MISTRA Executive Director, Joel Netshitenzhe,
Dr Mongane Wally Serote,
Academic Scholars and the Academic Fraternity,
Colleagues from MISTRA,
Distinguished delegates,
Ladies and gentlemen.
I am humbled and privileged to be given the opportunity to provide the closing remarks.
I want to thank the Mapungubwe Institute for focusing on our heritage of Mapungubwe in this Conference. Mapungubwe remains clothed in mystery and the unknown, but increasingly it is recognised as a heritage of outstanding universal value - and as such was declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 2003.
It is fitting therefore that we have gathered here on this very auspicious day, Africa Day.
We have come here to discuss and debate the rich legacy that our continent’s people have bequeathed us.
Today we have taken another look at the outstanding contribution of our great Iron Age communities who lived at the confluence of the Limpopo and Shashe Rivers, who built towns, who tilled the land, who herded cattle over huge expanses, who adorned themselves with jewellery made of their own hands in gold, who made pottery and wove fibres and fabrics and who had a philosophical understanding of the world that safeguarded their way of life over centuries.
We are reminded too of the advanced social networks and trade routes that existed a thousand years ago and the ways in which people organised themselves that brought stability to their society.
We realise that among these people must have been those who were true leaders, those who had well developed diplomatic skills, those who were innovators and those whose mission it was to preserve their way of life.
Addressing the parliament of Zimbabwe in 1997, Tata Nelson Mandela said:
‘At the swearing-in ceremonies of leaders of the great kingdoms of Mapungubwe, Great Zimbabwe and Khami, the presiding officers always underlined:
"You are the chief of everyone; father of orphans and of those who suffer."
In this way, the new chiefs were reminded of their responsibility as leaders of all, but guardians of especially the poor.
I stand before you in awe at the profundity of these words; at an injunction that has carried through generations, to ring even truer today on the responsibility of the men and women who have been elected by the people to lead modern Zimbabwe.
Such is whence our institutions of democracy derive their mandate; such is whence they claim legitimacy; such is the lodestar that should guide their actions.
The civilisation of Mapungubwe, Great Zimbabwe and Khami succumbed to the destructive power of better-armed force from across the oceans. The settlers came and they conquered. They sought to obliterate everything that these kingdoms stood for. They rewrote history in their image to deny the very being of this African civilisation - for how could they justify their own blood lust!
But in the end, the vainglorious expedition that defined might as right had to face an ignominious defeat. “
These profound and possibly prophetic words of Madiba in addition to speaking to present day citizens also painted a picture of a society that cared for the wellbeing of its people, a world where ubuntu prevailed, where the land was shared by all, and where societies were developing into fully-fledged nation states long before the arrival of the first Europeans on the Southern African shores.
This was also a society that traded with the East at a time when others assumed that no such contact existed.
This was a society which appeared to show marked social stratification and where everyone knew their place and acted in accordance with what was expected of them.
They were a society it seems as the one described by the writer, Bessie Head, when she describes the people as living together “like a deep river”.
Yet in making these deductions, we also need to be careful not to romanticise the past but to show the realities of that past even as we attempt to imagine the lives that people led then in a world so different from our own.
It is fitting that we examine such a rich history on a day that marks 50 years since the emergence of the OAU and a decade since the formation of the African Union (AU). After all it was the luminaries of the OAU who called for African narratives of the past and future, who demanded a “renascent Africa” and who embraced the notion of an African Personality.
The aim was then as it is now although through different strategies and emphases to promote an integrated, prosperous and peaceful Africa that is people centred and represents a dynamic force on the world stage.
In recent decades Africa has made great strides in preserving its histories. Notably, during 2005 South Africa along with other African countries helped to set up the African World Heritage Fund.
Currently Africa is the only continent with a fund dedicated to the implementation of the World Heritage Convention, the African World Heritage Fund. The objectives of the fund include among others insuring good conservation practice, building capacity, increasing the number of listed properties for Africa in the World Heritage List and ensuring the removal of African sites from the list of World Heritage in Danger.
More so than ever before African governments are seeing the importance of heritage. In South Africa more than sixty per cent of our annual funds are disbursed towards heritage preservations; these include Legacy Projects, archives and record keeping.
In fact we declared last year as the “Year of Heritage” which began with the oldest liberation movement in Africa, the African National Congress celebrating its 100th Anniversary and included the centenary of Alexandra and Sophiatown as among its milestones.
Allow me the opportunity of stressing the importance of learning from our past through oral traditions, collecting untold stories and celebrating unsung series. This is why in partnership with OHASA (Oral History Association) we run an Oral History programme with an annual conference every October and this year the theme will focus on land with emphasis on the centenary of the infamous “Native Land Act of 1913”. Oral History is an integral part of unearthing our intangible heritage. We too encourage young students to research and collect information in various communities.
Ours is an important task of restoring and rewriting our history. Yet clearly, the greater difficulty and challenge is where there are no written records at all, when only archaeological or even geological evidence provides clues to human existence and achievements.
The challenge is to re-piece and re-imagine the cultural past.
The challenge is also the restoration of black people to centre-stage as the bearers of flourishing iron-age civilisations, yet without romanticising that past, which an almost overpowering exercise.
The numbers of disciplines involved even at an academic level in such an exercise of ‘shaping’ history is overwhelming!
That is why it is important that MISTRA has brought all this wealth of knowledge, experience and interpretation together.
We are also challenged by the full implementation of the World Heritage Convention. In this regard it is not the task of government alone or heritage practitioners but the role of universities and institutes that are the centres of knowledge production. In fact, any long-term, viable, sustainable training must make use of universities and their resources.
It is important too that we understand and accommodate the role of civil society and communities in sustaining heritage and through cultural tourism so that they are the beneficiaries even as they actively contribute to the conservation of World heritage properties. Ultimately they are the guardians of the African Cultural renaissance.
We also cannot underestimate the significance of capturing this history for the present and future generations. This certainly restores pride, dignity, self-worth and self-confidence. It enables our youth to learn from the past and position themselves as one generation who come from a long line of thinkers, actors, blacksmiths, potters, craftspeople, traders, diplomats, kingdoms, leaders, those who tilled the soil, herded the cattle and built beautiful and magnificent hilltop palaces and towns.
Allow me to conclude with a call to action; and in the words of the delegates to the International Conference on “Living with World heritage in Africa” who celebrated the 40th Anniversary of World Heritage Convention in South Africa last year.
The delegates declared that: “Our contribution to the heritage of humankind is the sum of our present actions. World heritage in 3 words is: knowledge, awareness and belonging.”
Distinguished delegates, on this 50th anniversary, the Golden Jubilee of the OAU, let us build on the human journey that started in this southernmost part of Africa. Let us raise consciousness about those early humans who painted rocks and fashioned stone tools. Let us learn more from those who worked with metal and adorned themselves and to those who resided in Mapungubwe, those who fought wars of liberation over hundreds of years and those who shaped our freedom.
Let new generations of scholars and intellectuals approach their work with new resolve inspired by past generations.
I thank you.
