Mzala Nxumalo: Everything you did not know about Buthelezi
Where Do The Buthelezis Come From?
Oral tradition traces the founder of the Buthelezi tribe to a Sotho herbalist who came to Zululand before the time of King Senzangakhona. This man had the reputation for always being in the veld collecting herbs to heal people, a skill he had learnt from his place of origin, which was probably in present day Lesotho or the Orange Free State.
Chief Mangosuthu Buthelezi. He showed this book during a press conference where he was insulting Zulu Princes opposed to his forceful installation of Prince Misuzulu as King against the wishes of the Zulu Royal House, which had appointed Prince Simakade ka Zwelithini to the throne. He called this book a 'Bible in which all of you believe', meaning the Zulu Royal House Princes opposed to his position on a legitimate Prince to succeed King Zwelithini
Because the Zulus could not pronounce his name, they decided to name him by this reputation of collecting herbs: 'butha' (collect) 'intelezi' (herbs) — these words synthesised to a single pronounceable 'Buthelezi’.
The first chief of the Buthelezis in recorded Nguni history was Shenge, the father of Ngwane, who was the father of Phungashe and Mvulane. When Ngwane died, Phungashe took over as chief since he came from the Ndlunkulu house. This was during the era of Shaka. And what did Chief Phungashe do? Instead of being King Shaka's 'Prime Minister', as one might expect from such statements of Chief Buthelezi as 'I am a hereditary chief in a long line of succession of those who have filled the position of Prime Minister to Zulu kings,' he tried to fight with Shaka.
The confrontation, which took place near the Umfolozi river, led to the complete routing of Chief Phungashe's forces by two of Shaka's regiments, the Fasimba and Mbelebele, led into battle by Mgobhozi and Mshokobezi respectively.
Chief Phungashe fled the battle zone and sought refuge among the Ndwandwe under King Zwide. It was here that King Zwide killed him on the advice of his influential mother, Ntombazi.
After the death of Phungashe, a son of his brother Mvulane, called Ngqengelele, became the chief of the Buthelezi. He and his brother, Khoboyela, grew up together at the Zulu royal court after the Buthelezi had been incorporated into the Zulu group. Ngqengelele was famous in the royal court for his knowledge of the medicines that cured children's diseases, an ability attributable to the skills first brought by their tribal founder. King Shaka often consulted him for medical advice, but he was never a premier chief or a noted military commander.
It should be remembered that guards of different kinds lived at the Zulu royal court — porters who closed the gates at night and opened them in the morning; sentinels who kept strict watch over the women of the royal court even while they worked in the fields.
There were also special milkers; experts for building the king's huts and making his utensils; cooks and butlers (izinceku) whose duty was to look after the food; praise poets (izimbongi) who had to keep near the king, especially on public occasions; numerous attendants such as the shield-bearer, the snuff-bearer, the insila (who was a menial responsible for attending to the cleanliness of the king's body, bathing him, dressing his hair and usually sleeping in the royal hut, cross-wise before the doorway), and also isisindabiso (the royal anus wiper, whose duty was to accompany and assist the king when he went to answer nature's call).
It is rumoured that Ngqengelele's work involved, among other things, emptying every morning the king's wives' urine containers. But these roles, prestigious as they were, did not add up to being a premier or even senior adviser. The fact is that there has really only been one Buthelezi serving as a king's adviser. During the period of King Solomon Maphumzana ka Dinizulu, Chief Buthelezi's father, Chief Mathole, did advise the king, but he was what in Zulu is referred to as 'induna yebutho' or leader of a royal regiment; nor was he the only one, as there was more than one such regiment.
Traditional Prime Minister?
A glance at how the KwaZulu bantustan evolved from a Territorial Authority to a Legislative Assembly suggests that there was something unusual in the choice of the personnel to lead it, in terms of the traditional Zulu leadership structure. In 'normal' circumstances of bantustan politics, the king of the Zulus would have been supreme head in the evolution of a new Zulu "state'. In the historical tradition of the Zulus a king was never a symbolic figurehead, but always had executive powers. All the chiefs were subordinate to him in terms of real authority and political power.
