Buganda System of Clans
“Totems are symbols that represent clans. A clan is a family group which traces its origin to one ancestor and must have two totems; the principal (muziro) for which the clan is known and the secondary one known as akabbiro. The two were held sacred in the family from one generation to another. Each clan had special names for their children and on mention of a name, clan members would know whether the child belonged to them or not.
Each clan had a freehold estate where they lived and buried their own. A freehold was established of a family if they buried in a given area from three to four generations. Not even the king would chase away such people. That would become their official estates. In Buganda, burial grounds have a special significance as far as ownership of land is concerned. The king’s chiefs were always watching out where the dead were being buried to avoid false claims from the bereaved.
The clan system was quite significant because it united members to help each other and for protection in times of war. Clans were exogamous and restricted incest. A member of one clan had to get a wife of another clan to avoid in-breeding and expand social networks. It is only the mamba (lungfish) clan that intermarried. The system even in this case is not defeated because it can only happen between members whose secondary totems (bubbiro) are different. There are two minor totems within the mamba clan; the fish muguya and the frog. When marriage prevails between the frog and the muguya under the same mamba, it is not incest because family lines are different.
Buganda being a patriarch society, when a woman got married, she adopted her husband’s totem and retained hers at the same time. So in each household, there were four principal totems held sacred and four secondary ones. The head of the family’s totem came first followed by his wife’s totem. The totem of the mother to the head of the family too was respected and much as there was no emphasis on the wife’s mother, that totem too was in the picture. These four major totems and their minor ones made a total of eight symbols making a huge impact on conservation.
The culture of totems in the world is as old as history itself. When people started developing and getting better organized, they needed symbols to identify them. In this particular area of study, this social or kinship division is patrilineal.
In Buganda, clans known as bika (kika singular) are not just family structures that simply trace ones origin only. They are a significant system with judicial powers. Each clan had a division known as a siga and the head of this siga had powers in the dispensation of justice. The siga was followed by enda and the head of this subdivision also could exercise judicial proceedings. Complainants however could appeal to the head of the siga if they were not satisfied with the verdict. The head of the clan had supreme judicial powers and if the two levels failed to satisfy the complainants, they would refer their matter to him. These posts were not hereditary. If a head of a clan died, the heads of the divisions would sit and nominate another person from the section of his clan thereby rotating power. The same applied if a head of a subdivision died.
When the wilderness weeps to preserve mankind amidst his chaos and confusion, man takes no heed to listen partly because there is so much at stake and partly because he does not discern the cry of the wild. When the bees buzz pollinating plants; he does not see beyond honey. When the forests form a splendid lush canopy on mountain tops and the country side; he does not see beyond timber. When birds of the air chirp and display their colourful plumage; his ears hear no music and his eyes see no beauty but possible trade of their feathers, eggs and meat and so goes other species of value in the market place. *The dodo is extinct because the British marksmen were perfecting their shooting targets. The rhino is extinct in Uganda because of its precious horn. The crested crane is now endangered because its habitat has been enchroached upon by man. In the process of displacing the crane, the water filters have been destroyed and all the filth now ends in the great water bodies unchecked. These water bodies incidentally supply man with the very water he consumes.
Our failure to care for the environment reflects the failure to preserve our own culture because in the days when culture prevailed, it protected the environment and the species that dwelled in it. The hills, lakes, swamps and forests belonged to Deities and this idea protected them from abuse, but with the advent of ‘civilization,’ these practices were labeled satanic by new religious teachings and at the turn of the 18th Century, the environment that had been managed by these spiritual forces of influence for thousands of years, faced the wrath of man. Indiscriminate hunting, commercial logging and other associated evils against the environment commenced. Culture in pre-colonial Uganda catered for man, the environment and protected species in their natural habitats but Western influence destroyed this institution, leaving everything in the hands of the law which law could be twisted to suit the selfish.
Some of the decision-makers in this country today come from a background that had no special regard for culture since it was the main obstacle for the colonialists. As the spires and towers of new religions shot high in the skies, cultural erosion was inevitable because ways of life paused a spiky challenge to the new unorthodox norms of belief. It did not matter what good there was in our social world; Good and bad practices were mixed up and thrown out of the system. Culture to date sounds negative to the current generation because it is associated with evil, poverty and backwardness.
There were many excuses and finger-pointing in the past because people did not know how to read and write. That episode is long gone now because the majority of decision makers has this skill and is in a much better position to decide. Culture has to be simplified and re-defined to be understood as a maker of wealth and not a backward force.
For any society to evolve and develop there must be cultural values behind it. These include food, medicine, beliefs, philosophy, dress, housing, transport, music, art, literature, to mention but a few. Culture unfortunately to the modern African elite has a satanic connotation and is therefore best left alone. We need to revisit this position and right the wrong but it is hard to exercise this since most local elites are alliterate.
African food needs better presentation. African medicine needs to be separated from witchcraft to earn the respect it deserves because it does not alleviate disease; it cures. Anthropologists need to study our beliefs and bring out the good causes behind them. Our philosophy of life rhymes better with the environment because it addresses issues in their natural habitat. All it needs is refinement and so goes our art, dress code, literature and music.
The over-hyped suits that opinion leaders of this country revere can never give us identity leave alone its chocking inconvenience. *Mahatma Gandhi could never have motivated the fabric industry of India if he hadn’t publicly denounced the suit and its tie to replace it with the Indian attire. Why as African people do we discern the intricate issues and fail the basic? The new times are calling for going back to check out the roots and see how deep the tap root went to ascertain the future of this gigantic tree that dominates the ground.
Our golden values have to resurface in a new packaging not as an instrument to fight anything but as a resource that everyone needs to know. We and our children must know our origins and learn the good from them. We cannot go on with today and tomorrow when we do not know yesterday because yesterday tells us who we are.
Source: African Truth Movement – Know Thyself
http://missingpagesinworldhistory.blogspot.com/p/know-thy-self.html
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