IN the last article I wrote about how the country’s detractors are using some small Ndebele tribal groupings to spread hate mainly targeting their Shona brothers.
This week we look at another highly contentious issue that has been dogging the Matabeleland region for a long time, the de-industrialisation of the city’s companies and the so-called marginalisation of the city from the rest of the country.
The country’s detractors continue to use Matabeleland as a ‘political hotbed’ and are quick to take every opportunity to divide the people along tribal lines.
They preached marginalisation and urged the Ndebele people to rebel against the Government through sponsored tribal groupings.
Writers have also been used to produce books spewing hate language between the Ndebele and the Shona people.
Publishing houses like ‘Amabooks’ have also produced literature demeaning the black people and advancing pre-colonial mentality among the people.
A seemingly highly contentious issue is the de-industrialisation of Bulawayo.
A lot has been written about this issue and the country‘s enemies have made it a Bulawayo issue despite the fact that it is a national problem affecting almost every town in Zimbabwe.
Ironically, while the number of industries in Bulawayo are constantly closing shop, the number of non-governmental organisations (NGOs) in the city are growing, it is some of these organisations that are sponsoring tribal groupings to spread hate language between the Ndebele and the Shona, while encouraging Ndebele people to boycott national programmes.
Most of these NGOs specialise in sponsoring programmes to do with anti-government work such as publish tribal online newspapers as well as encouraging the Ndebele people to get compensation for the 1980s Matabeleland political disturbances.
Nocturnal meetings are held and literature inciting people to demand compensation is distributed.
A case in point was highlighted a few weeks ago when a Harare-based fast food outlet, Chicken Slice, inserted an advert in The Chronicle newspaper announcing their arrival in Bulawayo
Their advert was wrongly spelt in isiNdebele, however instead of laughing off the grammatical error, these tribal groupings had a field day announcing that their language was deliberately mutilated to suit the Shona-speaking people.
They also blamed the wrong spellings on marginalisation of the Ndebeles.
As usual the country’s detractors took this opportunity to sponsor tribal meeting and a mini-demo that was eventually foiled by the security forces.
These and other incidences are just a tip of the iceberg as some of the groups are being sponsored to cause confusion in Bulawayo.
It is therefore important at this juncture to face the real enemy of the people of Matabeleland.
They are not the Shona or any other tribe, but former colonialists who have failed to effect regime change in Zimbabwe and are now trying to use the tribes to divide the peaceful people of Zimbabwe.
If the enemy of the people of the Matabeleland people was the Government, we would not be having numerous programmes and developments taking place in the region.
There would be virtually no development to talk about. A recent commitment by the Government to the people of Matabeleland is the hosting of the recent African Youth Games late last year, while numerous other programmes aimed at uplifting the lives of the people of Matabeleland are underway in several districts in the region.
It is the duty of artists, writers, churches and other public people to use various platforms to confront the real enemy for the benefit of future generations in the region.
It is also important to note that the Ndebele, like other African people, combined functionality and artistic traditions that were carriers of their cognitive culture.
A new start was made in which the Ndebele were strangers with little or no confidence in themselves.
It is important now that the focus of the Ndebele people be the preservation of their rich material culture for the promotion of cultural tourism in line with the Zimbabwe Agenda for Sustainable Socio-Economic Transformation (Zim-ASSET) cluster four on the benefication of cultural tourism for local communities.
Although some ethnic cultural symbols such as the traditional leopard skins worn by pre-colonial Shona and Ndebele chiefs and the Nguni hats worn by Ndebele chiefs, and other adornments such as beads and ceremonial stools and head rests have remained among some Ndebele people, most of these items have disappeared and only appear in national archives and museums in Southern Africa where the Ndebele trekked.
Items of material culture provide much more than utility, some carry decorative designs which increase their worth or value.
Some come in attractive colours that add value to the items, the same items , depending on the degree of artistry in their manufacture, colour code, decorative designs, will vary in value and thus their possession will correspond to different socio economic status. High value items were the preserve of the royalty and the elite (Abezansi).
An item made from a Rhino horn belonged to the King.
The King always appeared clad in the prized leopard skin and when the beads were introduced, certain colours of beads were reserved for the royalty.