WHAT is colonisation?
Answer.
It is the diabolic process whereby imperialist nations from the West loot the rich resources of other nations in an atmosphere where the citizens of the victim nations simply watch helplessly with folded arms doing absolutely nothing about the evil being perpetrated on them.
The colonised people become docile, pliable and in most cases, totally useless as far as fighting for their rights is concerned due to the use of force against them by the coloniser as well as being brainwashed.
When it comes to brainwashing, the very big weapon which the colonisers use here is religion.
It is the aim of this article to show that religion has been used as a deadly weapon to stupefy colonised people into submission since the time of what we may call classical colonisation up to today.
To support our submission we are going to look at how religion was used by the Portuguese to undermine the rule of Mutapa Kings in our country Zimbabwe in the 16th and 17th centuries.
Zimbabwe had plenty of gold during the time of the Mutapa Kings and even before.
The Portuguese who were the biggest European colonial power at that time decided to find out the truth about the existence of the rich gold fields under the Mutapa Kings.
And so they sent one Fernandes to check out the situation.
Fernandes went up and down our country and in the end reported to the Portuguese King that yes, there was a lot of gold in Zimbabwe.
On hearing about Zimbabwe’s gold riches, the Portuguese King decided to colonise our country.
But before he did that, he sent one Father Ganzalo Da Silveira, a Roman Catholic priest to use religion to make the Mutapa Kings pliable and docile so that in time, the Portuguese would find it pretty easy to colonise the country and control the gold trade.
S.I.G Mudenge picks up the story.
“Silveira saw his mission as being the conversion of the Munhumutapa.
“Once a Christian King, the Mutapa was likely to favour the Portuguese traders in his country and either expel or reduce the numbers and influence of the Muslims trading in his state.
“If Silveira converted the Mutapa and his people, then the Christians would be able to completely dominate the trade of lower Zambezia.”
It was therefore game on!
Father Ganzalo Da Silveira left Portugal and arrived in Zimbabwe at the Mutapa Kings court on January 1 1561.
He was well received there by the Mutapa King.
His name, Negomo Mupunzagutu.
Father Silveira used all tricks in the religious book – ‘hocus pocus’ uttered during baptism sessions, baptismal water, burning of incense, wonderful pictures of the virgin Mary, you name it to convert Negomo to Christianity.
“Silveira then started to catechise Negomo and his mother twice a day for a period of 16-18 days.
“On the 25th day of his arrival at Mutapa’s court, Silveira baptised Negomo Mupunzagutu giving him the name Don Sebastiao.
“Negomo’s mother was given the name Dona Maria, very soon Silveira was able to convert and baptize 250-300 in the Mutapa State.”
The stage had been set.
And despite Silveira being killed for spreading his religion by local religious leaders, the Portuguese kept on sending missionaries to the Mutapa Kings to undermine their rule through the use of their religion.
It was therefore not surprising that when the Portuguese sent a military expedition in 1561 to try and conquer the Mutapa King’s goldfields.
The chief intelligence officer who led that expedition was a Roman Catholic priest, one Fransisco Monclaro.
The use of religion to undermine and therefore colonise the Mutapa State became pronounced during the reign of Mutapa Kings, Gatsi Rusere and one Mavhura.
During Gatsi Rusere’s time, the Portuguese who had helped him consolidate his power asked that Mutapa King do them a favour.
Allow them to spread their Christian religion in his country.
“The Mutapa King (Gatsi Rusere) agreed to Dominican requests to build churches and freely proselytise.
“Soon Gatsi Rusere’s two sons were baptised.
“The eldest boy was baptised, Filipe and the youngest Diogo.”
And due to the religious brainwashing which the sons endured, “in 1615 Filipe was reported to be assisting the Portuguese locate the Chicoa silver mines.
“This Portuguese manipulation of Gatsi Rusere’s son Filipe greatly angered the Mutapa.”
The most successful use of religion as a colonising weapon from Portuguese point of view happened during the rule of one of the Mutapa Kings called Mavhura.
The Dominicans who were now all over the Mutapa Kingdom baptised Mavhura and gave him their favourite name, ‘Filipe’.
“When the Portuguese installed him as their vassal King, they secured unfettered access to all his lands.
“For most of Mutapa Mavhura’s reign he was surrounded by his Dominican mentors and acolytes chief among them were Father Manuel Sardinha and Father Luis de Espirito Santo.
“During these years, there was a phenomenal rise in the numbers of Portuguese who came to Zimbabwe in search of gold.
“These years of Mutapa King Mavhura brought exploitation and misery of the African population to a high point.
‘Mavhura was reputedly so devoted to his Dominican teachers that in 1643, he was known as the ‘Black man of the Portuguese’.”
Throughout the Mutapa Kingdom there developed what became known as ‘Feiras’ (mining towns).
The Dominicans made sure there was a church at these ‘Feira’.
For example, at a big ‘Feira’ called Masapa near Pfura Mountain in present day Mt Darwin district, there was a “ Dominican church dedicated to ‘Our Lady of the Rosary’.
At a ‘Feira’ called Dambarare in the present Harare area, there was a Dominican church, in Manicaland the most important ‘Feira’ was called Machekeche and there too was a Dominican church, and so on.
Portuguese colonisation of the Mutapa State was at its worst for the locals when religious influence from the Dominicans was at its highest.
Once this religious influence was destroyed when new rulers – The anti-Dominican Rozvi came on the scene and took over the country from the Mutapa Kings, and chased away the Dominicans, out of the country the Portuguese’s colonisation project in Zimbabwe completely collapsed.
In Zimbabwe today we should be careful not to allow religion being used to undermine our nation as it was used by the Portuguese during Mutapa Mavhura’s reign.
As far as the West, is concerned, their colonisation project in Africa is not over.
Today they are busy funding dodgy churches that are all over the country.
These churches are meant to make us pliable, docile and outright stupid so that we spend all our free time being bombarded by sick religious propaganda.
Meanwhile, the imperialist carry away the loot.
And so we should never forget that even today, the West is still using religion as a deadly weapon of colonisation.