Zimbabwe has Never Been a Monolithic Shona Society of One Language and One Culture: The Best Way Forward is !Ke e :/Xarra //Ke: - Unity in Diversity


The following is a talk that I delivered at the National Indaba on Minority Languages at the Cresta Churchill Hotel in Bulawayo in preperation for the Second All-Stakeholders Conference.


Mabuyani. Dumilani. Molweni. Ndimatsheloni. Sanibonani. Le ka e hle. Totanahaa. Good Morning.

Now, ladies and gentlemen, I would like to thank the organizers of this Indaba for the opportunity to stand here and deliver this talk to you. Thank you very much.

There is a line that Effie likes using, which I like too, and it goes like we are here defend civilization. I say you today we are here to defend and promote civilization. We are here to defend and advance the common interests of man. We are here to advance the freedom of man.

We are here to deliberate on ways to entrench democracy, to promote unity in diversity, to forge a way forward for this our country as a united and progressive country that delivers a good life to all of its citizens whatever their color, whatever language they speak and whatever culture they have. Such is our mission here.    

The talk that I would like to deliver to you here is a bit of a summary of my two books, The Rebirth of Bukalanga and The Case for a Federal Republic of Zimbabwe, and it is titled Zimbabwe has Never Been a Monolithic Shona Society of One Language and One Culture: The Best Way Forward is !Ke e :/Xarra //Ke: - Unity in Diversity.

I will look at four topics as far as our marginalized languages are concerned. 

Number One - I will argue from a historical standpoint that contrary to what certain scholars and political elites in this country would have us believe, Zimbabwe has never at any point in recorded history been a monolithic society of one language and one culture, therefore, there is no need to suppress and oppress certain of our languages and cultures trying to rebuild that kind of mythical society.

Two - Our languages, whilst classified by the UN as 'minority languages', they historically are not minority languages, they have been deliberately decimated, minoritized and villagized, hence the present situation.

Number Three - I will argue that the best way forward for this country to remain united, at peace, prosperous and progressive, is to stand united in our diversity. Unity does not require uniformity. Like the South Africans, let us say to each other - !Ke e :/Xarra //Ke: - Diverse People Unite.

And lastly, Number Four - I will answer the pertinent question that I have been asked many times - what's in it anyway? Why revive these languages, of what benefit is that to this country.   

With that said, let us go straight into the topic. Let me warn you that some of the historical claims that I will make here are not what you are used to hearing, and some may even shock you, but if you want the details thereof, you can have yourself a copy of this book later and weigh the evidence for yourself.

1.    We Have Always Been a Diverse Society, even Before the Coming of the Ndebele, not a Monolithic Shona Society of One Language!

Ladies and gentlemen, there is a common misconception, or lie, that is being advanced in Zimbabwe, both via high school education and the media, and as I said, held by certain political elites and scholars in this country that Zimbabwe was once a monolithic society of one language and one culture, and all these other languages are seen as a disruption to the process of rebuilding that society.

This misconception posits that before the mid-1800s when the Nguni crossed the Limpopo during the Mfecane wars, what is now called Zimbabwe was a monolithic society of one language and culture, that is, Shona language and culture.  

It further posits that all people between the Limpopo and Zambezi were Shona, and on that basis is laid the claim that TjiKalanga, Tshivenda and TjiNambya are (corrupted) Shona dialects, as a result all of Zimbabgwe was once Shona country, and it has to be restored to that.

Ladies and gentlemen that is a lie of Gobbelsian proportions. Zimbabgwe was never like that, and to try to build Zimbabgwe into a monolithic Shona empire by suppressing our languages is trying to restore or rebuild something that never was. It is a myth!

Let me tell why I can be so audacious about these claims.

Did you know that the people properly called Shona today, namely what Professor David Beach has classified as the Central and Northern Shona, that is the Zezuru and Manyika, only arrived in this country three hundred years ago?

Yes, 300 years ago, and that is on record. Here what one historian, Dr George MacCall Theal, had to say about this writing in 1896, and I will read this verbatim:

About the close of the fifteenth century, white man encountered a number of groups in southern Africa, and there were three major groups of these people … In the first group [were] the Amaxosa, the Abathembu, the Amampondo, the Amabaca, the Abambo, the Amazulu, the Amaswazi, the Amatonga, the Magwamba, the Matshangana, and the Matebele … The second group … include[d] the Batlapin, the Batlaro, the Barolong, the Bahurutsi, the Bangwaketsi, the Bakwena, the Bamangwato, all the sections of the Makalanga, and the whole of the Basuto, north and south … The third group will comprise all the Bantu living between the Kalahari and the Atlantic Ocean, such as the Ovaherero, the Ovampo, and others (Theal 1896, 39-40).

