fPcN interCultural:

defenders of free tribal life

1.Do the Bushmen have a representative in the Botswana government?

The bushmen don’t have any representatives in the Botswana government

2.The Botswanas governments says that the relocation of the Gana and Gwi Bushmen to New Xade would be necessary for providing educational development. Would you say that this kind of development is a good alternative for your people to live in dignity and self-determination?

The development that the government mean is not the truth because we the bushmen have it not seen.is that we moved to the resettlements camps, we got a high HIV rate of our people in the resettlement camps. Now the graveyards are full of our people. Is that development? Now we talking about people which culture has changed now. They receiving a lot of HIV, alcoholism, violence after getting drunk, committing suicide those things we’re not used to. We don’t term that as development to us it’s only to kill the Bushmen. and finish their lives and their lifestyle of the bushmen. The school of the government is talking about have never come out with any good results. You recently have ask me the question if the bushmen have any representatives in the government and the answer was, no and a lot of kids was taking to school. Whereby that school could have some good results by having some of the Bushmen representing us on the government. So that show that that the school has not brought any results so you can not call that development.
3.Would you say that this eviction is a systematic one to obliterate your traditional lifestyle?

To my own looking at this relocation is to finish the name of the bushmen is to finish the bushmen at all, not to been seen at end. Because it´s just like digging a graveyard of people putting them inside and then covered them with sand. So that those people could not been seen at all. I look this kind of relocation to be like that.

4.Are their any movements of young Bushmen to follow the steps of your ancestors or do they rather prefer the western way of live?

We are afraid of that, that a lot of our bushmen kids not want to follow our ancestors lifestyle. It is not that their are interested in western kind of live but the problem is that the government is force them into different culture like talking to school we they learn about western culture they learn about some peoples culture and they are forced on that the language also they use different language so even the language is about to finish our language. So by doing that they are not given an opportunity to learn our ancestral culture, which we had, grew them up with. So I would not say that there is some of the Bushmen kids wish following our ancestral culture because all these things we were doing where we evicted from. They are not allowed to hunting. Where they are they cannot do any gathering, where they are there is nothing for the medicine men. So all these things are not there on this place. So from there we pushed at this place and been forced in the modern culture but that is what we are keep they are keen to learn culture but we are not allowed.

5.Are you getting benefits or support from corporations who use parts of your traditional knowledge for business?

All this corporations or organisation, which use the Bushmen knowledge’s and ask everything from the Bushmen doesn’t benefit them. Whites and others came and ask in the name of the Bushmen for funds, they make proposals Bushmen benefits nothing from that. They use that money for their own activities which doesn’t benefits anything from the bushmen. It is time for us, the bushmen, to stop this kind of things from peoples names been used which doesn’t benefit them. One thing if you go and look at this kind of corporations and organisations you see not one of them been run by the Bushmen themselves. All are foreigners all are black people who come and they celebrate. The question comes up, how could they know the problems of the Bushmen. They don’t know our lifestyle, how we live, what we need and what we want. So how could they represent our interests? So I’m afraid of that kind of people. It is just to use the bushmen’s names for their own interests.

6.Would you say that living like your ancestors did is in the opposite of economic interests?

We are not economic, because we don’t need anything to buy. We ‘re not needed to go to shops, we’re not needed to work. What we have to work is: each and everyone has to wake up early in the morning and go into the bush to find something to eat. To hunt and to eat, that is work. At the end of the day you bring something home for the survival of your family. So if there is something to change it is up to us, according to our culture. We want this thing to go to generation and generation and generation. If we were hunters we want kids from school to go hunting, to learn how to use a bow and an arrow they have to know all the tricks, all these things that have to be done when we go to the hunting. We need all this things to pass it to our grand grand children. So that is the education we want to pass to our kids. And we can even pass it to the global, to the world. People come to learn this. This is the way of our live, teaching. Don’t say you want developing us. Let me develop you to our culture. There are a lot of things, which we can develop by our self. A lot of problems now, which we face with our kids, which we are taking to school, is that they do much at school but they don’t bring good results at school. They don’t got this qualified education to go to university. They fail at school because of the language. It is a problem to them. After they fail they come back home. One thing they have wasted about 15 to 20 years in school their lives become difficult. Now they just sit down you find them at the shopping you find them at bad places most of them go to prison because of stealing peoples cattle and goats and all these things are not good for them. That these are the problems we face.

7.(What for experience you have with nature conservation organisations?) later…

8.Would you believe that a bigger resonance in the media could help your people?

I thing this media can help us if journalists go up there and right the real story they get from the bushmen. Not going there looking at the Bushmen like one of the journalist who look at my glasses and mobile that I have. That is not the way I want to live. That’s why I’m still complaining and saying and talking, so people have to listen to our problems get what we are saying told from us ride it and publish it. I think that can help us.

9.(Roy, as a traditional medicine man, what kind of healing do you work with?) later…

10.What are your wishes and dreams not only for you but also for your children and grandchildren?

Mainly for my children and my grandchildren that they can go back to the ancestral land, practicing culture, learn things which our forefathers, forefathers, forefathers, forefathers, father me, brothers did before they have left the land and live in the conditions they lived.

11.Have you any questions to the people in Europe?

My question is to ask the European people, that a lot of countries in Europe, there is Sweden, there is Germany, UK, France, Italy, Holland, what ever. My question is: do they have one religion? Or are they different? Or do they speak one language because all of them are whites they looks the same? But I’ve been not want to going around and they got different languages they speak and no one have force them to learn or to be in one religion. So we also don’t want to get forced to have one language or one religion.
Note: Done by FdN - 12.12.05 - Berlin

Region

• South Africa

Topic

• Human Rights

Tribe

• Hadzabe