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5 Genealogical Geographies

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Remaking Mutirikwi
This chapter is in the book Remaking Mutirikwi
1395GenealogicalGeographies After 2000, land occupations around Mutirikwi meant disputes be-tween rival chiefs and clans over boundaries, people and ‘ancestral territories’ re-emerged with new immediacy. These related directly to re-imagined and re-membered pre-colonial landscapes, involving contested ‘history-scapes’ (Fontein 2006a:19) and what I shall call ‘genealogical geographies’. In 2005/06 such disputes were particularly prominent on occupied state lands bordering the lake’s southern shores, which had been subject to squatting, and in some places formal resettlement, in the 1980s. But they also took place on farms to the north being resettled for the first time, as well as to the east around Zano, which had ‘reverted’ to native reserve in the late 1950s to settle people removed for the dam. At Boroma, the grazing areas of mhinda mirefu (long fields) resettle-ments and an irrigation scheme from the 1980s were re-occupied in 2002 by the late Chief Mudarikwa Murinye and his people, provoking new boundary disputes with Chief Mugabe. As territorial markers rivers fea-tured prominently (especially the inundated Mutirikwi river), as did the graves and ruins of past occupations and new burials, such as Mudarik-wa’s own burial in 2004. With prevailing droughts these disputes also reverberated through the distribution of food aid, as chiefly territories were conflated with new ward boundaries, and hungry people crossed disputed boundaries to seek assistance from whoever was able to source it. Not far from Boroma, Chief Mugabe placed settlers on state lands between the lakeshore and parts of former Mzero and Le Rhone farms, a section of the lake’s protective boundary zone later earmarked for the Great Zimbabwe University. Besides his own clan these settlers included vatorwa incomers, some of whom became sabhuku (village heads) as the chief tried to increase these under his jurisdiction to bolster his status among local rivals.1 In a contiguous stretch of land between the lake and Great Zimbabwe, long-standing tensions between Mugabe, Nemanwa and Charumbira, as well as within the Mugabe clan, re-emerged as various Haruzvivishe ‘houses’ (particular branches or families within the clan) re-occupied lands they had been removed from twice before: by Morgenster mission in the 1940s and 1950s, and by the independ-ent government after earlier re-occupations in the 1980s. Further west, 1 Mai Makasva 26/11/05.
© 2015, Boydell and Brewer

1395GenealogicalGeographies After 2000, land occupations around Mutirikwi meant disputes be-tween rival chiefs and clans over boundaries, people and ‘ancestral territories’ re-emerged with new immediacy. These related directly to re-imagined and re-membered pre-colonial landscapes, involving contested ‘history-scapes’ (Fontein 2006a:19) and what I shall call ‘genealogical geographies’. In 2005/06 such disputes were particularly prominent on occupied state lands bordering the lake’s southern shores, which had been subject to squatting, and in some places formal resettlement, in the 1980s. But they also took place on farms to the north being resettled for the first time, as well as to the east around Zano, which had ‘reverted’ to native reserve in the late 1950s to settle people removed for the dam. At Boroma, the grazing areas of mhinda mirefu (long fields) resettle-ments and an irrigation scheme from the 1980s were re-occupied in 2002 by the late Chief Mudarikwa Murinye and his people, provoking new boundary disputes with Chief Mugabe. As territorial markers rivers fea-tured prominently (especially the inundated Mutirikwi river), as did the graves and ruins of past occupations and new burials, such as Mudarik-wa’s own burial in 2004. With prevailing droughts these disputes also reverberated through the distribution of food aid, as chiefly territories were conflated with new ward boundaries, and hungry people crossed disputed boundaries to seek assistance from whoever was able to source it. Not far from Boroma, Chief Mugabe placed settlers on state lands between the lakeshore and parts of former Mzero and Le Rhone farms, a section of the lake’s protective boundary zone later earmarked for the Great Zimbabwe University. Besides his own clan these settlers included vatorwa incomers, some of whom became sabhuku (village heads) as the chief tried to increase these under his jurisdiction to bolster his status among local rivals.1 In a contiguous stretch of land between the lake and Great Zimbabwe, long-standing tensions between Mugabe, Nemanwa and Charumbira, as well as within the Mugabe clan, re-emerged as various Haruzvivishe ‘houses’ (particular branches or families within the clan) re-occupied lands they had been removed from twice before: by Morgenster mission in the 1940s and 1950s, and by the independ-ent government after earlier re-occupations in the 1980s. Further west, 1 Mai Makasva 26/11/05.
© 2015, Boydell and Brewer

Chapters in this book

  1. Frontmatter i
  2. Contents vi
  3. Illustrations ix
  4. Acknowledgements x
  5. Note on Fieldwork, Notes & Sources xii
  6. Glossary xiii
  7. Acronyms & Abbreviations xvii
  8. Chronology xix
  9. Remaking Mutirikwi: An Introduction 1
  10. PART ONE Remaking Mutirikwi in the 2000s
  11. 1 New Farmers, Old Claims 26
  12. 2 Graves, Ruins and Belonging 52
  13. 3 Rain, Power and Sovereignty 78
  14. 4 Hippos, Fishing and Irrigation 112
  15. 5 Genealogical Geographies 139
  16. PART TWO Damming Mutirikwi 1940s–1990s
  17. 6 New White Futures, New Rhodesian Settlers and Large-scale Irrigation, 1940s–1950s 170
  18. 7 Remaking Fort Victoria’s Landscapes, 1950s–1960s 197
  19. 8 War & Danger in the Wake of the Dam, 1970s 230
  20. 9 Promising Returns and Frustrated Futures in the Wake of War, 1980s–1990s 256
  21. Epilogue: Remaking Mutirikwi in the late 2000s & early 2010s 288
  22. Bibliography 310
  23. Index 329
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https://doi.org/10.1515/9781782045243-012

Chapters in this book

  1. Frontmatter i
  2. Contents vi
  3. Illustrations ix
  4. Acknowledgements x
  5. Note on Fieldwork, Notes & Sources xii
  6. Glossary xiii
  7. Acronyms & Abbreviations xvii
  8. Chronology xix
  9. Remaking Mutirikwi: An Introduction 1
  10. PART ONE Remaking Mutirikwi in the 2000s
  11. 1 New Farmers, Old Claims 26
  12. 2 Graves, Ruins and Belonging 52
  13. 3 Rain, Power and Sovereignty 78
  14. 4 Hippos, Fishing and Irrigation 112
  15. 5 Genealogical Geographies 139
  16. PART TWO Damming Mutirikwi 1940s–1990s
  17. 6 New White Futures, New Rhodesian Settlers and Large-scale Irrigation, 1940s–1950s 170
  18. 7 Remaking Fort Victoria’s Landscapes, 1950s–1960s 197
  19. 8 War & Danger in the Wake of the Dam, 1970s 230
  20. 9 Promising Returns and Frustrated Futures in the Wake of War, 1980s–1990s 256
  21. Epilogue: Remaking Mutirikwi in the late 2000s & early 2010s 288
  22. Bibliography 310
  23. Index 329
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