Land Of My Skull (and Tribe)
By: Tsudao Gurirab
A THREE-MAN delimitation commission appointed last year by President Pohamba is touring the country to gather vox populi on the present and future regional and constituency borders. From what we gather, the commission might as well not bother, as the government has already taken the decision on the new boundaries, largely for reasons of gerrymandering and bigoted vengeance.
Those in the know say that it is the intention of the authorities to create an additional region or two which will result in a dozen or so new constituencies. As you would appreciate, the intent and purpose of Article 104 of the Constitution was the direct opposite of this planned action. Our country has extreme characteristics which may aid or hinder governance. One of this is its huge, if barren, size and sparse population. Over the years the 13 regions that were created in response to Article 102 appear to have metamorphosed into centrifugal forces rather than complementary parts of the republic.
And so we hear a clamour for the repetition of same institutions in all 13 regions without which, we are made to believe, we would be incomplete. So, a university in each of the regions, a vocational centre in each, an equal number of police and army recruits drawn from all even though the process is clearly farcical, etc. According to a regular insert styled as a visitor’s filofax in Flamingo, Air Namibia’s in-flight magazine, we even have “13 ethnic cultures and 16 languages and dialects.” Wow! We presume these may just increase in numbers with additional regions?
Even before the delimitation commission was appointed, tribesmen were up in arms to battle against possible loss of tribal land. The problem, of course, has its roots in the fact that the government paid tribute to the Bantustans when the regional boundaries were initially drawn. Except for the central and southern parts of our country, where the colonialists expropriated land from the natives, the rest of the regional regions largely mirror tribal boundaries. And “Namibians” as a consequence thereof are only eager to wrap themselves in their ethnic/tribal garb to assert their differentness.
The remarks by President Pohamba about the whereabouts of the skull of Mandume ya Ndemufayo have now created a whole new enterprise of skull hunting for a revered patron saint or talisman of each tribe. So, the Ndonga have now already thrown their hat in the ring with questions about the skull of Nehale lya Mpingana, with other tribes standing ready to take the plunge on the skull trail. At this rate, Nickey Iyambo’s project of erecting statutes (would it be one in each region?) to the dictates of the Veterans Act, he says, will fall foul of the test of engendering and enhancing Namibian-hood.
We are, of course, mindful that the consequences of the 5th Congress of Swapo continue to colour all actions and pronouncements by the different factions of government, except we should not allow them to hold the country to tribal hostage!
But what all these show is that our distance to tribal affinity and solidarity is closer than our commitment to being Namibian. In other words, being Namibian is something we do as a job, and tribe is how or what we live. These in a larger scheme of things also explain the Omusati clique, the Radopa jibes and the kwangara syndrome stalking swathes of the nation.
For our part, we are unapologetically republican. The source of political authority is the republican constitution and those freely elected as a consequence thereof. But we acknowledge the presence of traditional authorities, but as bit actors performing the final hooray, albeit out of tune, on the national stage. As a matter of fact, we were guests at the first fundraising by the Oukwanyama Traditional Authority at a hotel in Windhoek last year and made a public pledge of financial contribution towards the erection of the museum in honour of Mandume ya Ndemufayo at Omhedi, as someone who fought colonisation en route to nationhood. And while they still whistle in the dark, Ndonga activists and others of similar mind can count on our support as long as their aim is Namibianness and not divide us further along tribal lines.
But when all is said and done, we must lay the foundations for the republic as peremptorily set out in Article 1 of our Constitution. Article 1 embodies the spirit of the architects’ plan bequeathed us on 21 March 1990 as the blueprint upon which to fashion Home Namibia. In the vast, if unforgiving, land of our forebears it is still possible to build a modern civilisation. Our aspirations should therefore be forward and outward looking and allow the tribe to die for the nation to be born.