Lesotho

When I was in primary school and my brother was just starting high school, he came home with an assignment—I don’t know what class it was for (Geography?)—to write a project of Lesotho. (His best friend was given Swaziland: I think everyone in the class had a different African nation.) So it feels like I’ve always known where Lesotho is, that it’s an enclave surrounded entirely by South Africa, and when naming as many African nations as possible, it’s one I would never leave out. But I’m realising today that, despite this awareness, I don’t know much about Lesotho. For instance: something as basic as the capital. (It’s Maseru.) Since today is Lesotho’s Independence Day (celebrating their 1966 independence from the United Kingdom) it’s time for me to do a little reading. Hey! Lesotho is the only country that is entirely above 1000 metres above sea level. Wow. Snowy in the wintertime.

During the Bantu migration south, Bantu peoples arrived in the region that is now Lesotho—they spoke a dialect that is known as seSotho, and the name Basotho was their name for themselves.

When Lesotho first became a single polity is was known as Basutoland—this happened in 1818, when Moshoeshoe consolidated Basotho groups and, from 1823, became their king. During the 19th century, under Moshoeshoe I, the Basotho found a series of wars with Boers settling in land traditionally used by the Basotho. As a result of this warfare, Lesotho lost quite a bit of land—still referred to as the “Lost Territory.”

Eventually Moshoeshoe asked the British for help, leading to the country being placed under British protection in 1868. After Moshoeshoe’s death, the protectorate of Basutoland was annexed to Cape Colony—but Cape Town couldn’t control the territory, and so the reins went back to Britain.

The Basotho opposed transfer to the Union of South Africa: I don’t know how things would have proceeded if it weren’t for apartheid, but the policy of apartheid effectively halted the annexation process. 1959 saw a new constitution, 1965 general legislative elections. And then: independence.

Unfortunately Lesotho experienced the all-too-common problem of political turmoil when independence arrived. Post-independence elections meant nothing when the ruling party saw it might lose: the results were thrown out, parliament dissolved, and a national state of emergency declared.

In 1986—by Military Council decree—executive power was transferred to the king (Moshoeshoe II)—who was stripped of his power in 1990 and exiled. A new constitution in 1993 saw the King given only ceremonial powers.

And things have continued to be rocky: multiparty elections returned in 1998—and in August 1998 a violent protest occurred outside the royal palace. South African and Boswanan troops, at the request of the government, entered the country (on what, it turns out, was my 19th birthday) to help prevent a military coup. Recent elections have been judged to be free and fair. Hopefully some stability will help things along.

Things seem to be improving a little—but there have been serious human rights abuses reported too, such as torture of detainees, lengthy pre-trial detention, child labour, and discrimination.

It took me some serious investigation to find a text for you—not a lot has been translated. Still, I found David Bellin Coplan’s book In the Time of Cannibals, which cites the songs of migrants from Lesotho who go to work in the mines and cities of South Africa. The following example of these migrant’s “word music” is by Majara Majara. I found it online here.


It contains nothing, this singing:
I say I know how to make this rope,
And I know how to finish it.
I say to you, long-time poets,
The days are two you [Coplan] visited me;
This is the last day:
You will respect me, the honorable one, trule.
I am not an apprentice but a doctor—
I am the horned one;
I’m not longer an owlet but a great horned owl.
What am I saying to you, my parents?
I’m the horned one who stays in the trees

—Majara Majara
from David Bellin Coplan’s In the Time of Cannibals