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San community approaches Mnangagwa

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THE San community, a minority group found in parts of Matabeleland North and South provinces, has approached President Emmerson Mnangagwa, seeking formal recognition and integration into the mainstream developmental agenda.

THE San community, a minority group found in parts of Matabeleland North and South provinces, has approached President Emmerson Mnangagwa, seeking formal recognition and integration into the mainstream developmental agenda.

BY SILAS NKALA

TSORO-O-TSO San Development Trust director, Davy Ndlovu, told Southern Eye that his lobby group wrote to President Mnangagwa this week bringing to his attention the lack of recognition they had endured since the colonial era.

The San are mostly found in Tsholotsho, Matabeleland North and Plumtree in Matabeleland South province. They are traditionally known as nomadic hunters and gatherers.

In the letter, Ndlovu claimed that his tribe had not been formally recognised over the last 90 years when they were forcibly evicted from their ancestral land to pave way for the establishment of the Wankie Game Reserve, now Hwange National Park, by the colonial regime.

“Since that time to this day, the San’s lives have been thrown into social disarray as many of them live in poverty on the outer edges of society. They have been called names and some people have gone as far as suggesting that they are primitive people that need to be made to change,” he said.

“…Of all Zimbabweans, the San are the least educated and they do not have a local governance structure since they don’t have own chiefs.”

He said their language was critically endangered with only a dozen elderly still using it.

“All they are asking for, Sir, is inclusion in all mainstream developmental programmes, including the availing of land for the San, education, health recognition of their cultural heritage and language.”

In May 2013, former President Robert Mugabe during the memorial service of the late Vice-President John Landa Nkomo accused the San community in Tsholotsho of resisting integration with neighbouring communities and shunning civilisation The San population is estimated to be over 2 500 across the country.