Mosotho horseman

Lesotho’s national anthem’s first verse says Lesotho, fatše la bo-ntatà rona, or Lesotho, land of our fathers. The music was composed by Ferdinand-Samuel Laur (1791-1854) and the lyrics were written by François Coillard (1834-1904), two Frenchmen. The freshly independent Lesotho adopted the tune as its national anthem in 1967, a year after gaining independence from Britain. You can listen to the anthem on the government website.

The two French fellows who penned it did a pretty good job. I quite like the way it sounds. The mothers, though–there are no mothers? We’ll let that slide. Sometime in the future, though, we’re gonna have to tinker with that line so as to include our mothers, who actually do the donkey’s work but always get the lesser of everything. The issue is the same in almost every document written before, and even during, the twentieth century, partly because the majority of human beings believe God is a man.

Is Lesotho the land of our fathers? We know that our fore-parents came from up north somewhere. My very own ancestors, Bakhatla or Bakgatla, came from Botswana. I’ve always heard talk of Ntsoana-Tsatsi, a place where the Basotho supposedly came from.

“Ntsoana-Tsatsi” sounds like “From the Sun”, so it could mean the East or the North-East. When I was in Nairobi, Kenya, I met a guy from Zambia: Mukelabai XXXXXXX. What was funny was the fact that he would stare at my brothers and me when we spoke. We became friends and stayed in contact for many years after that, for Mukelabai was a Lozi and could understand almost everything we were saying.

The Balozi from Zambia, it turns out, decided to go down South, and eventually formed a big chunk of what is today the Basotho nation. At least that’s what one school of thought says. Mukelabai sings the Lesotho national anthem like it was the Zambian national anthem. Why? Because of François Coillard. The anthem author had adventures all over southern Africa, especially in Barotseland, and must have written the tune in Silozi / Sesotho. The group that stayed around Zambia still sings it, as well as the one that trekked south! So who are we? Do we own this land enough to call it Fatše la bo-ntatà rona?

What about the bushmen (Baroa in Sesotho, Basarwa in Setswana) we found there? Isn’t it the land of their fathers more than it is the land of ours? I think we ended up blending with Baroa, which would give all of us together some right to the land and justify some of that first verse, Lesotho, fatše la bo-ntat’a rona. Apparently

one important site of early settlement was Nts’oana-Tsatsi near present-day Vrede in the northern Free State. Archaeological investigations have revealed that this area was settled as early as 1350, probably by the Bafokeng clan. These were the pioneers of the Sotho groups who settled much of the Free State and Lesotho. They lived closely with the Baroa as well as with the ancestors of the Baphuthi, who were the first Iron Age peoples to settle by the Caledon River Valley. The northern half of the Free State is the true heartland of Sotho settlement. Lesotho, as we know it today, was the southern frontier of this civilization although the upper portion of the Caledon River Valley was very rich and fertile

The above excerpt also identifies Ntsoana-Tsatsi, which is where my mum had always taught me was the origin of the Basotho people. A myth by many standards. But judging by the age of the Basotho nation, I guess we do come from the North-East or the East somehow, and I guess we do have legitimate claim to this land and can go ahead and call it Lefatše la bo-ntat’a rona. The next verse is Har’a mafatše le letle ke lona, or Among worlds it is the most beautiful.

What does one say about one’s country but that it is the most gorgeous of all? I certainly am not going to say that it is the ugliest. Yet, looking at that second verse of the national anthem’s first stanza:

Lesotho, fatše la bo ntat’a rona
Hara mafatše le letle ke lona

I have often wondered what we mean to say. You and I have already agreed that yes, we can lay claim to the land and call it Land of our fathers, the first verse. Which gives us the right to make another claim: Among worlds it is the most beautiful, the second verse. We’re lying through our teeth. We’re lying to ourselves and we’re lying to the world, because we do not believe what we’re singing. How do I know? If we believed what we were singing and really thought our country was the most beautiful in the world, then

We’d do a lot towards keeping it that way.We would be selfless, and go out of our way to help unfortunate Basotho. We would plant trees all over the place, instead of uprooting them. We would not have burned down Maseru, the capital city, because we’d lost an election. We would not be running away and draining Lesotho of its grey-matter. We would not suffer from IPS, Inverted Pyramid Syndrome, but back and support everything local. We would not have killed other Basotho for political gain. We would not throw paper and other rubbish in the street but in the rubbish bin.