Front row from left: FW de Klerk and Chief Mangosuthu Buthelezi
It was King Cyprian who accepted the Bantu Authorities Act in the 1950s. During a series of meetings with Zulu chiefs between 1955 and 1960, various leaders of the South African government used King Cyprian's acceptance of the system as a lever and rallying point to get other chiefs to work within the bantustan system. In their speeches, they openly acknowledged that the Zulu king was the key figure in this whole process, and even went further to assure the chiefs that their king's status, as the principal traditional leader of the Zulu people, would not be altered by the system of Bantu Authorities.
If the South African government had reservations about the king's ability to shoulder such an undertaking, it might have been expected, in terms of Zulu custom, that the government would turn to a prince, one of the king's brothers or sons to replace the king in such a post. There are many such princes in KwaZulu, all of whom hold positions in the traditional hierarchy more senior than the chiefs. But this is not what happened. The South African government had its own approach to the question of leadership, which had more to do with the provisions and requirements of the Native Administration Act of 1927 than with Zulu tradition and customs.
It is necessary here to dispose of three controversial issues closely related to this question: one, that Chief Buthelezi was a logical contender for, and appointee to, the position of 'Prime Minister' by virtue of his being the son of Princess Magogo, the daughter of King Dinizulu. Two; that the choice of Chief Buthelezi as head of the KwaZulu government was consistent with the role traditionally filled by the Buthelezi chiefs as 'Prime Ministers' to Zulu kings. And three; that Chief Buthelezi is a prince. Chief Buthelezi has on numerous occasions claimed that his present leadership position in KwaZulu is a hereditary traditional right; that it was not one created by the bantustan constitution. Addressing the Foreign Affairs Committee of the British House of Commons in May 1986, he reiterated:
"I was born to occupy a leadership position in South Africa ... I am a leader by hereditary right and follow in the footsteps of my father, grandfather and great-grandfather, who in turn followed in the footsteps of their forebears to the time of the founding father of KwaZulu, King Shaka ... I and my forebears have always occupied influential positions as prime ministers ... to successive Zulu Kings. Whatever Whites did or could have done, I would have had to play one or another political role ... Not only does my line of descent go back to the founding father of KwaZulu, King Shaka, but the transitional period for South Africa towards the end of the last century saw my forebears both on my father's side and on my mother's side, as prime actors. King Cetshwayo was defeated and was the last reigning monarch of a sovereign and free KwaZulu. He was my mother's grandfather ... My great-grandfather was Prime Minister to King Cetshwayo ... I provide this detail about my own background because it is a detail known to Black South Africa and accepted by them as establishing my bona fides."
Three years earlier, on 16 December 1983, Chief Buthelezi had told a Prayer Meeting in Imbali township, Pietermaritzburg: “I am an hereditary chief in a long line of succession of those who have filled the position of Prime Minister to Zulu kings. It is in response to this demand of my ancestry that I took up my political role in KwaZulu. That role was pre-ordained for me long before apartheid emerged in this country. I was a chief in my own right before the National Party ever dreamt of the current homeland policy objective.”
In the written texts of some of the speeches delivered by Chief Buthelezi and subsequently distributed by Inkatha or the KwaZulu government propaganda machinery, Chief Buthelezi is referred to as 'Prince' or 'Mntwana' (its Zulu translation). His speeches of 24 March 1979 and 22 July 1979, to the Second Ordinary Conference of the Inkatha Youth Brigade and to a rally of the South African Black Alliance respectively, bear such descriptions.
Chief Mangosuthu Buthelezi and former British Prime Minister and apartheid advocate Margaret Thatcher (middle)
In addition, Wessel de Kock, author of a book sympathetic to Chief Buthelezi and Inkatha, not only asserts that 'Chief Buthelezi was destined to be prime minister of the Zulu nation', but writes that he is 'a prince of the Zulu nation, a scion (descendant) of the royal house'. Chief Buthelezi's biographer, Ben Temkin, likewise includes at the end of his book an appendix reportedly written by Zami Chonco, which claims that 'the correct form of address that should be used in addressing Buthelezi is Mntwana, meaning Infanta or Prince, a title given to all direct descendants of the Zulu kings'. Temkin also makes a point of adding that 'Buthelezi is a direct descendant of the Zulu kings, hereditary prime minister to the Zulu king..."
As has already been made clear, Temkin is wrong in regard to Buthelezi's direct monarchical descent, and hence the claim that he should be referred to as Mntwana or 'Prince' is wrong too. It is true that Chief Buthelezi is related to the Zulu royal family through his mother who was the daughter of King Dinizulu. But that in itself adds up to nothing in his claim to hereditary leadership as prime minister of the Zulus. Chief Buthelezi's mother was not the only daughter of King Dinizulu. There were nine in all.
