A shocking headline, “Ramaphosa recognises Prince Misuzulu as Zulu king”, had me falling off my chair.
I tried to reinterpret it and thought it meant to say “Ramaphosa relieved that the court decision has paved the way for the Zulu nation to install Prince Misuzulu as its king”.
My revised, more measured and dignified headline suddenly usurped the powers of the president to recognise and install traditional rule and leadership.
My revised headline was a deliberate departure from a colonial, apartheid-perpetuated system of deposing and installing kings now sustained by a democratic dispensation, except it remained in my own imagination.
Who would have thought that this mighty Zulu nation, imagined and forged by Shaka ka Senzangakhona in just over 12 years of his rule from 1816 to 1828 and which lasted for only 55 years before being destroyed to near extinction, would today still be subjected to a Shepstonian and Wolseleyan policy that sought to weaken chiefly authority by putting it under the control of government?
The ultimate dismantling of the Zulu kingdom and weakening of chiefly authority was a campaign carefully constructed in 1877 by Lord Carnarvon, secretary of state for the colonies, and executed a year later by Sir Bartle Frere, the British high commissioner for Southern Africa.
Both these two colonial officials harboured the belief that the destruction of the Zulu kingdom and its military power was a necessary condition for a complete takeover of Zululand and ultimate white rule in SA.
The Battle of iSandlwana in 1879 had not been coincidence. It had been carefully planned since the arrival of the first British settlers in 1824 at Port Natal, four years before the death of King Shaka.
Fifty-three years after the arrival of the British settlers in Zululand it had become clear that the colonial project was not going to succeed if the Zulu kingdom remained intact, let alone being able to still have its own military regiment — amabutho.
Arriving in Natal in 1878, Sir Bartle Frere didn’t waste time in executing a scheme that would lead to what the British envisaged would be the necessary condition to wage a full-scale war on the Zulu kingdom.
The ultimatum, impossible to accept and issued to King Cetshwayo in December of the same year by Frere, included the dismantling of the Zulu military system within 30 days as well as for the king to forsake his sovereignty over the kingdom, was a recipe for the Anglo-Zulu war.
Frere’s ultimatum was never intended to be complied with in the first place. The plan had always been to bring the Zulu kingdom under the control of the British colonial government, ultimately dismantling the Zulu kingdom; breaking it down and putting it under the complete authority of the British.
In a decolonised Africa, a new legislative and constitutional framework that gives powers back to traditional communities to recognise and install their own kings and chiefs is needed
After suffering an embarrassing defeat at iSandlwana on January 22 1879, Britain was determined to see to it that the Zulu nation was never going to be a threat to its imperial quest of finally controlling the whole southern African region.
It took the British colonial government six months, from January to July 1879, to unleash its military power that would bring the Zulu kingdom to near extinction. The fact that it still stands today is an ancestral miracle.
Determined to see that the Zulu kingdom remained weakened, several colonial policies and laws were enacted. Among others was the Zululand Code of Native Law, which gave powers to a governor and his white magistrates to rule over what once was the preserve of the king and his chiefs.
Under this law, chiefs were appointed and dismissed by the governor, who was the supreme chief, together with magistrates. Of course, according to the colonial government, there was no longer a Zulu king, but several chiefs recognised and appointed by the supreme chief.
The breakdown of the Zulu kingdom into chiefdoms was to ensure that no Zulu king would emerge to regain power over the Zulu people, including the power to assemble a regiment and therefore have military power.
Among the many other restrictions was the stripping of the powers of the chiefs to hold traditional ceremonies and other rituals.
The chiefs were expected to obtain permission from the white magistrates to hold any gathering of a ceremonial nature. It was clear that in the event of the demise of an incumbent chief, permission to install the heir to the throne would require permission from even a magistrate.
Before the Battle of iSandlwana and breaking down of the Zulu kingdom, the king was a supreme ruler and reported to nobody except his traditional council.
Fast-forward to the Black Administration Act of 1927, which appointed the governor-general as the “supreme chief” of all natives in the Union (formed in 1910). This act also granted the governor the authority to appoint and remove traditional leaders.
Who then would have thought that in this democratic dispensation traditional rule would still require the endorsement and recognition of the president using the same colonial tactics that sought to undermine the autonomy of traditional communities to choose their kings and chiefs?
I am not a constitutional or customary law expert, but Chapter 12 of the constitution dealing with the recognition and role of traditional leaders, which is only half a page, raises eyebrows.
The chapter’s non-committal nature, with clauses that only commit to “maybe” and “subject to the constitution” are indicative of a new dispensation that had no desire to entrench traditional communities in the management of their affairs.
In a decolonised Africa, a new legislative and constitutional framework that gives powers back to traditional communities to recognise and install their own kings and chiefs is needed.
A decisive break from a colonial situation, in search of epistemic freedom, is the only path to a decolonial moment.
A recognition by the president is no breaking news. The Zulu people long to choose their king and need no validation from another institution.
• Sithole is a research fellow at the Johannesburg Institute for Advanced Study and writes in his personal capacity.
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