ULUTO MU CISWANGO

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Ministry of Education-Curriculum Development Center (CDC) Approved.

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CAN WE ISOLATE OUR LAND FROM OUR NATURE?

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Sometime in October 2021, we woke up to the news that a combined team of village scouts and Zambia Wildlife Authority officers got into bitter combat with the villagers of Muwele, in which about 24 people got injured. The informer said ZAWA officers used live ammunition in the nasty exchange that erupted over the villagers’ protest against officers’ arresting one of them, who they allegedly found with game meat. Mpika Radio and other media later confirmed the sad news. Bangweulu Black Lechwe- Source of conflicts Such conflicts are common in Muwele, Lavushi Manda, part of the Bangweulu Swamps Game Management area. Lavushi Manda GMA is home to large herds of black Lechwe and other species. From time immemorial, people here have lived with and hunted animals for food. Since the introduction of Protected Area status, sporadic conflicts between the indigenous people and conservationists have become familiar occurrences in this highly volatile community.  This incident reminded me ...
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ONE SWAMPY DAY IN APRIL

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Would you tell the origins and character of a man by the piece of cloth he hangs around his neck? Nor would you, by the way he polishes his boot?    Not until you get him to talk about himself. Otherwise, you will be judging a book by its cover. In this post, I digress from telling you about the how to of fishing, just to break the monotony. I present to you a bite of my true story having grown up in two spheres of one Bangweulu Swamps. It’s a portion of hardships, probably not so different from any other Unga and Bisa child brought up in a poor rural setting. Ng’ungwa lies at the very edge of the Bangweulu Swamps in the east and is famous for hosting coveys of black lechwes, sitatungas and the famous shoebill stork. It forms a boundary between the Bu-Bisa main land of Chief Chiunda Ponde and the Ba-Unga swamps of Chief Bwalya Mponda. It is home to Chikuni, a Ramsar Site , recognized as a Wetland of   international importance;   and also as an I...
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THE MATOLONGO RESURRECTION

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One of the listeners to my radio dramas asked how I manage to imagine things that usually make sense. Deliberately, I did not answer him. Instead, I led him to imagine a situation that involved our grandfathers. "If your ancestor who lived around 1900 resurrected today, would he rejoice or lament about your way of life?" "Of course, if he is like mine, he would find his village desolate. How quickly everyone deserted the once-upon-a-time beautiful village knit by kinship would strike him. He would see that the soil is the same while the rivers have become distant. The swamp that barricaded his village has dried up. He would note the same bare open space with no trees. He would wait to see some animals wandering around but will find none. Those birds he used to prey on would have significantly diminished. He would expect the rainy season to have ended by April but would find it raining in July. "He would take a walk into the nearby villages. No one would recogn...
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FISHING METHOD NUMBER FOUR- THE SEINE OR DRAGNET -MUKWAU

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This post is a continuation of where we ended in 2019, giving you highlights of life in the Bangweulu Swamps, and Lunga in particular. We started talking about fishing, the mainstay of the people in the area and we resume to continue discussing some of the methods employed to earn a living. Let’s talk about the seine net. A seine net is of historical importance in the business of commercial fishing. It is said to be the fishing method employed by the fishermen that later turned fishers of men during the time of Jesus Christ. It is one of the mass-catch methods of old that is also used in the Bangweulu Swamps today. “Seines hold a special honor in the Bible. Of all the nets mentioned in the Bible, the seine is mentioned more than any other, a total of nine times. In the Old Testament, written in Hebrew, the word for seine was "Herem" while in the New Testament, written in Greek, the word was "Sagene" from which we probably get the English word seine .” ...
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