He then continued:

In 1505, when the Portuguese formed their first settlement on the southeastern coast, the Makalanga tribe occupied the territory now termed Rhodesia and the seaboard between the Zambesi and the Sabi rivers. Before the commencement of the eighteenth century that tribe was broken up by wars … and about that time a considerable immigration began to set in from the north … These immigrants, who were the ancestors of the people now called by Europeans Mashona, came down from some locality west of Lake Tanganyika in little parties, not in one great horde. The first to arrive was a clan under a chief named Sakavunza, who settled at a place near the town of Salisbury ... when recent investigators, like Mr. R. N. Hall, of Zimbabwe, and Mr. W. S. Taberer, the government commissioner, endeavored to gather the particulars from the descendants of the immigrants, it was found impossible to obtain more accurate information from them concerning the events of distant times than the general fact that their ancestors came down from the north about two centuries ago (Theal 1907, 63. Italics mine).

Now, this is not the kind of information that you will find in a school book today. It is heavily censured so that you and me do not know that information, and that we accept the official narrative as the true one.

Let me also state that Dr Theal is not some obscure source, but a major and highly celebrated historian who translated most contemporary Portuguese documents from 1506 to about 1700. You can easily find his works at the National Free Library here in Bulawayo.

Dr Theal's record is supported by that of Professor Stanlake Samkange, a contemporary of Dr Joshua Nkomo and other early nationalists. In his book, The Zvimba People, Professor Samkange records Zezuru oral traditions stating that the Shona arrived in this country 300 years ago.   

This is also seconded by Professor David Beach in his book, A Zimbabwean Past: Shona Dynastic Histories and Oral Traditions. He recorded in this widely researched book that the Shona could not furnish any oral tradition of theirs dating back to anything earlier than 1700, which is 300 years ago, and in that book gives convincing and detailed evidence that the Shona actually arrived in Zimbabwe 300 years ago.

Much of what you learned at school as Shona history (or Karanga history in the early years of independence) is actually your history!  

But you may ask me and say what is the relevancy of all this to this meeting.

Let me tell you why it is relevant. We, the people gathered here, where the earliest Bantu inhabitants of this country, and our languages have never been, are not and will never be Shona dialects, and Zimbabwe has never been a monolithic Shona society that some among us are trying to rebuild.

This country was always a diverse society, even before the coming of the Nguni, who are now called the Ndebele. So the notion that diversity threatens the peace and unity of the country is false, and is not grounded in history nor experience.

If anything, our languages - TjiKalanga, TjiNambya and Tshivenda - where the most widely-spoken languages in this country pre-independence. They have been deliberately minoritized and villagized, something we shall come to later.    

But one may ask, before the Shona and amaNdebele arrived, what was there?

The answer is: Bukalanga was there, and is still there, and of course the Khoisan and Tonga.

That Bukalanga was and is still a diverse society. Ladies and gentlemen, most of you here were taught in school that the Monomotapa Empire, the Togwa and Lozwi Kingdoms were Shona polities. Let me tell you, that’s a lie.

These were Bukalanga polities - they were your ancestors' polities.

Your ancestors were the builders of Maphungubgwe, Great Zimbabgwe, Khami, Dzata, Bumbusi, etc.

Since about 100 AD., we are the people that have always occupied the region called Matebeleland, Midlands, Maswingo, the Limpopo Province of South Africa and the North-east and North Central Districts of Botswana.

This land was all Bukalanga or Makalangaland (excepting the Zambezi Valley which was Tonga land), and it has never at any point in history been Shona land.

There is therefore no reason why some Shona zealotic nationalist should seek to shonalize our region and claim that it was once Shona land stolen by the Ndebele. That is a lie. This has always been Bukalanga and shall always be Bukalanga.

Now, let me clarify what I mean by Bukalanga, for I know some of my friends here may be wanting to lynch me by now. Did you know that in the past we - Bakalanga, Banambya, Babirwa, Vhavenda, and of course the majority of Ndebele-speakers - were (and still are) one people, called by the common designation Bukalanga or Makalanga.

Let me give you evidence before you pelt me with your notebook.

Bakalanga and Banambya are just some of the tribes of Bukalanga, so I shall not go into that, for their languages speak for themselves. But let me address the question of Vhavenda and the Bukalanga relations. Please listen closely.

Let us start off with the Kalanga-Venda-Lemba relationship. About this we have the testimony of Professor G. Fortune who stated:

The Venda had a special relationship with the endogamous caste of smiths and craftsmen called the Lemba who have Islamic (actually Jewish) traits in their culture. These people are also well known north of the Limpopo. In Vendaland this group still speaks a form of Kalanga and, in Rhodesia, the only specimen of Lemba that the writer has seen is certainly Kalanga (Fortune 1973, 3).