That’s how I know. And I hereby ask you, when you hear yourself chanting that second verse of the first stanza, to wonder what it is you are doing for Lesotho that gives you a right to proclaim its beauty before the world. As much as we have agreed that we can safely say the land is ours, I disagree as to its purpoted absolute beauty. Beauty, like love, must be maintained through deliberate action.

“I’m washing my car because I want it to look beautiful.” When you’re done washing it, then you drive it to town to boast, because at that instant you do believe it is beautiful, because you’ve done something to gain the right to believe that it is beautiful. Why should it be different when it concerns a country? You shine your shoes regularly, you whiten your “liteki” (sneakers) and iron your shirt to a crease. When you go out at night wearing those clothes you feel handsome, you feel that you can conquer love, you try to conquer love. Why should it be different when it concerns a country?

We’re lying to ourselves and to the world. One of our common goals must be to ensure that Lesotho remains or becomes the most beautiful we can make it. Beauty rarely comes with the package. How? Look at the list above and start making that 2nd verse of the 1st stanza true.

Lesotho, fatše la bo-ntat’a rona,
Har’a mafatše le letle ke lona,
Ke moo re hlahileng.

Verse 3 is pretty straightforward. We’ve already talked about verse 1, Lesotho, fatše la bo-ntat’a rona, and verse 2, Har’a mafatše le letle ke lona. This is therefore verse 3, Ke moo re hlahileng, or It is the place of our birth.

Why shouldn’t it be? I was personally born there, at Scott Hospital in Morija. My parents were born there, in the Quthing district on the southern tip. It is, it seems, the place of our birth. But we are supposed to have come from up north or north-east, if you recall. Ntsoana-Tsatsi, to be exact, and we found Baroa (Bushmen) inhabiting the area that is present-day Lesotho. In Sesotho, “boroa” means south, so that Afrika-Boroa is South Africa. Baroa means People of the South. They were there when we arrived! We were going down south and they were there people of the south.

We were born there but of course one of the prior generations must have got “naturalised.” Oh, it happens all the time. New-comers integrate their new societies frequently, and usually even become more nationalist than the folks that were already there. When the new-comers butcher the already established people, though, and grab their land, naturalisation it is not. New-comers to the American continent hacked and decimated the people they found there. I am told we lived and inter-married with the Bushmen so that we became one: Basotho. Ke moo re hlahileng.

Lesotho, fatše la bo-ntat’a rona,
Har’a mafatše le letle ke lona,
Ke moo re hlahileng,
Ke moo re holileng.

Verse 4 is in a way a continuation of verse 3. Ke moo re holileng, or It is where we grew up. I personally grew up and became a responsible and conscious human being outside Lesotho. But I don’t suppose that’s what the lyrics relate to, since they are more figurative than Cartesian. I believe that a non-negligible minority of Basotho teenagers either left of their own desire or were driven out¹. Either way they, just like me, grew up outside Lesotho. So what does the verse mean, then?

As far as I’m concerned, it is true that the most visible part of my growing up happened in exile, which means my voice deepened, I grew a beard, I almost doubled the size of my shoes, I got sloshed for the first time, and I became a hopeless fan of woman. But almost every seed was planted, and the seed-bed itself remained, in Lesotho. That’s where I first met hope, felt the joy of belonging, faced desperation, knew fear, and touched compassion.

Perhaps things like these happen in other places, too. But my own seed-bed was no doubt Lesotho, so in essence that’s where I grew up².

Mum and I were driving north up Kingsway, toward home, having packed the Datsun pickup van with stock for the family shop. I glanced at the clock. Maseru was unusually deserted for six p.m. Perhaps there was a curfew that we hadn’t heard about. Or perhaps it was due to the unfriendly looking clouds, stationed across the skyline as far as I could see.

–*It’s going to rain…,* I must have thought aloud.
–*What?*
–*Ah, it looks like it’s going to rain,* I said.
–*Don’t worry. We’ll have finished unloading with the first drops.*
–*I sure hope so.*

We drove past the bakery on the left and the new shopping centre on the right. There was hardly anybody even there! We zoomed past the hardware store where a woman was sitting in front on the pavement with small mounds of potatoes for sale, and headed for Mafafa and the Cathedral roundabout. And Mum jumped on the brakes and brought the rickety Datsun to a noisy stop, and me out of my dreamy stupor. She was looking at me, or rather through me at something I could not comprehend. It was my turn to say what. So I did.

