From Enslavement to Environmentalism: Politics on a Southern African Frontier

Chapter 1: Compulsory Labor and Unclaimed Land in Gogoi, Mozambique, 1862-1992

1 COMPULSORY LABOR AND UNCLAIMED LAND IN GOGOI, MOZAMBIQUE, 1862-1992 GOGOI'S DOCUMENTED HISTORY COMPRISES TWO PERIODS OF WARFARE bounding ninety-odd years of peace. From 1862 to 1889, the Gaza Nguni empire ruled the area, subjected it to tribute, and raided neighboring polities . From 1979 to 1992, Renamo and Frelimo contested Gogoi, alternately occupying and attacking it. During both of these periods, political leaders enslavedsmallholderfarmers. Thatisto say,theycompelledmen andwomen to serve as property and/or to perform work in a fashion qualitatively different from the wage labor form. People functioned as tribute,. as soldiers , and as carriers of materiel. War and its associated maneuvers, then, placed wealth in people at the pivot of power in Gogoi. Yet, war did not havethiseffectthrough anycharacterintrinsictoeitherAfricanwarsorGogoi politics. Frelimo and RenanIo did not force people to work because, like a repressed psychological drive, awill to enslave suddenly resurfaced. In fact, the ninety-year peace had kept the practice offorced labor alive and active. Portuguese rule perpetuated many of the underlying forms of the Gaza Nguni kingdom. After 1975, the warring parties-especially Renamocapitalized upon people's familiarity with colonial methods of recruiting forced labor. Inthis regard, war was merelyaharsherform ofpeace. So, too, peace underthePortuguese resembledthe mildermoments ofGogoi'swars. Portugal, however, had taken power over Gogoi in the 1890S with positive , forward-looking purposes. The first administrators hoped to develop the region and its people. Located on a fertile upland relatively free of disease , Gogoi couldbecome a center for white settlementand white production ofcrops and livestock. But Gogoi's location was unfortunate: the Buzi 22 COMPULSORY LABOR AND UNClAIMED LAND IN GOGOI and Rusitu rivers hemmed it in on three sides, while the international border blocked the only outlet. Both rivers flooded in the wet season, and Rhodesia periodically dosed the border to agricultural products. Portugal mighthave overcome at leastthe riverine obstacles, but it disposed ofscant finances for infrastructural improvement. Gogoi's development, then, depended on inadequate bridges and ferries and was constantly stymied. For reasons ranging from bombs to broken cables, this infrastructure still cannot deliver the goods on time. Thus, the political history of Gogoi's administration centers on an enduring tension between vision and reality: the ambition of white colonizationand the outcomeofarrested development. Thestrainbecamemost apparent during the short periods when whites did colonize Gogoi. This chapter presents two such historical junctures, moments when white-run enterprisestriedto takelandandproduce from it. Atthese times, Portuguese hopes ran high.Wouldthe settlerstransform northern Mossurize into aproducer ofwealth rather than merely an exporter oflabor? The answer is no. These failures led the administration to rely upon the only economic activity that consistently worked in Mossurize: forced labor for agricultural andindustrialventureslocated elsewhere. Bydefault, Gogoi becamealabor reserve-thedeadendofitsdevelopment from thePortuguesepointofview. For the Gogoi chieftaincy, however, forced labor was anything but stagnant . This chapter follows that chieftaincy through multiple phases of Portugueseforced labor. Colonialadministrators delegatedto him andother lineage leaders the task of recruiting workers. Thus co-opted, chiefs occupied atenuous position: theycontrolled the labor oftheir subjects, but, in so doing, they risked antagonizing and ultimately losing followers. Although Frelimo abolished forced labor, Chief Gogoi regained this control under Renamo's occupation. In 1992. however, the system of forced labor finally collapsed. The chapter, then, endswithGogoiand otherchiefsonthe thresholdofan unprecedentedsituation: thecessationofthecorveecombinedwith another,moreseriousintrusionofwhitesettlers. Chapter5explores this threat of colonization and Gogoi's equally unprecedented response to it. PRE-PORTUGUESE POWER, ROOTED AND UPROOTED Longbefore 1890, migratorymovements had brought new people and new rulers to the Chimanimani and Sitatonga uplands. These early conquests andexpansionsresembledIgorKopytoff's (1987) frontier processmuch more than theydid thecadastral politics ofthe twentieth century. Inotherwords, 23 PART 1. COLONIZATION, FAILED AND SUCCESSFUL polities rose and fell as men sought to free themselves from patriarchs in one place and to become patriarchs themselves in another place. The first known revolution ofthiskind inZimbabweoccurredinthelateseventeenth century when a number of lineages departed from the Rozvi state of the central highlands. Moving east, these mwoyo-totem dans conquered the dziva dans of the Save Valley and eastward.l Under paramount chief Mutema, the conquerors maintained ties with the Rozvi. By roughly 1730, however, they were independent and in the process of creating their own state. Beforethe endofthe century, Mutemahad established the Sanga confederacy , encompassing mwoyo and dziva chieftaincies and spanning the entire area.2 Thetwo chieflylineages focused upon in this workderive from this grouping. The Ngorima titleholder, a mwoyo, had migratedwith Chief Mutema.3 Much later, a seceding son ofChief Mafussi, one ofthe original dziva...