Fortune cites as sources of his information Professor G. P. Lestrade (The Copper Mines of Musina, pp. 6, 10; “Some notes on the ethnic history of the VhaVenda and their Rhodesian affinities”, in Contributions towards Venda History, Religion and Tribal Ritual, edited by N. J. van Warmelo, Pretoria, Government Printer, 1932, p. xxviii); and N.J. van Warmelo (“Zur Sprache und Hernkuft der Lemba”, Hamburger Beit rage zur Afrika-kunde, 1966).

Professor Lestrade and van Warmelo had at the time done what was perhaps the most extensive study of the peoples living on the banks of the Limpopo.

We also read the following concerning the Kalanga-Venda-Lemba relationship in a 1905 report prepared for the General Staff of  the War Office in London titled the Native Tribes of the Transvaal by Major R. H. Massie, General Commanding-in-Chief, South Africa:

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The BaVenda people, apart from the ruling families, are believed to have crossed to the south of the Limpopo about 1700 A.D, and to have originally come from the valley of the Congo.

Before entering the Transvaal they probably made a long stay in Mashonaland, the country of the “Makalanga,” and while there, seem to have come in contact with people of Arab extraction or other Semitic stock, for many individuals of the tribe at the present day show a strain of Semitic blood in their features.

The language of the BaVenda, which is called Sivenda, is not easily understood by other tribes, but appears to be a mixture of some form of Sesuto with Lukalanga, the speech of the Makalanga people. It is said that a tribe now living on the Congo speaks a very similar dialect.

There are remnants of a tribe called BaLemba among the BaVenda. These people are chiefly found in the Shivhasa district; they have no chiefs of their own, but have distinct customs, which point to Semitic origin, e.g., they do not eat pork or the flesh of any animal killed by people of other tribes. They speak the Lukalanga language (Massie 1905, Online).

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Concerning the Kalanga-Venda and Twamambo relationship we have the evidence of Professor Beach of the University of Zimbabwe when he wrote:

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[t]he Zoutparnsberg mountains had long been inhabited by Venda groups known as Ngona and Mbedzi, while the Limpopo Valley and the courses of its tributaries such as the Shashe or the Mzingwane had been the equally long-occupied area of the southwestern Shona, the Kalanga (I have extensively argued in my book, The Rebirth of Bukalanga, that the Vhukalanga are not a Shona group!).

These Kalanga, or more accurately, southern Kalanga – had been cut off from the northern Kalanga of the Togwa and Tjangamire states by the immigration of the Sotho-speaking Birwa, such as Hwadalala.

One of the groups of southern Kalanga south of the Limpopo was ‘Twamamba’, and whereas some in the Brak River-Saltpan area continued to speak Kalanga, those who lived in the Zoutpansberg range itself came to speak Venda (Beach 1994, 180).

The Venda, we are told (Stayt, 1931) are ‘a composite people … the tribe is composed of sibs and groups of unrelated people, who have, in varying circumstances and localities, come into contact with a small homogenous nucleus and have become identified with it’.

The Venda groups from the Congo are probably the Ngona who, according to Beach, seem to be the core-Venda, with the remainder being the ones of Bukalanga origin, these being: Vhadau, Vhambedzi, Vhatavhatsindi, Vhatwamamba, Vhanzhelele/Vhalembethu, Vhanyai, Vhalaudzi, Vhalemba and Masingo.

We also have the following stating the Vhukalanga-Venda relations from ANC Chief Whip Professor Mathole Motshekga. He declared before the Gauteng Legislature in September 2007 during Heritage Day celebrations that:

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I am a Molozwi-Mokhalaka also known as Molobedu. The Balovedu (also known as Balozwi) and Bavenda are an offshoot of Barozwi … who founded the Maphungubwe and Great Zimbabwe Civilizations. The name Balobedu means: the Recipients of Tribute while Balozwi means: sacred scientists who can make rain and control the forces of nature. The BaRowzi … are an offshoot of the Makalaka/Bakhalaka people of Naphta (now Kordofan in the Sudan, heartland of ancient Ethiopia). … the BaRowzi migrated to the Limpopo Valley where they established the Bokhalaka Empire with its Capital City of Maphungubwe which became both a spiritual and international trading centre of Central Africa (Motshekga 2007, Online).