The first daughter of King Dinizulu was Princess Phikisile, who was the mother of Dr Pixley Seme, the founding member of the ANC. Dr Seme never considered himself a claimant to 'premiership' in the Zulu tradi-tional hierarchy. The second daughter was Magogo, Gatsha's mother. The other daughters of King Dinizulu and their children are as follows:
(i) Sulumane, who married Shange and gave birth to Rogers Thanduzalo Shange;
(ii) Zamokunye, who was married to a Khumalo;
(iii) Mkhandandlovu, also married to a Khumalo;
(iv) Ntishisane, who married Cebekhulu and had a son called Kuthukakwenzeka;
(v) Woniwengani, married to one of the Mbathas;
(vi) Mhlabamuni, who married Mhloluthini Mbatha, and gave birth to a son called Gilbert Mathendelana Mbatha
(vii) Mpiyamaxhegu, who married a Dlamini and gave birth to a son called Langalethu.
In other words, Chief Buthelezi's position in the Zulu royal hierarchy is no different from that of Pixley Seme, Rogers Shange, Kuthukakwenzeka Cebekhulu, Gilbert Mbatha and Langalethu Dlamini, all of whom were sons of the daughters of King Dinizulu. They too have a line of descent through their mothers which goes back to King Cetshwayo, and to King Shaka. Were they not also 'born to occupy a leadership position in South Africa'?
Dr Pixley ka-Isaka Seme
None of these sons of the daughters of King Dinizulu had the title of 'Prince or 'Mntwana1 as Chief Buthelezi is sometimes called. The title of 'Mntwana', which literally translated means 'child', was used in Zulu tradition to refer to the children of the king. Chief Buthelezi is not the child of a king. The usage of this title is therefore without traditional or customary foundation.
[Side Note: It is after the release of this book by Mzala Nxumalo, we believe, that the emphasis wakwaPhindangene was added to uMntwana. Otherwise this would have remained a confusing title if Buthelezi was not properly described as Prince of the Buthelezis, something we believe may have been deliberately peddled by the fake Jews to create an impression that he was a Zulu Prince. Buthelezi is not a Prince of the Zulus, he is a Prince of a Buthelezi clan, something that still confuses many of his followers in the IFP, who still think that he is a Prince of the Zulu nation. Nxumalo does not dispute that Buthelezi is a Prince of the Buthelezis, he is making it clear that he does not hold the same title at the Zulu Royal House as his political propandists would like us to believe. We blame the final copy editors of this book in London for also trying to obfuscate the obvious. Nxumalo was a Zulu. He was also related to the Zulu Royal House. He understood that the word Prince is used also to address offsprings of the ruling chiefs under the Zulu Kingdom, but some mischief was created in this context to paint a picture that the word Prince only refers to sons of Zulu Royal House. This is the problem everywhere when you must publish your book in a foreign country whose editors have little or no clue about your traditions. You can easily notice there was no consultation whatsoever with Nxumalo towards the final imprint of the book, perhaps deliberately so to push a nasty agenda or for some sinister reason. Even well known author Dean Koontz has made serious complaints about copy editors in this regard.]
The Nguni cultural group, of which the Zulus are a part, is patrilineal in its tradition of succession. In Zululand, since the time of Malandela, who lived six generations before King Shaka, the general rule of succession was that the eldest son of the great wife of the king succeeded his father, and only the sons or daughters of the king were referred to as 'Prince' or 'Princess' or 'Mntwana', not the children of the king's daughters, who would normally not marry another prince in the same tribe. Princess Margaret's children in England are not referred to as princes or princesses.
Turning to the question of the traditional premiership role of the Buthelezis, it is certainly true that Chief Mnyamana was the premier chief or what Gatsha prefers to call 'Prime Minister' during the reign of King Cetshwayo. Chief Mnyamana did not inherit this title. He was appointed to it by the king in recognition of certain of his leadership qualities.
King Cetshwayo
Each Zulu king appointed a chief councillor or premier chief, but it was certainly not always a Buthelezi chief who was so appointed. The premier chief during the reign of King Shaka was Ngomane, who remained King Shaka's 'Prime Minister' long after the death of Shaka's mother, Nandi. Ngomane was not a Buthelezi but a Mthethwa.
