Whither the Karakubis bogosi?

With the easing up of Covid- 19 restrictions, villages throughout the country have been permitted to commence discussions on choosing their traditional leaders where there are vacancies.

Where either dikgosi or their subordinates have left office for various reasons or have passed on, some villages have begun to seriously address the sometimes tricky question of deciding the successor.

Not so with the village of Karakubis in the Gantsi District. The last kgosi of the village, Tlhophane Botshake, left office owing to old age in October 2020 and it appears that only half- hearted measures have been taken so far by sections of the community to seriously address the question of succession.

There never was a time when the whole community came together at the kgotla to look into the matter in spite of efforts made by some of the headmen of arbitration to convene a kgotla meeting for this specific purpose.

It is difficult to determine where the community’s lack of interest or enthusiasm about the issue stems from the fact that it may be a result of the now deceased Kgosi Tlhophane’s apparent disinclination to convene a full kgotla

meeting to officially inform the morafe,

that he was leaving office.

It is possible that the morafe is in a state of suspense, as some even talk of inviting the District Commissioner to the village to explain to them what is going on, and possibly suggest the way forward.

It is possible also that people have difficulty deciding from which of the ethnic groups that make up the community the next ruler is going to come from.

In attempting to address some of these vexing questions, we will consider the history of the village, the ethnic composition of the morafe, and the history of the village’s bogosi itself.

Karakubis village dates its origins from the early years of the 20th century when it was called Habakubis that being the name of the first village well from which the small community drew water. The well was owned by Kgagarape Kene, a Motlharo who came from Batlharo country in the Northern Cape Province, South Africa.

The name Karakubis was later adopted by the new settlement that slowly developed as more people continued trickling in, chiefly from nearby Kaepe, South Africa and later Mokaleng, present- day Aminuis in the Gobabis district of eastern Namibia.

Some came in from northern Kgalagadi where they had lived alongside the Bakgalagadi for many years, and others from the Okwa valley in the southern parts of modern Gantsi District.

As to why and when the name Habakubis changed to Karakubis must remain unknown, except perhaps, to draw attention to the fact that there is a Herero settlement called Karukuwisa in the Grootfontein area of Namibia in Herero country.

This is the name that the Herero may have used to refer to Habakubis, but which the Batswana later corrupted to read Karakubis. The meaning of the name Habakubis is equally shrouded in mystery and remains a subject of baseless speculation that need not tie us down.

It is significant to note that before the people of Tswana stock arrived in Karakubis the Herero freely grazed and watered their herds in the open country south of modern Rietfontein.

This is the area of which Karakubis is a part and it fell on the Bechuanaland side when the Bechuanaland - South West Africa boundary was drawn up in the 19th century. The Rietfontein area is said to have been teeming with wildlife at the time and served as a favourable hunting ground for Kaepe and early Karakubis inhabitants who called it Lotlhakane.

Herero activity in early Karakubis is borne out by the names of some of the pans in the outskirts of the village, as well as that of the first settlement that preceded Karakubis ( Kaepe) out of which some of the early inhabitants of Karakubis came.

Names like Kankamele, Lomahwe and Kaepe, all said to be of Herero origin but since Tswanalised, readily come to mind. Kaepe lies to the north of present day Karakubis where Gaebuse Mabung is said to have dug a well that sustained both humans and animals.

The settlement was abandoned, especially after the erection of the border fence. White farmers on the Namibian side began to shoot and kill with impunity any Batswana cattle that crossed the fence.

There is a sad story of a widow named Mmadikuku Maruping who, as fate would have it, woke up one morning a confident owner of a sizeable herd but died a pauper that same day.

Mmadikuku’s lost almost all her cattle to white farmers who shot them dead leaving her with only five animals. The colonial authorities are said never to have done anything about this incident as they may have been complicit in the commission of the cruel act.

The inhabitants of Kaepe relocated to Karakubis, which was strategically located next to the new Gantsi- Gobabis motor road that initially passed south of Kankamele pan.

Karakubis is small, both in terms of size and population, and is currently inhabited by five ethnic communities, namely the Batlharo, Barolong, Bakgalagadi, Ovaherero and Basarwa. Of these, the first two each speaks a variant of the same language, Setswana.

Before all these people were brought together under one ruler with the accession to the bogosi of Matlamme Leacwe in 1950, only the Barolong and Batlharo had their own nominal rulers.

Karakubis came under one ruler after the District Commissioner at the time realised that the Batlharo and Barolong were so few in numbers as to qualify for the appointment of a ruler for each of them.

At the time of Matlamme’s appointment, the nominal ruler of all the Barolong was Asirile Magano, whom the Barolong had installed as kgosi at the behest of Tlhage Modise a Morakile Rolong who had himself declined to be kgosi of ba- ga- Morakile following their removal from Klein Kalkfontein, Tsootshane Pan, to Karakubis in 1939, and of the death that same year of their erstwhile ruler, Kgobetsinyane Ntshekang.

The Bakgalagadi in Tshootsha or Kalkfontein had lodged a complaint with the colonial authorities that the

ba- ga- Morakile Barolong were illtreating them and subjecting them to indignities, whereupon the authorities had the Barolong moved to Karakubis or Kaepe proper to join other Batswana there, the majority of whom were Batlharo.

The year also saw the removal of a small group of Bakgalagadi from Karakubis to join their kinsmen in Tsootsha in an effort to stem the tide of inter- ethnic rivalry. There were a few families that remained though, among them those of Molehanku and Masenakwe.