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Evidence on the Bukalanga-Babirwa relationship is to be had from well-known Bulawayo historian Pathisa Nyathi, himself a member of that community. Writing with a focus on one of the Birwa groups he wrote:

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The group in question is descended from one Tshamuyalila, said to be the son of Malahwana/Marahwana the son of Mafutana. It should be clear that Mafutana is probably Makhurane, a name that was later Ndebelised in line with the incorporated status of this group of Nyathis. This particular group of the Nyathis does remember that they are Mbikhwa, Mbikhwa waMakhura, Nareng, Mageza ngochago, amanzi alezibhidi (they bath with milk, because water is polluted) Banongula nonkaka is a common family praise among the BaKalanga. The words have merely been translated into SiNdebele. (Interview with Goodboy Nguye Nyathi, Inyathi Mission 11 April 2009). It is interesting too to observe that Tshamuyalila sounds more Kalanga than Sotho.

This should not come as a surprise given that the Babirwa are part of the generic BaKalanga. It could also be an indicator that the Babirwa had retained their erstwhile Kalanga identity by moving north. By so doing they were moving into an area where TjiKalanga was still spoken (Nyathi 2012, Online).

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In explaining how Babirwa came to speak a dialect of Sotho, namely Sepedi, Nyathi wrote that:

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The move to the south by the Babirwa must have brought them into contact with the ethnic Sotho. The Babirwa must have adopted both the language and the cultural practices of the Sotho. The one cultural practice they adopted was the preferred first cousin marriages. The language too changed but there were elements of the Kalanga/Venda that were characteristic of Northern Sotho. The Sebirwa has a heavy accent, for example in comparison with Setswana” (Nyathi 2011, Online).

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Now, let no mistake be made, Bukalanga has always been a diverse nation of diverse languages and cultures, and our kingdoms, the Monomotapa, Togwa and Lozwi Kingdoms were confederacies, never were they monolithic empires of one language and culture. It was rightly pointed out by R. N. Hall and W. G. Neal in 1904 that:

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the Rev. G. H. Cullen Reed of the London Missionary Society station in Bulalima [Bulilima], in Matebeleland, who has labored for some years among the Makalanga of that district writes: In all descriptions of the Makalanga it must be carefully borne in mind that there is no tribe, existing as one, which bears this name, but the people to whom it is applied consist of many tribes having their own peculiar traditions and customs more or less allied, but with considerable differences most confusing to the enquirer” (Hall and Neal 1904, 134-135).

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So ladies and gentlemen no one here should feel threatened by the designation Bukalanga or Makalanga and think that somehow Bakalanga now want to replace Shona and Ndebele hegemony with their own. We are just one of the tribes of Bukalanga out of at least 16 different tribes that make up this great nation. 

Having said all this, it should be clear to us all by now that the proposition that Zimbabwe has to be a unitary state and monolithic society of one language and one culture is contrary to the history of this country.

It has no historical basis whatsoever, and the land, erroneously called Matebeleland, has never at any point in history been Shona land.

For that reason our languages need to be revived and be the official languages of this our region, and Shona can, must and will be the official language of Mashonaland, not this land of our forefathers!

We shall not allow the continued minoritization and villagization of our languages, which is our next point.

2.    We are not a Minority, we Were Forcibly Minoritized & our Languages and Cultures Villagized

Now, this part certainly will raise the eerie of my Ndebele friends (and by Ndebele I mean strictly the Nguni, those whose forefathers crossed the Limpopo already called Matebele).

I know since the days of the Matebele Homeland Society and the rise of Ginyilitshe Hlabangana the mention of uMzilikazi's career of violence, rapine and murder has now been made a taboo topic, and my experience has been, mention that you are automatically labelled a Shona sympathizer, agent, CIO, etc.

But, ladies and gentlemen, it is impossible to address the question of our languages without mention of the negative impact of Mzilikazi and his impis's career. As pointed by that brilliant Tonga student, Isaac Mumpande:   

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According to interviews with the Kalanga, Venda, and Sotho members of ZILPA (Zimbabwe Indigenous Languages Promotion Association), these groups have been considered as part of the Ndebele people. This can be understood as a lasting effect of Mzilikazi’s conquests in the 1830s, when he subdued and absorbed different people into his new state.

These absorbed people were normally referred to as abenhla and amahole and belonged to the middle and lower castes. ‘Encouraged’ to adopt the Ndebele language and culture at the expense of their own, they actually had no alternative to so doing as the Ndebele political and social systems were regarded as superior. 

Thus, to survive within the Ndebele system, assimilated tribal groups had to seek refuge in the Ndebele language and culture. This involved changing their names. Indeed, today, it is sometimes argued by politicians that efforts by members of minority language groups, who also speak Ndebele, to assert their mother tongue is divisive.

