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Opinion Saul Gwakuba Ndlovu
The Zimbabwean traditional religious shrine of Njelele has recently been in the news, again this time after a group of people including some war veterans were refused permission to visit it for among other things, cleansing purposes.The shrine is located in the Matopo Hills in Matabeleland South province’s Matobo district. The district’s administrative seat is Kezi, and Njelele itself is in Chief Masuku’s territory.
It is looked after locally by a Mwali-chosen descendent of the house of Lubimbi of the Malaba clan. Chief Malaba’s area lies much further to the south of the shrine, and is separated from it by several chiefdoms. All of them are however in the same province and are administered from Gwanda.
Njelele has been Zimbabwe’s centre of traditional worship long before Cecil John Rhodes colonised this country in 1890.
Before it there have been earlier centres such as Mavulamatjena (later called White Waters by the colonialists), Mbudzi, Tjizeze, Lutombo Gwaba Nyayi.
Presently, there are two other shrines which are offshoots of Njelele. There are Dula in Mzinyathini (Diana’s Pool) sector of Umzingwane District, and the Manyangwa Shrine near Tjehanga School, some 30 or so kilometres north of Plumtree.
There are other less known traditional worship centres, scattered all over Matabeleland provinces, northern Botswana, South Africa’s Limpopo Province and most likely other sectors of that country’s northern region.
In 2012, there was a big controversy about Njelele, after about 600 or so war veterans accompanied by some Matabeleland South natives descended on the shrine, unceremoniously forced themselves on the sacred place where they deposited some rocks they had brought then they force-marched the official shrine- keeper a woman called (MaNdlovu) to the nearby Hovi River where they bathed nude while she was ordered to ululate and clap hands while she was kneeling on the river bank!
The visiting war veterans were travelling in a convoy of buses and were reportedly accompanied by a few chiefs from various parts of Mashonaland provinces.
The war veterans were also said to be from Mashonaland provinces. They made at least two such trips to Njelele, so said the relevant authorities in 2012 alone. The visits upset the local people who feel that the war veterans had not shown any respect to either the revered shrine or to the appropriate authorities of the locality where the Njelele is.
That was eventually resolved in the traditional way by chiefs and those concerned with such matters. The current complaint by the war veterans is about the fact that they have been denied access to the shrine. What appears to be the cause of the complaint is that war veterans do not know that the Mwali shrines close down their major operations at just about the end of the lunar month of September (Mapembwe).
The shrines are not all season, open house. They operate according to their own clock and calendar. In addition to this, there are certain traditions, customs and mores, what we may reflect to as “protocol” to be allowed or observed by every person who visits the shrine. Such information is certainly given by the shrine-keepers.
Respect for the shrines is most important. Arrogance and disdain have no place at Njelele, Manyangwa and Dula. It is extremely unfortunate, no, actually tragic, that some shrine-keepers and intercessors are said to have shown strong tendencies towards drunkenness while performing their duties.
Visitors too are to be both respectful and respectable. A trip to any of those shrines by traditional worshippers is treated as a pilgrimage and not as picnic or an amorous excursion or a mere outing. The people responsible for keeping the shrines deserve much respect.
A remark by one of the war veteran leaders that those who refused them permission to visit Njelele this time was because they supported Christianity and not traditionalism is utterly uncalled for, and so his comment that war vets wishing to visit Njelele should have as easy access to the shrine as members of King Mzilikazi’s family have to Mzilikazi’s grave.
The Constitution of Zimbabwe upholds the freedom of worship. The author of this article is a confirmed Christian but he is in this opinion defending traditional worshippers.
The people of Zimbabwe are free to worship anywhere as long as they are not being a public nuisance to their neighbours, if they do not pose a health hazard to both themselves and others. They can worship as a group or as individuals on hills or mountains, in temples, mosques or in their own houses without let or hindrance.
All they are expected to do by the leaders of their respective religious organisations is to follow the laid down rules and regulations, and that is what this article’s message is, in effect, all about in connection with Njelele.
The reference to Mzilikazi’s grave was ill-advised in that whereas the Njelele Shrine is a centre of international religious culture to which worshippers go to present their individual family, communal, regional and national wishes and problems, the purpose of a visit to Mzilikazi’s sepulcre by usually those from his lineage would be to remember and honour him as that founder of the Ndebele Kingdom and as a patriarch of the Khumalo clan.
It should also be pointed out that Mzilikazi was a human being and mortal but Mwali is a deity and immortal. I am sure and so is every war veteran that everyone can visit his or her ancestors’ grave without any interference just as Mzilikazi’s descendants do. Njelele ought to be treated as a national uniting factor and not a cause or source of discord.
Saul Gwakuba Ndlovu is a war veteran and retired Bulawayo-based journalist. He can be contacted on cell 0734 328 136 or through email [email protected].
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