afternoon, the Wayei danced to thundering drums and the mawayawaya, shembiro and the matoti songs in the presence of their king. Such cultural songs, the Shikati explained, were sung during special occasions by the tribe. They could be sung to appease the gods, to request for rain and during good harvests or happy moments.

 

Unlike Christians, who, in remembrance of the death of Christ converged in worship arenas worldwide, the Wayei of the Kamanakao Association were gathered at Sexaxa settlement as per their culture. The venue was decorated with gourds, beads, calabashes, fruits from the fields, curved and woven items, a live symbol that depicts Wayei not just as water people but farmers and artists. On Good Friday there was an appetising smell from steaming Shiyei cultural dishes of Tswii (meat mashed in water lily potato stew), Ghao (cooked extracts of a palm tree), Bhabhu (water melon soft porridge) and samp as the tribe celebrated at Sexaxa settlement.

 

Shikati Ozoo narrates that Wayei are the descendants of a Sudanese tribe in Central Africa. He says that the word Wayei means people (Batho).

Ozoo says that Wayei moved from Sudan because of population pressure. The first settlement of the Wayei during their migration was the Democratic Republic of Congo. They then pitched camp in Diyei in Barotseland, Zambia before they relocated to Namibia's Caprivi Strip. Although some historians wrote that Wayei arrived in Botswana in 1750, the Shikati is of the view that his tribe entered Botswana through Kasane in 305 AD. There they found Basubiya and Basarwa, mingled, shared culture and intermarried. Today, he says, Wayei with a population of close to 150,000 are the dominant tribe in the Ngamiland District. Some members of the tribe are found along the Boteti River in the Central District.

 

Ozoo says that he was enthroned as paramount chief of the Wayei in 2004. He is the successor of the late Shikati Calvin Kamanakao who passed away in 2003. Unlike other tribes, where chieftainship is inherited by the eldest son of the paramount chief, Ozoo reveals that the Wayeyi nominate a member of the royal family as successor. The candidate is assessed on his leadership qualities such as 'botho', 'bonolo' and love for the people.

'When Wayei left Sudan they were led by their chief as it is the case amongst all Bantu tribes that migrated then. After the death of each chief, chieftainship rotated among royal members until it was taken over by (Calvin) Kamanakao's great grandfather who was known as Shikati Matshara-tshara.

 

Matshara-tshara had two brothers namely Qhun-kwe and Qhun-kwe-nyane. I am from Qhunkwe's vein, Calvin and I were cousins'.

Though he has been enthroned as Wayei paramount chief, Ozoo is not recognised by the Botswana government nor the Constitution. This is despite the fact that in 2001, the High Court declared the Chieftainship Act unconstitutional. The law has been changed to expand the House of Chiefs but the Wayeyi were not granted their wishes.

 

'We had hope, that the amendment was going to please us all. But last year President Festus Mogae went around the country giving directives that additional chiefs to the House were going to be nominated by headmen. That was unfair. Had the nomination been open to the communities, then each tribe would have chosen a candidate who is their rightful chief by birth and royal blood. Also, according to our culture, a chief is born. We as Bayei are not going to consider all those that have been nominated to the House of Chiefs on five-year term bases.'

 

Ozoo says that although the Kamanakao Association was formed in 1995 to revive the tribe's culture, the organisation is an organ through which they express their voices against oppression.

For the past 70-years, he states that the Wayei have been fighting for freedom and to be recognised as a single entity and an unattached solid tribe not as Batawana or Bakoba as they are presently known.

'We inherited the name Bakoba from the Lozi tribe who used to shout at us saying, 'Shekoba she' (these fools) when they saw us serving the Batawana during our years of bondage. Now that the slave era is over and that it is well-known we are the first occupants and the dominant tribe in the northern parts of Botswana, why should we keep on being ruled by a tribe of minority people?

 

'How can we be ruled by a tribe which has a population of not more than 2,000 in the district? Don't you see that someone out there needs to tune his guitar strings fairly? We are the first tribe to dominate Ngamiland and the Batawana just arrived around 1850.

'Through Kamanakao Association we are a lamenting voice that weeps for its lost Kgotlas.

 

We want to have a recognised Moyei paramount chief and we want to have headmen from our own tribe all over Ngamiland. As such, our culture will never perish because we will be led by leaders who know and understand who we are and where we come from. If this is what is happening among those considered as major tribes in this country why can't it also happen to us,' he said.

During the Good Friday celebrations, attorney Duma Boko told Bayei that like Basarwa of the Central Kgalagadi Game Reserve (CKGR), they will win their case against government.

The Kamanakao Association has referred its case to the Minority Rights Group in Geneva, Switzerland.