Yet these languages have a different morphology, phonology, philology, and syntax from Ndebele, and cannot be defined as Ndebele dialects. The question is, therefore, why indigenous speakers are denied the opportunity to promote their ‘own’ languages? (Mumpande 2006: 13).

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I shall not go into the details but say that they can be found in my book, The Rebirth of Bukalanga. But what I can say is that the demise of our language - their minoritization and villagization, began with uMzilikazi, strictly followed by his son Lobhengula and the Ndebele indunas.

This situation was worsened by the coming of the British colonialists. Between 1920 and 1930, they strictly promoted isiNdebele and ChiShona, in the process suppressing our languages.

I can tell you with confidence that TjiKalanga was the most widely spoken language in Zimbabgwe at that time, but as a result of the division of Zimbabwe into Mashonaland and Matebeleland, the language was suppressed. This was worsened by what we all know:

In 1893, 1896 and the 1950s, Bakalanga were the first to rise up against colonialism, and as a result, they were suppressed, their chiefs dethroned and replaced with Ndebele chiefs, and with that went their language. By this time the Rhodesians struck a deal of their own with the Ndebele indunas, and Bakalanga and all Bukalanga groups were shut out and oppressed.

It is for this reason that I say to us: we are not a minority group, we were forcibly minoritized and our languages and cultures villagized. Which is why today the majority of Ndebele-speakers are Bakalanga - the Ncube, Moyo, Ndlovu, Dube, etc.

I know the question always arises when I mention this - if all these people are Bakalanga, how about people with the same surnames in KwaZulu-Natal. That is explained again in my book - those people are originally of Bukalanga stock and migrated into what is now Zululand a few centuries ago.

Now, after the Ndebele and Rhodesians came the imperialist Zimbabwean government. In a brutal act of legitimizing British colonialism, the same government went on to suppress our languages and cultures, branded the Ndebele and Shona 'major', and us 'minor'.

For 30 years ladies and gentlemen, the Zimbabwean government has flatly refused to admit our languages back into the schools, the media and government offices. The story is well known and I shall not repeat it here. But I note with gladness that things have started to change with the circular that returned our languages to school.

But more still needs to be done, and that is our next point.         

3.    Way Forward for Marginalized Languages

Ladies and gentlemen, this meeting is about charting a way forward for our languages as we look forward to the Second All-Stakeholders Conference on the Copac Draft Constitution.

We, the people, spoke out clearly, we want our languages made official in the Constitution, and Copac listened to that. Yet now, a misguided clique claims to know the "people's views", and would continue to shut out our languages and cultures out of the media, education and government.

I shall name this clique by its proper name, its Zanu PF. Zanu PF, let me make it clear, shut out our languages from the Constitution, know that you will never again have our vote! We have had enough of being treated as second-class citizens. What is it that is major about Shona and isiNdebele? Are you saying we aren’t human enough?

We say to you Zanu PF, as we go to the Second All-Stakeholders Conference, drop that nonsense about Shona, Ndebele and English being the only official languages! You will be on the wrong side of history if you continue with that undemocratic, imperialistic, colonial and evil stance, we will vote you out!      

We want our languages made official in the Constitution and used in the media, government and education. We want our children to be taught their mother language, to hear news and government announcements in their mother tongue. That is the only way this country will move forward in peace and unity.

For those who say that diversity of languages and cultures brings division, we want to remind you that this is 2012, not 1712. Unity does not require uniformity.

Let Bakalanga children learn TjiKalanga in the schools. Let Tonga children learn TshiTonga in the schools. Let Venda children learn Tshivenda in the schools. Let Sotho children learn Sesotho in the schools, and let Nambya children learn TjiNambya in the schools.  

And as I say this, let me make one thing clear - we will not accept the nonsense that say children should just be given a choice to learn whatever language they want. We will not accept that. Our children were never given a choice whether to learn isiNdebele or Shona.

This brings me to this very important point: ladies and gentlemen, fellow Zimbabweans, let us accept that each and every ethnic or language group in this country has ancestral territory.

Except in the cosmopolitan cities of Bulawayo and Harare, let us accept that Beitbridge is Venda country, and Tshivenda and English should be the official languages there.

Let us accept the truth and fact that Binga, Kariba and parts of Gokwe is Tonga country. Let us accept that Bulilima-mangwe, Tjolotjo, Matobo and Gwanda Districts are Bakalanga and Sotho country.    

I know the Ndebele will be furious with these propositions, but let's face it, if you dispute that Gwanda is Kalanga country, you tell me why Gwanda is called "emaJawundeni", and why elderly people there still speak TjiJawunda, a TjiKalanga dialect.