–*What?*

She stopped looking at whatever it was in me or behind me, dipped her hand into her purse and gave me a zoka, a five-cent coin.

–*Get me some potatoes with this.*
For some reason I just took the money and got the potatoes, two mounds, without bringing it to her attention that we had several sacks of the stuff in the van. I did ask her a day or two later, because I was genuinely intrigued. And her answer placed me a step further on my way to becoming a responsible and conscious adult, without actually growing an inch³.

So, yes, in my case, and I suspect in many other cases, I did grow up in Lesotho, although I physically grew up elsewhere. And I suspect this of any place that has such a mixture of seed-bed and seed.

¹ There is no more driving out of Basotho. That nasty bit of our history petered out with the first democratically elected government.
² I’m not suggesting any correlation between this verse and how Basotho children are brought up or grow up. I just happen to believe that I actually grew up in Lesotho, although puberty came afterwards.
³ It is a true story, if you were wondering.

Lesotho, fatše la bo-ntat’a rona,
Har’a mafatše le letle ke lona,
Ke moo re hlahileng,
Ke moo re holileng,
Rea le rata.

Verse 5, Rea le rata, is not yet true. It translates into We love her, or She is dear to us.

1. Lesotho, land of our fathers,
2. Among worlds you are the most beautiful,
3. In you we were born,
4. In you we grew up,
5. You are dear to us.

Anything or anyone that man loves becomes an object of obsession. A car, a pair of shoes, a lover, the self. The latter are pampered and taken care of in unimaginable ways, but Lesotho isn’t on that list and Lesotho isn’t pampered in any way by any man, woman, girl or boy that I know. If you pamper Lesotho the way you pamper things you love, let me know. I’ll pin a medal of honour on your chest.

today there was a mass march in johannesburg (from library gardens to the zimbabwe consulate) in solidarity with the folks in zimbabwe and against mugabe. it was an intense day. i was a bit annoyed with all the talk of the need to try “inclusive dialogue”… inclusive dialogue between whom? mugabe just kills off his opposition–he is not trying to have any kind of conversations. how inclusive can a meeting of state leaders be? furthermore, the leadership in SADC has already proven to be non-responsive to the needs of their people and the demands from mass movements so why should we depend on them to come to some viable solution? we all know how “inclusive” these dialogues will be for civil society. all this talk of dialogue is creating a protracted drama played out on the international stage and it shamelessly panders to further destruction and mugabe’s hagiography. we are at the moment of mass movement.

when we arrived at the zimbabwe consulate the person who was supposed to accept our memorandum refused to come out so he sent out one of his other folks. this dude was arrogant, but if you looked closely you could see the arrogant, stoic attitude was hiding some serious fear. i managed to push past the people with their big cameras and forced my little camera into the crowd and got some pictures of this guy. he never said a word. not a damn word. as he was leaving the stage someone threw some zim dollars at him which i quickly picked up–not because they are worth anything because inflation is damn near 1700%, but because they are in memory of this day which i think is extremely important. even with the police surrounding him and others pushing marchers off the platform, the zim consulate representation was still rushed by a few eager marchers. these marchers were pushed and blocked by the police officers. one nearly pushed me, but i managed to make eye contact and he just shoo-ed me away.

i’ve posted some photos here. please look at the photos of the construction workers. during their lunch break many watched and joined in with the singing. some of my favorites photos:

****Above is a picture from I took at the Human Rights Day March in Johannesburg on March 21, 2007.****

Zimbabwe has made headlines recently following the of Zimbabwean police’s killing of Gift Tandere, a young activist who organized against human rights abuses and the brutal beating of the MDC faction leader Morgan Tsvangirai. This is in addition to the growing attention on Zimbabwe related to high inflation rate (near 1700%), reports of human rights abuses, the growing refugee communities fleeing Zimbabwe (also check here), the HIV/AIDS orphanage crisis, the Look East policy and emerging relations with Iran. Trying to gain a coherent grasp on the situation in Zimbabwe under ZANU-PF and Robert Mugabe can quickly develop into a masochist and tiring exercise that leaves you feeling more frustrated then enlightened. I receive about 40 emails a day concerning Zimbabwe and each email does the work of further obscuring a complex situation, but at the same time (rather unintentionally) does the work of illustrating how important it is to be firm, but careful in our critique of Mugabe. Careful not because we don’t want to disrupt some hagiographic metanarrative about the greatest of Mugabe, but careful because we must not/cannot a) deploy ahistorical myopic discourses that paints Mugabe as a liberation leader (who by the way readily accepted structural adjustment programs, and delayed “land reform” until he was practically forced) or the image quite rampant in the Western imagination of a brutal, savage dictator and b) must not mimic or become ventriloquist of imperial endeavors. This delicacy in speaking about Zimbabwe does not mean we stay silent—engaging in the quiet diplomacy that South African president Thabo Mbeki has seemed to master; it means that we develop the strategies to speak about Zimbabwe in productive ways. In 2003, The Black Commentator published a feature article entitled “The Debate on Zimbabwe Will Not Be Throttled,” in which it is written: [Read more…]

