Mola Mbua Ndoko: Wisdom and Ways of the Bakweri People

207. “Mbgwa je ewoka yo asa kane foni livangi”.

No one dog among dogs living in the same compound runs faster than its colleagues.

Maito, maito kaii !  (It’s time to tell tales).

Yasi  nanu:  Once upon a time there lived an extremely powerful and fast running hunting dog called Mokonde.  Mokonde was very skillful in the capture of wildlife.  Consequently, the name Mokonde became a household word in the neighbourhood and beyond. 

Unfortunately, Mokonde was fond of seizing meat from other dogs, and thereafter run fast and eat the meat alone.  Ikula  Nyame  warned Mokonde to stop harassing his fellow dogs lest they should be forced to form an alliance against him, run after him, attack him, capture him, and humiliate him. 

206. ose-ndevene foni yoma o-Velimo.

No body carries along with him property into his grave.

Maito, maito  kaii  !  It’s time to tell tales.

Yasi  nanu:  Woombe (Hawk) made repeated claims that he was the king and the sole owner of the sky and the clouds and the seas and the creeks and the Mountain (e-Fako) and the top of the tallest trees in the forests. 

He proclaimed that being the king he had decreed that he alone had the prerogative to rest on top of the tallest trees and also to fly across the Mountain (e-Fako), above the clouds and over the seas and creeks. 

Woombe said he would not want to see Yuungu and other birds fly beyond the Mosanje, that is, beyond the grass/savannah zone of the Mountain.

230. An amazing prediction in Bakweri sorcery in 1907.

An amazing prediction in Bakweri sorcery in 1907.

In their determination to establish plantations of banana, cocoa, oil palms, tea at all costs to the Bakweri people, the German Colonial Administration in Buea and gangs of German nationals carried out

(a) Forceful notorious expropriations of most of the most fertile lands of the Bakweri from 1890-1914

And

(b) Brutal displacements of Bakweri populations. 

The German Administration & the plantation owners made no arrangements for the accommodation and welfare of displaced populations. On arrival at new sites families had to take care of themselves – search for food and drinking water and then built shelters and huts/houses.

229. Bakweri Funeral Spirituals composed from 1890-1914

Bakweri Funeral Spirituals composed from 1890-1914

At that time as the Bakweri continued to die under the strain of land expropriations and brutal displacements, funeral after funeral, the Bakweri composed and chanted several remarkable spirituals.  Here are four of the spirituals.

(i)   “i-nwe-eya  ndi   anu  monye  mwasu, eee  !
We are determined to die for/in our land.
Here we are being slaughtered in our own land.

(ii)  Nanu  ndi  eveli ! 
ndenga  va-samba:
mwaana  mboli  nwa !  e-Mwaana  moto  ao-nge !
This is how/what the world is – a brutal fulfillment of the citation of traditional Doctors, namely: