I am struggling to find words that can politely describe a bizarre stance recently taken by the Maun tribal authorities. Maun is my home village, proper. I was born and partly bred in Maun. I am a son of the soil and I hold the tribal leadership of this cosmopolitan village in high regard and respect. Not only are they my tribal leaders but ke batsadi bame as well. Being a Motawana from Maun, both maternally and paternally, I stand to be affected by the decisions taken by the tribal authorities in my home village. I stand to positively benefit from all the right decisions they make, much as I stand to be negatively affected by all the irrational (and in this case stupid) decisions that they come up with. I first learnt through the social media that the chieftaincy in Maun has ordered that no marriages shall take place in Maun between September 2013 and March 2014.
At first I ignored the reports because really, I never imagined batsadi bame can come up with such absurd and archaic orders. To me, the statement sounded so 1936. The reasons were even more uninspiring and outright lunatic. I did not believe any sane person could, in 2013, halt marriages because they believe people have to observe the ploughing season. Yep! The wise old folks at the Maun kgotla have issued an order that stops everyone in Maun from getting married between the months of September and March. They reckon this is the time for people to go to the lands and plough into the soil and not plough into their commitment to their partners through marriages. Now, can someone please tell me how best to describe this move without labeling my tribal leaders a bunch of wankers?
How do you justify such a decision in this day and age? Just how do you explain a situation where the tribal leadership stops marriages for seven months? The royals have lost it here. If this latest move is meant to prove their existence and relevance and somehow meant to stamp their authority then I have to say their strategy is not only wicked but is extremely ancient. Look, we all understand and sympathize with Dikgosi on their frustrations over their relegation to nobodies by the government. We understand their pain over the powers that have been undraped off them by the political leadership but that gives them no excuse to bully their subjects. The chiefs remain our leaders and at no time should they usurp the role of our uncles. In fact, even uncles no longer dictate when their nephews and nieces should get married. The decision of when people should get married remains the prerogative of the concerned parties, that is, the bride and the groom. Yes, back in the day the uncles used to command everything when it came to marriages and this was only because they played a pivotal role in the process of marriage. Uncles used to be the ones paying the bride price (lobola or bogadi) and as such it made sense, then, that they be the ones to come up with the date of when the marriage should take place. Nowadays if a man wants to get married, he has to pay for everything, including for lobola and as such it would be absurd to expect his uncles to dictate the dates for his marriage, even though some di hakgale uncles still find no shame drawing up ridiculous directives even when they have not donated a single goat towards the marriage. In the same way, traditional leaders used to have a say in marriages because of the important role that they played in marriages. Chiefs used to be the legally recognized authorities in the solemnization of marriages. You needed the chief to append his signature on your marriage certificate to make it a legal document and as such you needed to take the chief’s availability into cognizance before you walked the love of your life down the aisle. Back in the day, a majority of villagers relied on farming for their subsistence. People observed the ploughing season. The rains were reliable and people knew the months during which the clouds open up for rains and would seize the opportunity to relocate to the fields and plough. Many people didn’t have 8 to 5 jobs and like I already mentioned, they heavily relied on farming. It therefore made sense during those times, that people would stop their other commitments, including getting married, to go and plough. The chief had a reason to declare the ploughing season because people needed those watermelons, sweet reeds, beans and maize to feed their families. More importantly for the chief, his subjects donated part of their harvest to him. It therefore doesn’t make any sense anymore to implement such a regulation in our times.
Nowadays marriages are officiated or approved by government officials, being the District Commissioners and I don’t understand how chiefs would want to instruct government employees to stop, for seven months, doing what they are being paid to do. Surely the chiefs can go and plough but that should not stop the people from getting married because government officials can do the work. Again, the rest of the villagers who want to go and plough at their lands can still go because we do not need the entire village to come and be part of our weddings. Why should I be stopped from getting married just because some families need to go and plough? Is it fair that my partner, who does not come from Maun, should bear such a long wait before I marry her not because I don’t want to marry her but only because of my stupid tribal regulations? Marriages popularly happen during the months of September and December and the reasons are simple. These are the months which offer public holidays and people always want to take advantage of these public holidays and get married because many of us no longer depend on farming but are in formal employment. In my quest to try and understand this absurd directive, I phoned the Maun Tribal office and they referred me to the DC’s office, which the lady termed ofisi ya manyalo (marriages office). I was not surprised when the official at the ‘marriages office’ absolved her office from this stupid directive and told me that the tribal office was not being fair to refer me to her office because her office got the directive from the Kgotla. Someone mentioned that a Kgotla meeting was convened and the people who attended the meeting agreed to this directive but my point is who attends these Kgotla meetings? Kgotla meetings are mainly attended by people who are not working and can afford to agree that seven months be allocated to nothing else but ploughing. The meetings are attended by elderly people who got married during those times when the ploughing season was observed and it comes as no surprise that they would endorse such ludicrous regulations. There are so many avenues where our tribal leaders in Maun can prove their relevance and authority. Minister Tshekedi Khama is fighting a spirited war to ‘steal’ our community wildlife park and this is where our tribal leaders should focus their energies and fight for their people and stop wasting time on outdated and unproductive regulations.