Ladies and gentlemen let us accept our languages have been deliberately decimated, minoritized and villagized, and we will not allow that any more. Let our languages be official and used in government like any other!

In fact the Ndebele should not complain about this arrangement, for they already have more territory than us all - Lupane, Nkayi, Bubi, uMguza, uMzingwane and Insiza, in addition to Ndebele-speaking areas in the Midlands.

Now, there are those who argue that such an arrangement will cause tribalism and division. That is a lie. We will continue to respect each other, and our children will have the option to learn a third language in addition to their mother tongue and English. Not only so, they will learn other languages through radio and television as well as the street just like South Africa children do.

And if you choose to settle in Bukalanga and you from Nkayi or Mashonaland, tough luck, you are gonna have to learn the local languages. If you are Nambya and choose to live or work in Venda, then accept the fact that that’s Venda country, and when in Rome, do as the Romans do. To my Shona friends occupying almost every public office in Venda, we say to you, now is the time to accept that you are in Venda country, that is not Mashonaland, and you have to learn and use Tshivenda in our public offices.   

It is only this way that we can achieve unity true unity, and truly say like the South Africans in Khoisan - !Ke e :/Xarra //Ke: - Diverse People Unite.

No true unity can be attained as long as some amongst us think they are superior and their languages and cultures ought to be promoted and those of others suppressed, which brings us to the last point.

4.    But what's in it for us & this Country - Why do these Languages and Cultures Matter?

As I said in my previous point - this country can only be truly united if and only if we accept one another as fellow and equal citizens - in our diversity.

I have always asked, and no one has answered me yet: Why should I first become Ndebele or Shona before I become Zimbabwean? For that is what it means if you tell me that there are only three official languages and Zimbabwe is made up of Shonas and Ndebeles.

I submit to you ladies and gentlemen that I am fully Zimbabwean as a Kalanga, and there is no need to go via Ndebelehood or Shonahood first before I become Zimbabwean. My humanness and Zimbabweanness is complete as a Kalanga, and to shut out my language and culture, and hence my identity, is to suggest that I am less human, and that I refuse to accept.

Second sub-point: the idea that our children speak TjiKalanga or Tshivenda at home and are taught isiNdebele in school disadvantages their learning. We will all accept here that our learning does not take place in a vacuum, it takes place within a certain worldview, which in turn tends to be shaped by one's language and culture.

It is important for us to recognize that the present system is discriminatory, it is undemocratic and it is plain evil, backward and uncivilized. 

Let me also state that the suppression and exclusion of our languages and cultures creates an unnecessary inferiority complex amongst our people, and that negatively affects their assertiveness in life, something which is very important for them to access political power, which in turn is very important for economic development.

Language and culture goes hand in hand with political and economic power, and we want our languages to be languages of power too. They can be, they must be and they will be!

As we go to the Second All-Stakeholders Conference, let it be clearly known, we, the people, want our languages back. We don’t ask for them from anyone, we demand them, they are our citizenship rights.

He who shall stand opposed to this demand should clearly know right now that they have denied themselves our vote come next election.

Let me close by recapping my talk:

1.      Zimbabwe has never been a monolithic Shona society of one language and one culture, so let us not try to create such, it never was there, not even before the coming of the Nguni. Imperialism will not work in this century! Let us take pride in who we are and accept that no one owns this country better than us.

2.      We are not a minority community, our languages have been minoritized through a deliberate process of imperialism and colonialism, starting with the Ndebele, followed by the Rhodesians, and perfected by the post-independence government.

As this process is colonial, I say to us all and to Zimbabwe: Bukalanga shall never be a colony again. Venda shall never be a colony again. Binga shall never be a colony again. Let us all arise and in peace and via lawful means, let us finish the liberation struggle and ensure freedom for all our people.

3.      It is to the advantage of this country that we accept our diversity and build on it. Without that, we are not involved in a nation-building project but in imperialism, and it is undemocratic and evil. It disadvantages the learning of our children, the development of our country, and threatens the peace, unity and indivisibility of the Republic.

For these reasons, ladies and gentlemen, I say to us, forward with our languages, forward with Real Devolution of Power, and down with an Imperial Presidency and system.

May God bless you all, and may God bless the Republic of Zimbabwe. Thank you very much all.    

Ndaboka. Ndolivhuwa. Ndiyabulela. Ke a leboha. Ngiyabona. Twalumba. Thank You.

Ndzimu-unami Emmanuel Moyo is the author of The Rebirth of Bukalanga and The Case for a Federal Republic of Zimbabwe. He can be contacted on ndzimuunami@gmail.com or www.ndzimuunami.blogspot.com.

