In the present day we fall prey to historical scholarship from the Orient and the West for simple reasons. We argue with our inner selves and with our peers that Africa’s history is not documented and hence is untraceable. We quickly jump into the bandwagon of Oriental and Western historical events and personalities and draw lessons from them all the time. Ghenghis Khan, Alexander the Great, Napoleon Bonaparte, among others prime our imaginations of the genius of warfare and heroic deeds as we gourd over the generals of time gone by. I too am a result, a product, of this line of thought, at least I have been for far too long. The truth is, it is not a crime nor is it a representation of any inferior quality in us. My only contention is that by so doing we have disallowed ourselves and the other cultures of the world the opportunity to learn about the generals and great leaders of our beloved Continent. We have locked the skulls of our fallen soldiers in the long forgotten unmarked graves of the times gone by.
East Africa, just like other parts of Africa, has had a fair share of heroic deeds that were accomplished by simple individuals who dared imagine a calling higher than their mortal existence. They dared do what other men would not dare dream. I speak of Kinjekitile Ngwale, Mkwavinyika Munyigumba Mwamuyinga (Chief Mkwawa), Omukama Kabalega, and Koitalel arap Samoei. These four men have a narrative sufficient to rewrite the perceptions of East Africa and the character of resistance in colonial Africa. Mukwavinyika or Mkwawa means conqueror of many lands. In truth Mkwawa did not so much as conquer many lands as he did conquer the fears of the Hehe people with courage and conquer the German pride and brutality with conviction. He was a conqueror who made it impossible for the Germans to rule over his people. When he was first engaged in the field of battle, he summarily defeated a 300 strong battalion of German soldiers with guns. However, when he got surrounded, he also denied them any retreat or surrender, choosing instead to shoot himself. He then became the Only African Chief whose skull made it to the Treaty of Versailles. “ARTICLE 246. Within six months from the coming into force of the present Treaty, … Germany will hand over to His Britannic Majesty’s Government the skull of the Sultan Mkwawa which was removed from the Protectorate of German East Africa and taken to Germany.” Then came Kinjekitile who argued with his followers that a spirit called Hongo had summoned him to help the Tanganyika communities to overcome their differences and meet the common enemy in the battlefield. The common misconception is that he lied to his followers that the “holy water” would protect them from German bullets. However, in reality, Kinjekitile reminded them of how much unity could achieve. He died a month after the rebellion began in German prisons and his skull was not to be seen again. Come over to Kenya and you meet the famed warrior tribe of the 19th century who never shied away from adversity and in spite of being a small tribe of few tens of thousands at the time, established its foothold in the expansive Rift Valley. Among them rose a Man who fulfilled the prophecy of Kimnyole that the community must resist the black snake (Railway line) when it comes. Resist they did, and in the attempts to follow the diplomatic path, he was gunned down, and again his skull taken. The Talai council of elders still remembers him, but the Great Nation of Kenya has placed his contribution as a foot note in the colonial narrative.
If we thought that maybe they were small and thus much less was even known about them, then we might consider looking at Omukama Kabalega. It is true, Kabalega was no saint and wanted power as much as every ambitious man. In fact, if Machiavelli were to use a man’s life to benchmark his writings, Kabalega was the perfect Prince in Machiavellian political thought. However, today, not a street in Uganda is named after him, honors he received from Iddi Amin were rescinded and the only acclaim he got was from the Museveni government in 2009. This is the acclaim for a man who chose resistance and was taken to exile and survived it for the love of his people. Historically, Kabalega died in Jinja, close to the border of his Kingdom when he came from exile in Seychelles. He died a defeated man, but in the historical narrative of colonialism in Uganda, no one resisted as fierce as he did. His resistance led to the death of over 1.8 million subjects, in fact the destruction of population was so complete that the British argued for some time that the tribe called Bunyoro was wiped out during the colonial wars.
Why the past? Why visit it now? My message is simple, and I do apologize if I had to bring all this up to communicate it. Heroic deeds are many, but the word “Hero” is not a noun, it’s a verb. Anybody can own it, use it, believe in it, and inspire generations with it. When you read through Chief Mkwawa, Kinjekitile, Kabalega, and Koitalel, one simple fact comes to your mind, they were the face of Africa then and they never betrayed their calling. Today we betray our calling because of idiosyncrasies that keep us from focusing on the Africa of the future. The challenges are different and so must be the weapons, but the courage to follow our convictions need no oriental or western superhero to teach us. We must always remember that history has tried and failed to forget them, because they belong in our future, not our past.
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