LAST week I had the opportunity to travel to Matobo district.
This is the same district where the spirits of Zimbabwe rest and well before Cecil John Rhodes chose Matobo Hills as his burial place, prayers for rain were held at Njelele Shrine in the same hills.
People travelled with zviyo (red millet) from all over the country.
They walked from as far as Buhera, Gutu, Mutare and from up north in Muzarabani.
Beer was brewed by the older women who no longer slept with men.
What was surprising were the dry and wilting shrubs that prompted one to think what has gone wrong with the traditional mukwerera ceremonies that used to take place at this sacred shrine.
Traditionalists lament that this generation of people has forgotten and denigrated many traditional methods used for many years to manage our ancestral land in a sustainable way.
Because of that and many other abuses of the land, it does not rain as it used to.
Many people have also forgotten or are ignorant about mukwerera, the ceremony to ask for rain from God, (Mwari, Mlimo, Musiki, Nyadenga) and choose to rely on scientific predictions.
Mukwerera is still a ritual that binds us together as a people.
It is a ceremony not only to call upon the ancestors for rain, but to ask for forgiveness if the people had defiled the environment they lived in.
Near Matobo, there is a spring where the people took calabashes of sacred water back home, full of hope that Mwari had listened to them, but it has since gone dry.
Water is the symbol of life since time immemorial.
Its deficiency has been and still is a cause for concern among communities around the world. 
It is for this hypothesis that the rain-making ceremony has been practised by many communities in Zimbabwe so that they have abundant rains each cropping season.
Zimbabwe has witnessed devastating droughts over the past years.
All sorts of ‘scientific’ explanations have been given including climate change, the greenhouse effect and global warming.
In Zimbabwe, some people have called on the nation to go back to its roots.
National figures, both traditional and political have pleaded for the people of Zimbabwe to rally as one and hold traditional ‘rain-making’ ceremonies to end droughts.
In Shona it is called kukumbira mvura with mukwerera being ‘standard’ terminology for the ceremony.
It seems there have been shortcomings with the ceremonies held in recent years as the rains have failed to materialise.
Traditional leaders believe there have been major weaknesses; the first is to do with procedure and the second is centred on the traditional chiefs who are supposed to be the custodians of culture.
They said when the ceremonies are carried out properly and at the right time, chances are that the request will be heard, but then the rains may still not come.
Chiefs are supposed to approach spirit mediums and then the Zimbabwe National Traditional Healers Association (ZINATHA) organises the ceremony.
The spirit mediums will then preside over the proceedings.
However, some traditional leaders oppose the idea that ZINATHA should be a central player in the proceedings saying that mukwerera predates the formation of the organisation.
In normal conditions, there should be no request for a ceremony to be held.
There is a set time of year when these things are done.
According to traditional leaders, the spirit mediums are responsible for instructing how the ceremony is to be held.
There is also the issue of correct dressing and who should be in charge.
Furthermore, they also instruct on who is to participate, what traditional brew is to be used and the type of grain to be used in brewing.
All these facets vary according to the localised traditions of various communities.
Generally people are expected to bring millet.
It is important to note that if these guidelines are not adhered to, the spiritual world will not accept the ritual.
There is general concurrence that the ceremonies are still important today as they contain a number of other rituals necessary for the survival of a community.
As there is a connection between sins and drought, the ceremonies provide a medium through which a community can understand where it is going wrong.
People are then made aware of what the spirits of their ancestors want corrected and other ceremonies can then be conducted to ensure the request for rain is heard by the ancestors.
The mukwerera ceremony remains a highly traditional and symbolic ritual.
Once the people have brought the millet, the medium or mhondoro takes only a little and climbs a sacred mountain.
The mhondoro wears black robes which are symbolic of rain clouds.
The millet is then poured into a crevice in the rock.
Kneeling, the medium beseeches the Creator via the hierarchy of the ancestors, Musiki, the Creator to save the people who are starving.
The brewing of the beer begins in the mountain.
What is symbolic, however, is that the process of fermentation represents the process of creation and life of mankind.
The millet actually represents man’s semen and significantly, it is placed in water which represents vaginal liquid.
The seed is then placed in the hands of the ancestors and Musiki for safekeeping, represented by the imposing stature of the mountain.
This is why to this day; many sacred hills, especially at Njelele and some mountains contain caverns filled with wooden plates full of millet and other ritual offerings.
If the heavens are merciful, they will ‘fertilise’ the peoples’ seed with their blessings.
A brief shower is a sign of such blessings, signifying that lives will be spared.
The actual ceremony only starts when the chief and the medium of the great ancestor have arrived.
Traditional religion is based on an acceptance of superiority and worship of the knowledge of the spirits of ancestors and Musikazvose and the spiritual, human and natural worlds are partners in survival – though the spiritual has supreme authority.
Hence once the Government appoints chiefs on its own authority, those same chiefs cannot expect the spiritual dimension to hear their pleas.
Studies conducted years ago stated that farmers who lacked access to regular weather updates from meteorological departments relied on mukwerera.
To be continued