Nc'wala Ceremony

Nc’wala Traditional Ceremony is the custodian of the Ngoni culture in Zambia, Malawi, Tanzania, Kenya, Rwanda, Mozambique, Zimbabwe and South Africa. Nc’wala Ceremony is celebrated during the last week of February every year. It was revived in 1980 to enable the Ngoni people: pay homage to their ancestral spirits, commemorate their victories during the tribal wars and praise the Lord for giving them fresh crops in the fields.

The 28th of February 2009, I was looking forward to the ceremony. I heard it is one of the tourist-drawing events in Chipata. Despite the late night out on the eve of the ceremony, I managed to wake up early and gear up for the event. I even convinced two priests to join me. We arrived at Mtenguleni Village at half past nine in the morning. The place was busy, which enable you to get the feel of the event. There was “tiangge” (in Philippine’s term) and a number of I/NGOs pitched tent for VCT and IEC. It was indeed an event that can be maximized for advocacy since there were many people that came to witness.

We reached the arena and tried to look for other people from the Diocese. On this occasion, I experienced once again the privilege of being attached to a church based organization. The Diocese got an invite to the event; hence, we were allocated with a comfortable viewing space. An usherette even led us to the tent for the Diocese. We sat and witnessed spectators come and go, performers practicing and showing off their traditional costumes. I also bought a headdress made of animal’s skin. After an hour of waiting for the ceremony to begin, heavy rains started pouring and a lot of people flocked to our tent, making it suffocating and warm. I have become restless because an hour was a long wait. But it was not the worst because the ceremony did not begin until 1 o’clock in the afternoon. Some of the people from the Diocese decided to leave even before it started because it was really a disappointing 4-hour waiting period. The main reasons being the most important people of the event came very late. They were the President and the Paramount Chief of the Ngoni tribe. It made me think why anywhere in the world, those occupying the highest position on earth always try to prove their worth and authority in a wrong way. People travelled from different places just to witness the event only to wait in agony because those who were supposed to be leader of the country were giving a negative example to people.

I went home disappointed because the people have been uncontrollable, after the rains, they have covered the ground obstructing our view from the nice position we were in. Part of the event was the unveiling of the statue of the first Paramount Chief. This was the only part we witnessed and we decided to go home disappointed. The waiting was not worth it because despite the long period we failed to see anything.

The Paramount Chief is the chief of all chiefs, honored and praised. Zambia highly regards the traditional form of governance. Moreover, the Paramount Chief is even superior to the President. In my four months in Zambia, I still fail to understand their system of governance. I find it hard to reconcile the roles and delineation of traditional leaders and the formal governance, since chiefs of chiefdoms are very important decision-makers in their villages. I also have difficulty trying to understand the tribal groups. I am not sure if they are the counterpart of our Indigenous Peoples in the Philippines because everyone in Zambia belongs to a particular tribe. I have yet to discover if this system of having a Kingdom has existed even before colonial period or it was an influence from the colonizers. In Zambia, Chiefs are one of the most powerful decision-makers on matters pertaining to land. This system of Kingdom I find very interesting and I hope that I would manage to understand better how it works before I complete my placement.