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Vusi Nyamazana-Correspondent
The process of reconquest of skulls of First Chimurenga heroes from Britain has been a highly contested affair between politicians and professionals on one hand and marginalised direct descendants, their clan spirit mediums, and the dead heroes themselves.
Politics of the dead is revealed here as the exclusive agency of politicians is being contested and viewed as a “centralised” and an “ivory tower” approach in matters that should be driven by and through affected families and the dead themselves. It is commendable that since 1980, the Government has articulated the significance of heroes and martyrs of the First Chimurenga resistance for the nation.
However, in the course of reconquest, the dead heroes must not be treated as abstract symbols to be appropriated from families by politicians and professionals.
The First Chimurenga contains highly significant contributions from spirit forces intermediated by mediums, traditional healers, and prophets.
In African spirituality, we believe that death does not end life, death does not sever the bond between the living and the dead, that death means not annihilation, but a departure to the spiritual world. The professionalising control over the reconquest has in effect appropriated and alienated these ancestral spirits.
There is a deepening sense of the negative presence of these spirits who manifest their anger by afflicting the living with individual and collective misfortunes. Some of them are making visitations through the agency of mediums to demand action on recovering their skulls.
These spirits cannot be ignored and they need to be summoned to legitimise and consecrate the reconquest process.
The psychosocial scars of Zimbabwe’s First Chimurenga are not healed or resolved, and the skulls in Britain continue to haunt direct and indirect descendants.
Hence the various repatriation campaigns since the 80s by concerned family members through letters to British Museums and the Queen of England.
These efforts at reconquest must in part be understood as a response to the outstanding funerary rites for the First Chimurenga dead.
These interests and practices of direct families seem threatened as the reconquest process has been ‘professionalised’ and captured by politicians.
Reconquest is the process by which the original owner fights back to get the property that used to be theirs.
It must be seen as an integrated process, a process broken down into parts and all the parts must function as an interrelated whole.
Politicisation inadvertently results in marginalisation of families, and the parts will never come together and work in harmony and complementarity.
Families will be rendered unable to;
Carry out spiritual rituals to consecrate the reconquest process.
Evoke the dead spirits to tell where exactly their skulls are held in Britain.
Allow for spiritual identification of the skulls as a complement to scientific DNA approach.
Allow families (spiritually appointed) to have guardianship of skulls when they are eventually transported back to Zimbabwe.
Politicians and professionals should, therefore, focus on bringing equilibrium back into the integrated process by assisting families in organising cultural ceremonies before, during and after repatriation of ancestral remains.
These ceremonies provide families with the opportunity to deal with problems from the past, since they serve to redress imbalances and pollutions caused by the execution of these leaders, and to resolve outstanding obligations and tensions between different houses within clans.
In some of the families right now there are competing claims to the dead ancestors. There are also tussles emanating from betrayals amongst the families that led to the capture and execution of some of these ancestors.
Cleansing ceremonies for the betrayers should be furtively done, including efforts to reach compromises for feuding families so that they view the to-be-returned ancestral skulls as part of a joint or shared heritage.
Objectifying of the skulls in Britain and not viewing them for what they are and what they represent is intolerable.
Handling of this special category of ancestors should not be discredited, toyed with or breached, but must comply to the fullest dictates of customary and spiritual practices.
Clans traditionally have individuals designated as “Official Undertakers” for Chiefs and other royalty.
Their responsibility is to treat remains of Chiefs and lead the interment in royal enclaves. We need to ask ourselves if we are accommodating them in the mix of things. Most importantly, we need to ask ourselves if professionals will play guardianship over the skulls ahead of families.
The return of the skulls should be met by high profile and elaborate set of “clan” and “national” ceremonies and rituals to receive the bones of these war dead. What will return are not objects that can be objectified, but remains of “national ancestors” who once were our chiefs, spiritual leaders and warriors.
They are regarded as martyrs who paid with their blood and should be accorded the posthumous respect they deserve. I admit that all cultures change through times. No culture is static.
However, some aspects like handling remains of chiefs are basically conservative in that they tend to resist change.
I call upon the culturally conscious Zimbabweans to put up barriers to alien ideas of professionals without familial connection entirely appropriating the reconquest processes.
As a nation, we need to engage in complex negotiations between customary and familial requirements vis-a-vis state demands. The families should not be viewed as obstacles to reconquest, but a fundamental and integral part of the process.
Politicians and professionals alike should acknowledge and internalise the families, spirit mediums and spirits of the dead heroes in the reconquest efforts.
Vusi Nyamazana, is a political scientist and one of the co-conveners for #BringBackOurBones Campaign. Twitter @VusiNyamazana. Views expressed are personal and do not represent the views of #BringBackOurBones Campaign.
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