Entirely within the letter of the law, Lesotho’s dominant parties have managed to massively manipulate almost a quarter of the seats in last weekend’s national election. Neither donors nor media seem interested in covering the irregularities. But the trouble is plain in the published numbers for all to see.

When Motorola joined (RED), they sought to work with companies in Africa and found Morija Printing Works in Lesotho to make the beautiful red packaging for their (RED) cell phones. After a visit to the Morija print shop two weeks ago, Motorola sent us some of these amazing photos of people at work and play, and also some candids of the print shop workers and their family members. You’ll also get to see some of the absolutely breathtaking landscape in Lesotho in these photos.

On Sunday elections were held in Lesotho. The small southern African “kingdom in the sky” was the continent’s first country to use a mixed-member proportional (MMP) system, in 2002. Sunday’s election was Lesotho’s second under MMP, and as I am not aware of any other African countries having opted for MMP (as opposed to MMM/parallel, which is used by several countries*), it must have been only the second African MMP election.

Lesotho politics is fraught with fallacies. There are even suggestions that the tiny mountain kingdom should be incorporated into South Africa before its tool late. In fact the only hope for the poor country is its big neighbour where there are more than 50 000 Basotho employed in the gold mines. Lately, its educated citizens are leaving in droves for greener pastures in the SA provinces. Is Lesotho becoming the next Zimbabwe? Is prime minister Mosisili taking after pres Mugabe?

The ruling Lesotho Congress for Democracy (LCD) is headed for a landslide majority as vote counts wind up after weekend parliamentary elections in the southern African country. With results returned in 75 of the 80 constituencies, the LCD party of Pakalitha Mosisili, Lesotho’s prime minister, had won 53 seats. The All Basotho Convention (ABC) of Tom Thabane was in second place with 17 seats. An alliance of smaller parties had won one constituency.

Mokha o tla loantsa khethollo ‘me o tla sireletsa litokelo tsohle tsa mantlha tsa batho joalo kaha li hlaha Molaong oa Motheo oa Lesotho le mehoong ea Mokhatlo oa Machaba a Kopaneng le Kopanong ea Linaha tsa Afrika. Mokha leha ho le joalo, o tla holisa likamano tsa oona le mekhatlo e meng kea kapa kae lefatseng ha feela eba likamano tse joalo ha li hohlane kapa hona ho thulana le sepheo kapa litakatso tsa Mokha.

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Lesotho election

Polling stations have closed in Lesotho’s general election. The Independent Election Commission says a voter turnout of 80% can be expected. Rethabile Pholo, a spokesperson, says the voting ran smoothly during the day after some polling stations opened late. Independent election monitors earlier indicated that the poll was free and fair. [Source]

Dear Deity… now what? This country of about 2 million people, independent since 1966 from England, with a 30 to 35% rate of HIV infection, one nation with one language and one culture, with a lot of water to sell in the form of electricity or just plain water, this country with some of the biggest diamonds in the world, this country is one of the poorest countries in the world, this country that is often described as “tumultuous” when it comes to politics, has seen its sons and daughters die for it, this country called Lesotho, surrounded entirely by another country, having the highest low point of any country on the planet…

…having copious snowfall (read Lesotho snow poem) and ski resorts in Africa, having a dinosaur named after it, and therefore ample dino prints, ample cave paintings left by its first inhabitant, the Bushman, this country that has one of the highest literacy rates in Africa, as well as, arguably, one of the first novelists on the continent, as well as mountains that inspired the Lord of the Rings Trilogy, as well as the highest pub in Africa…

… and the Aloë Polyphylla, a plant found nowhere else on earth, this country is mine, and it deserves a break. For crying out loud, Lord, I said it deserves a break. There’s a lot going for us — help us capitalise on our resources and on our identity and on our culture. Amen.

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