Then came King Dingane, whose premier chief was Ndlela ka Sompisi. He, too, was not a Buthelezi but a Ntuli. After King Dingane, the kingdom was led by King Mpande, who appointed Masiphula ka Mamba as the premier chief. His surname was Ntshangase and not Buthelezi. It was only when Cetshwayo was king of the Zulus that a Buthelezi featured — Chief Mnyamana.
Cetshwayo was the last King of the sovereign Zulu kingdom as founded by King Shaka, and before it was divided into various chiefdoms by the British. What emerges clearly from Zulu history is that there is no established Zulu tradition that obliges kings to appoint chiefs from particular tribes for the so-called role of premier. The premiership is not a hereditary title. Chief Buthelezi's claim is therefore not substantiated by history. Chief Buthelezi has used the circumstance that placed his own great-grandfather in this position, and has then made a 'tradition' of it.
But even as a tradition it fails, because no Buthelezi other than Gatsha has held such a position. When Dinuzulu took over as King after Cetshwayo, he appointed Mankulumana as his premier chief. Mankulumana ka Somaphunga, a direct descendent of Zwide, was a Ndwandwe (also known as Nxumalo), not a Buthelezi.
It was Mankulumana who stood trial with King Dinizulu in 1908, charged with high treason following the 1906 Bambatha rebellion. He had been implicated on the evidence of Bambatha's wife, Siyekiwe, who told the court in Pietermaritzburg that on Bambatha's arrival at Osuthu (King Dinizulu's royal residence), and in the presence of Bambatha's wife and children, Mankulumana gave Bambatha a gun and cartridges and instructed him to go back to Natal to start an uprising there with the support of Chakijana and Ngqengqengqe.
Brave revolutionary: Chief Bhambatha Zondi of Engome in Msinga
[Side Note: This is a typical Zulu Prime Minister uMankulumana, who gave Chief Bhambatha Zondi a gun and said go and shoot a land thief coloniser with it, not a Prime Minister who gives one Zulu a gun and say go and kill another Zulu with it.]
No Buthelezi chief was regarded as senior to Mankulumana in the structure of Zulu political power during Dinizulu's time. When the king was found guilty of high treason and sentenced first to imprisonment at Newcastle, and later to banishment on a lonely farm in Middelburg, it was Mankulumana who went to prison with him and stayed with him in banishment until the King's death in 1913. Although there was a Buthelezi chief in Zululand, it was not he but Mankulumana who gave the funeral oration at the graveside of King Dinizulu. Chief Buthelezi knows these facts but is silent about them. He is silent too about the dubious history of his great-grandfather, Chief Mnyamana.
Zulu Prime Minister during the reign of King Dinuzulu; Mankulumana ka Somaphunga Ndwandwe
How Mnyamana betrayed King Dinuzulu
Although Chief Mnyamana served King Cetshwayo faithfully, he betrayed his son King Dinizulu when he joined forces with the British and with the renegade forces of Zibhebhu ka Maphitha of the Mandlakazi faction to fight the Zulu King.
After the Battle of Ulundi in 1879, King Cetshwayo was imprisoned by the British forces and banished from Zululand. Zululand, once a close-knit kingdom, was divided by Sir Garnet Wolseley, the British High Commissioner to Zululand, into thirteen independent chiefdoms. Some chiefs like Zibhebhu, Hamu and Hlubi, saw in the defeat of the Zulus at Ulundi an opportunity to establish and extend their own power.
Chief Mnyamana was also offered an independent chiefdom but declined, electing to serve under Hamu precisely at the time when Hamu deserted to the British side. Apparently Chief Mnyamana (Side Note: opportunistically) did this in the belief that Hamu would succeed King Cetshwayo under the new order, and that he would retain his position as the king's premier chief.
However, the following year in 1880 Chief Mnyamana, realising that there was no intention of making Hamu the King, changed his stance and asked to be made chief in his own right. When this was refused by the British administration, he began to agitate for the return from banishment of King Cetshwayo.
In 1884, King Cetshwayo died, and in May 1887 the whole of Zululand was declared a British reserve territory. When King Dinizulu ascended to the throne, and the British found him unfriendly to the colonial power, Melmoth Osborn, the British Resident in the Southern Zululand Reserve, thought it wise to use Zibhebhu as a counterweight to King Dinizulu and the royal family. He sought the aid of the Natal garrison, as well as of loyal Zulu levies and Chief Mnyamana to fight King Dinizulu. Chief Mnyamana sided with the colonialist forces against the Zulu king.
