KAMBA PEOPLE: INTELLIGENT, BRAVE, SKILLFUL CRAFT MEN, DRUMMING AND DANCING PEOPLE OF KENYA WHO ALSO FOUNDED AFRICAN TOWNS IN PARAGUAY The Kamba (Akamba in the plural) or Wakamba are agriculturalist, music and dance-loving as well as Kikamba-speaking people of Bantu extraction living in the semi-arid Eastern Province of Kenya stretching east from Nairobi to Tsavo and north up to Embu, Kenya. The Akamba refer to their land as Ukambani; which is currently constituted by Makueni County, Kitui County and Machakos County. The Maasai call the Akamba - Lungnu and the coastal people call the Akamba – Waumanguo due to their scanty dress. The Kamba with the total population of over 4,466,000 people is regarded as Kenya`s fifth largest ethnic group. Apart from Kenya, Kamba people can also be found in Uganda, Tanzania and in south American country of Paraguay. The population of Akamba in Kenya is over 4, 348,000, about about 8,280 in Uganda and 110,000 in Tanzania. Undoubtedly the most spectacular manifestation of traditional Kamba culture was their dancing, performed to throbbing polyrhythmic drum beats. It was characterised by exceptionally acrobatic leaps and somersaults, which flung dancers into the air. The style of playing was similar to that of the equally disappeared traditions of the Embu and Chuka: the drummers would hold the long drums between their legs, and would also dance Interestingly, Kamba people as music and dance loving people are the original African descendants that founded the city of Kamba Cuá, an important Central Department Afro Paraguayan community in Paraguay. Kamba Cue people of Paraguay are known famously in South America for their awesome, intense and lively traditional African drumming and dancing performances. The Akamba are known in Paraguay as Artigas Cue -or black of Kamba Cuá. They arrived in Paraguay as members of a regiment of 250 spearmen, men and women, who accompanied General Jose Gervasio Artigas, the independence revolutionary leader of the Eastern Band (the current Uruguay) in his exile in Paraguay in 1820. After their arrival to Asunción, they settled in the Campamento Loma area, practicing dairy and secondarily agriculture. However, in the 1940s, they were dispossessed of their land by General Higinio Morinigo. Out of their land of 100 hectares they were given paltry 3 hectares to stay on. However, the community survived, kept his chapel and dances, created a football club (Jan Six-ro) and one school of drum and dance for children. Their ballet is the only Afro-Paraguayan expression, and premiered at the Folk Festival peach Uruguay Yi sings in 1992, where it won the Golden charrúa. Their original lands at Campamento Loma remained vacant, and Kamba Cuá recently occupied them and planted the manioc, but by unfair and discriminating government decision (post-Stroessner), they were accused of being terrorists, beaten and evicted. Today, according official estimates, in Kumba Cuá there live about 300 families (between 1.200 and 2,500 people). However, according censuses of the Afro Paraguayan Association Kamba Cuá, this community it formed has only 422 people. Historically, Kamba were ancient hunters that traveled together with their Bantu cousins, the Kikuyus, in the Great Bantu migration from West Africa to Central, Eastern and Southern Africa. It is believed that Kamba and the Kikuyus came to settle together in Kenya as one group until they separated. Kamba settled in Taveta until the 17th century when they dispersed to the lower parts of the Eastern province. The major reason for migration was their search of water and pasture for their livestock. Despite the incontrovertible evidence that Kamba are undiluted Bantu group, some anthropologists believe that the Akamba as a result of living amongst various Kenyan ethnic groups, are now a mixture of several East African people, and bear traits of the Bantu farmers (Kikuyu, Taita) as well as those of the Nilotic pastoralists (Maasai, Kalenjin, Borana, etc.) and the cushite communities with whom they share borders, to the east of Tsavo. During the colonial era, British colonial officials considered the Kamba to be the premier martial race of Africa. The Kamba themselves appeared to embrace this label by enlisting in the colonial army in large numbers. After confidently describing the Kamba serving in the Kings African Rifles (the KAR, Britains East African colonial army) as loyal soldiers of the Queen during the Mau Mau Emergency, a press release by the East Africa Command went on to characterize the Kamba as a fighting race. These sentiments were echoed by other colonial observers in the early 1950s who deemed the Kamba a hardy, virile, courageous, and mechanically-minded tribe. Considered by many officers to be the best [soldierly] material in Africa, the Kamba supplied the KAR with askaris (soldiers) at a rate that was three to four times their percentage of the overall Kenyan population.(artsci.wustl.edu/~tparsons/journal_articles/kamba.pdf) The Kamba people were also very brave and successfully resisted an attempt by the British colonialist to seize their livestock in an obnoxious livestock control legislation in 1938. They peacefully fought the British until the law was repealed. Among the Akamba people, lack of rain is considered an event requiring ritual intervention. As a result they perform a ritual rain making dance called Kilumi. It is a healing rite designed to restore environmental balance through spiritual blessings, movement, offering, and prayers. According to Akamba, Kilumi has been present since the very beginning of Kamba existence. This ritual emphasizes symbolic dance movements as a key force in achieving the goal of the ceremony. The heart of the dance ritual is its spiritual essence; in fact, it is the spiritual aspect that distinguishes the dances of Africans and their descendants worldwide. For this reason, it is important to understand the nature of rituals. Dance rituals take participants on a journey; they are designed to foster a transformation moving them to different states, with the ultimate goal of invoking spiritual intervention to resolve the problem at hand. In line with other collective cultures, identity is based on the social system; therefore it is not strange to find among the Kamba community‟s source of intellectual property proverbs such as, Kathoka kanini kaitemaa muti munene, Which roughly translates to (A small axe does not chop down a huge tree), or another one too is; Kyaa kimwe kiyuwaa ndaa, (One finger cannot squash a bug) to emphasize how peoples‟ allegiance to groups takes priority over their personal goals. A famous Kamba woman called Syokimau, a Prophetess and a great Healer - Prophesied the coming of the white people to Kenya and prophesied also about the construction of the Mombasa to Kisumu railway line. In her prophecy she said she could see people of a different colour carrying fire inside waters which was later to be understood as white people in vessels carrying match boxes and guns. She prophesied seeing a long snake that whose head was in the Indian Ocean and the tail was in Lake Victoria. Kitili Maluki Mwendwa, the first black Chief Justice of independent Kenya, Dr Willy Mutunga, current Chief Justice of Kenya, Samuel Kivuitu chairman of Electoral Commission, Professor Kivutha Kibwana, former cabinet minister, former Dean of Law Faculty University Of Nairobi and current Governor Makueni are all notably people from Kamba tribe.
Posted on: Tue, 23 Dec 2014 07:28:38 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015