Comments

  1. Great post Mr.Moyo, but you're stating the obvious...indeed, there was never a time when Zimbabwe was a "monolithic society with one language and culture".

    I dare say that no such society has ever existed on the African Continent. We've always been (and we continue to be) a mixed up jumble of different creeds, cultures and languages.

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  2. A really clear case for the celebration of difference as understanding and ACCEPTANCE of each others humanity. We are to provide EQUITY and EQUALITY for each other. The dominant discourses only colonise a single reality - subjugating local knowledge and divide us/separate us and make us weaker. These colonising dominant discourses pave the way for capitalist and globalism ideologies that commodify our way of life, our very being, land and resources. The Divide and Conquer ideology creates an illusion of scarcity where we compete against each other and dehumanise us thus supporting a false economy and eroding our full identity which is always constructed in close community - UBUNTU/ HUNHU - UNITY IN DIVERSITY - there is enough for us all - we can provide for each other. Let us seek out what is different and discover it and if it contributes to life and relationships and lets care for it and nurture it - Toby Stocks (006421 2090981), New Zealand - Zimbabwean Love Zimbabwe and her people

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  3. There is nothing wrong with most of your claims. However, you should know that both the name Kalanga and shona are names our ancestors were given by other people incuding the Nguni, Portuguese and white people.

    All the children of Murenga are va Dzimbahwe. Led by Munhumutapa then Chamgamire Dombo under the High priesthood of Mwari who lost know high priest was Mukwati.
    Do not be angry and do not rely on history written and distorted by white people. Do not be colonised as well. Your passion and hunger will lead you to the true history of our people. But do not seek to divide them seek to reconcile them.
    The presence of Moyo people in virtually every province in Zimbabwe should remain your kind. You are neither Ndebele nor Sotho, nothing wrong with them but you are not them.

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  4. Who was the original Nehanda? I believe she was the daughter of Nyatsimba Mutota. If Mutota was Kalanga and not Shona, why is it "mhondoro yenyu yakanobudira ku vauyi/ vatorwa" i.e. [why is it your venerated spirit was accommodated by a strange spirit medium]

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  5. Emmanuel, this was a very inspiring and well prepared piece from you. I fully support the teaching of so called minority languages in areas they are spoken. The only problem I have with you is that you attempt to dissect between what is Shona, what is Kalanga and what is Ndebele. I think you will not be able to be successful in that respect. The history of the three groups is very mixed. As you may be aware, 72% of the people of Zimbabwe identify themselves as Shona people, while 15% of the Zimbabweans identify themselves as ethnic Ndebeles. That would mean that more than 87% of Zimbabweans will not agree with your analysis. I am not even sure if the Nambyas and Vendas who constitute only 0,5% and 1% of all Zimbabweans will agree that they are a subset of the Bakalanga. I think, Emmanuel, should concentrate more on ensuring that the Kalanga language is taught up to University rather on proving that there are more Kalanga people than the 2,5% of Zimbabweans that we know about. We know some Kalangas were involuntarily converted to Ndebeles when Mzilikazi arrived while others might have been converted to be Shonas but that's now in the past and what happened is no longer reverseable. Lastly, but no least, do no try to pick some confrontation with Shona speakers: the Shonas are saying Kalangas and Shonas are one people, it's you who is saying, they are different peoples. If you say Shonas are descended from Kalangas and not the other way round, that still means Shonas and Kalangas are relatives. The problem was, our ancestors were not able to write, so no one of us should pretend to know the truth. We can not rely on the history written by colonialists to dissect the Shona- Kalanga - Ndebele relationship as the colonialists had ulterior motives.