Meanwhile the Herero and Basarwa, owing to their nomadic herder and hunter- gatherer lifestyles respectively, did not feature in the Karakubis bogosi issues, at least in terms of consideration for leadership positions, albeit, as in the case of the Herero, they could partake in kgotla deliberations.

For instance, a Herero man known simply as Tumbee is said to have been vocal in bogosi succession discussions. And with the Bakgaladi, Ovaherero and Basarwa out of the picture, the village of Karakubis was considered a Batswana settlement whose rulers had to be drawn from either of the two ethnic groups.

When it was decided that only one ruler was needed for the village, the Barolong had a ready candidate in the person of Matlamme Leacwe Mothibi, himself a descendant of the Maiketso house of the Mariba Barolong dynasty of Morokweng.

Boo- Mariba are a branch of the Ratlou Barolong. Asirile Magano and Jackane Mangate were thus overlooked in favour of a Rolong royal. Although he did not enjoy the support of some of his fellow Barolong, particularly on the grounds that his father had never ruled and that he was himself not a man of means, Matlamme was declared

kgosi in 1950.

He was in the years that followed confirmed in his position alongside his compatriots, Theko Kaome in Tsootsha, Kavangera Kurukava in Makunda, and Ramoswaane Leswape and Keakopa Peter of Kole and Ncojane respectively.

The Karakubis morafe decided at that time that whenever a ruler came from either of the ethnic groups, the court secretary would come from the other. Thus Malgas Peloole, a Motlharo from the Phadima section of the Batlharo, became court secretary when Matlamme became kgosi.

Kgosi Matlamme ruled uninterruptedly until he abdicated in 1968 because of old age. The country was now two years into independence and by then some of the bogosi arrangements made in the early 1950’ s were either forgotten not strictly adhered to or simply discarded.

For instance, tribal secretaries were no longer appointed by merafe, and it would appear, the requirement that the two ethnic groups should occupy the bogosi seat on an alternate basis was not strictly adhered to.

Matlamme was given a free hand to invite his sons, Mogwera and Mothibi, to take over from him but none of them showed any interest. Enoch ( Henoke) Mothibi, Matlamme’s younger brother, emerged as the ‘ pretender’ but was rejected on the grounds that he did not have a permanent home in Karakubis and was a “farms man.”

With the Barolong having failed to produce a candidate, the Batlharo were then asked to find a ruler from amongst their ranks. Karakubis has five Batlharo ‘ wards,’ namely Ba- Phadima, BaKhidi, Ba- Keakopa, Ba- Koledi, Basetlhatsela or Basetlatsela and Bahute.

A ruler had to be drawn from the most senior of these wards. The Bakhidi were at that time considered the most senior but did not have a candidate. Next in rankings came the Ba- Phadima whose ward consists of three divisions, Notwane, Mabung and Tlhophane.

From the last division was chosen Tshakhong Botshake, the eldest son of Botshake Tlhophane, who was subsequently confirmed in his position as the next ruler of Karakubis. Tshakhong’s rule, too, ran without incident from 1968 to 1978 when he died in office.

And as was customary, the morafe

came together again to choose a new ruler. Two men, Leio Asirile Magano and Tlhophane Tshakhong Botshake submitted their names for consideration.

The third candidate was Kebopecwe Sabone whose name was proposed by sections of the morafe. Leio Magano’s name was rejected outright, thereby leaving the stage to Tlhophane Botshake and Kebopecwe Sabone.

And since the latter was away from home out in Ngamiland on family pursuits, Tlhophane remained the only candidate and was thus chosen the next ruler.

Tlhophane Botshake’s rule was by far the longest, spanning a period of fortytwo years, from 1978 to 2020. He died in 2021, one year after stepping down, but before he could gather together his people to inform them that he had left office.

The village has been without a leader since October 2020 and the three heads of arbitration do not have the authority to attend to cases that would normally require the presence of a kgosi.

People are now forced to travel to Tshootsha, some 30 odd kilometres away, to have their cases attended to at the local kgotla. This, in a nutshell, is the situation with the Karakubis bogosi as at the time of writing.

The burning question now is where to go from here and how to proceed. Residents say that a promise was made by the District Commissioner’s Office when Covid- 19 was still raging that an officer would be sent in to address the morafe on the subject of succession but that never happened, probably because the office needed to adhere to Covid- 19 protocols.

Another promise was made after things had eased up to the effect that a letter would be forthcoming to inform the morafe about the next course of action but again nothing seems to have come of that.

Amidst all this, there are unconfirmed reports that the DC’s office met some members of the Botshake family at one stage to discuss the question of succession. If such reports are true, then it means things are not going in the right direction.

It should be made clear to all and sundry that the Karakubis bogosi is not hereditary. There never was a time when residents of Karakubis came together and decided on creating a dynasty for the village. At no time was it ever agreed that the rulers of that village would be drawn from any one single family.

We have attempted to demonstrate above how all the rulers from Kgosi

Matlamme to Kgosi Tlhophane were selected. In case there are some who believe that Tlhophane, the last ruler, inherited bogosi from his father through dynastic succession, they will need to disabuse their minds of this because it simply is not correct.

The fact that between themselves Tshakhong and his son Tlhophane have a solid 52 years as dikgosi does not in any way make their family a permanent ruling house.

Towards the end of his rule, Tlhophane found himself facing a challenge from the Mothibi family, from which Kgosi Matlamme came. The family is said to have demanded, among others, that Tlhophane give way to them because they were the rightful rulers of Karakubis.

The Mothibis considered Tlhophane to have been merely holding fort for them and that he should surrender the throne to them now that they were ready to take over, although it is not clear whether they had a ready candidate. The Mothibis had in doing this seriously misdirected themselves.

No one ever declared the house of