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  6. Emmanuel, I do not understand why you want to insist that the Shona are still very different from Kalangas, and also want to create a picture that the Karanga people are Kalanga. If Karanga people are Kalanga, then all the other Shona people are also Kalanga. It is a matter of fact that all the Shona people are Kalanga. Karanga means Kalanga, so why are you fighting against yourself? Why are you fighting against your relatives? Kalanga and Shona are only different languages because of distance and fusion with other languages over time. Some Shona people arrived in Zimbabwe in 1700AD but found other Shonas already living in Zimbabwe. The Shonas who arrived in Zimbabwe after 1700AD were coming from Mozambique and not from the far North as you alleged in some of your texts.As you may aware, Central Mozambique is mostly populated by Eastern Shonas and the Manyika. That is why the new arrivals had no problem speaking the Zimbabwean Shona. Shona is a large dialect continuum that stretched from the Indian Ocean in the East to the Kalahari desert in South West. It is not possible for a language to be spoken uniformly over that large distance. Kalanga is too far West to be spoken like Zezuru in the centre of the dialect continuum. But if you really know Zezuru, you will be surprised to find out that it has a lot (thousands) of words found in TjiKalanga and Zezuru did not get these words from Karanga; in fact Zezuru is Karanga but Karanga is not Zezuru (Zezuru and Karanga are like father and son and the son has become greater than his own father because of his relative position in the dialect continuum of the Central Shonas i.e. Zezuru is the nucleas of Central Shona). Modern Karanga, Zezuru, Manyika and Korekore are known as Central Shona dialects and speakers of these dialects can converse even if the people involved are speaking in their individual dialects. Zezuru and Karanga are said to be the most close of the Shona dialects. You can only distinguish a Karanga person from a Zezuru person by the accent (Karanga is high pitched and the Karanga people are also largely extroverts while Zezuru is low pitched and the Zezuru people are largely a reserved and quiet people) and pronunciation (Karangas pronounce words the same ways as Kalangas and Nambyas). The majority of Zezurus are very peaceful people and do not like professions which require a projection of force e.g. army and police professions. Most Karangas have no problems with professions that require a projection of force i.e. the majority of our soldiers, police and intelligence officers are actually Karangas. You may think I am biased against Karangas but I am actually Karanga myself and I come from the Midlands. My totem is Moyo Chirandu, Gono. I am a MuDuma and my ancestors migrated from Eastern Masvingo (my ancestors were Eastern Karangas) to the Midlanda about 100 years ago. Zezuru and Karanga share up to 90% of the vocabulary and also have the same grammar. Emmanuel, you will not be successful in separating Karangas from Zezurus because they are the same people. The North Eastern and Eastern Karanga dialects are actually closer to Zezuru than to Western Karanga. North Eastern and Eastern Karanga dialects are linked to Western Karanga by Central Karanga (Central Karanga is the Karanga dialect spoken in Gutu West, Chrirumhanzu, Masvingo North and Shurugwi). It is Central Karanga, which is commonly referred to as Karanga.

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  7. I am grateful for the knowledge I have gained in your presentation. Thank you. It was an eye opener.
    However I also happen to notice your confrontational approach in Bukalanga rebirth. Rather than pity one tribe against the Bukalanga why don't you simply use the angle of just reviving the near defunct Kalanga language and customs. You do not need to draw swords with anybody to achieve that least of all your neighbour. You will find that through passage of time we have inter marriages and thus established relationships between the hated Ndebele and your tribe.
    Also the name Monomotapa is said to be actually Mwene Mutapa. I am not sure if this is Kalanga or Karanga language. It is a corruption by the Portuguese.
    You tend to quote the Lemba as a being of Kalanga origin. This is a false statement of fact. They are not and were never of Kalanga origin. Speaking the Kalanga language does not on its own make them Kalanga. These people are found in the Northern province of South Africa be it Limpopo or similar. , In Zimbabwe they are found in Masvingo, Mbelengwa, Insiza and elsewhere. In Insiza they use the surname Ndlovu or preferably Msoni.They tend to adopt a community language of their location while retaining their customs and traditions. The Lemba originate from the Middle East in Yemen at a town /region called Senaa. In ancient times their ancestors crossed the Red Sea into present day Sudan and moved South via countries like Tanzania, Mozambique and the like finally settling in Southern African countries. In short they are believed to be of Semitic origin: the lost tribe of Israel. There have been DNA tests done on the leading members of the clan and it has established a link to the priestly House of Aaron in Israel. In ancient times they crossed over with the Ark of King David in the Bible. This aspect is being researched further. They believe in God. They do not practice ancestor worship as is the case with the Bantu.
    On a positive note, I am aware that of late the Zimbabwean government has taken measures to address deficiences in recognition of minority languages eg community radio stations and educational curricula. I am sure full recognition in the remainder is in the pipeline.
    Finally it must be stated that King Mzilikazi crossed the Limpopo River with a mixture of Nguni, Ndebele,((Limpopo) Sotho and Tswana tribesmen. I guess you thought he came only with the Nguni per your submission. In there were animal surnames like Sibanda, Ncube, Ndlovu etc.
    This is stated as a matter of record as Tlou in Sotho/ Tswana converted to Ndlovu, Sebatha converted to Sibanda ..you name it.
    The present day Venda tribe is a mixture of numerous tribes of different origins assimilated into Venda. This includes Karanga Shona people. Some of them relocated under a Karanga Chief from Mbelengwa at the arrival period of the Ndebele. They could not put up with the easy spilling of blood evident on the Ndebele.
    Also King Mzilikazi raided Mashonaland regions while still South of Limpopo River.

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