The British and Mnyamana's forces tracked down the king and arrested him at Ceza, after which he was tried for treason, sentenced to ten years imprisonment and exiled to St. Helena. At the trial of King Dinizulu, much reference was made to the role of Chief Mnyamana by the king's advocate, Harry Escombe. Shula Marks, in her study of the 1906 Zulu Rebellion, wrote that 'the Buthelezis had become estranged from the Usuthu when Mnyamana had given his allegiance to the British in 1887, and fought against the Usuthu during the 1888 disturbances.'
[Side Note: It is believed this is where the name Mangosuthu Buthelezi comes from]
King Dinuzulu
This view is corroborated by such scholars as Jeff Guy and CT Binns, as well as in official records. In King Dinizulu's praise poem there is mention of this incident when Zibhebhu and Mnyamana aided the British police sent to arrest King Dinizulu at Ceza in 1888:
...INkosi yensizwa uMaphikelela ngob’ephikelel’amadod’akwaZulu
Esagunda izicoco azibeka emseleni
Mlomo ongawodwa suk’ukhulume uyayibon’imilom’eminingi
Iyavunana phakathi kwezwe
Kuvunana uZibhebhu benoHamu
Kuvunana uZiwedu benoMnyamana...
This estrangement between the Buthelezis and the Zulu royal family still existed during the time of Mnyamana's heir, Chief Tshanibezwe, who tried to seek reconciliation by sending his young men to assist in the building of King Dinizulu's palace.
Conflict with King Zwelithini
In the early 1970s clashes developed between Chief Buthelezi and King Zwelithini, during which Chief Buthelezi time and again demonstrated his power over the king. These need to be analysed in historical perspective because they serve as a further demonstration that the apartheid system has enabled chiefs who lead the bantustans to assume tremendous power over some of the persons to whom, by traditional custom, they should be subordinate. This account, taking up the discussion with the death of King Solomon, will yet again show just how dubious is the claim by Chief Buthelezi that he is the 'Prime Minister' by traditional right, not by decree of the South African government.
King Cyprian, Solomon's heir, was Chief Buthelezi's first cousin, since Gatsha's mother was Cyprian's aunt. For these family reasons, the two men were very close. The king even accompanied Chief Buthelezi to his graduation ceremony at Fort Hare. As the only chief in Zululand who was a university graduate at a time, Chief Buthelezi proved a great asset to King Cyprian, particularly because he had majored in Native Administration and History. He was his closest adviser on many political questions. He also attended the Royal Council in his capacity as chief of the Buthelezi tribe.
Their intimacy went beyond political matters. For example, when on 6 September 1957 Chief Buthelezi was officially installed as chief of the Buthelezi tribe by Mr A Turton, the Chief Bantu Affairs Commissioner, King Cyprian attended the ceremony. His attachment to the chief was also demonstrated when tragedy struck the Buthelezi family. Chief Buthelezi's nine-year old son, Mabhuku, was killed in a car accident when his wife, Irene, was driving. The car crashed into a donga and Irene and two other children, Ntuthuko and Phumaphesheya, were seriously injured. King Cyprian called at Nkonjeni in Chief Buthelezi's Mahlabathini district, and was one of the prominent mourners to comfort the chief.
King Zwelithini and his sons. Heir to the throne; Prince Simakade, now King of the Zulu nation, is right behind the King in this photo taken more than two decades ago
Their relationship, however, did have its difficult moments. In 1959, for example, Chief Buthelezi tried to revive an organisation called Inkatha ka Zulu, which had been founded in 1922 by King Solomon, but which became defunct within ten years because the emissaries sent to collect funds embezzled them. The purpose of the organisation was to restore Zulu culture and unity around the king. When Chief Buthelezi first introduced the idea to the king, he was initially very enthusiastic, but later withdrew his support. One of his reasons was that Chief Buthelezi was trying to reassert himself through Inkatha. King Cyprian's lack of support led to the dropping of this plan.
[Side Note: First attempt to hijack powers of the Zulu monarch through a political instrument foiled.]
Let me cite another incident. In 1968 at a rally in Nongoma, King Cyprian was to be made a commissioner of the Boy Scouts. Chief Buthelezi accompanied him to the ceremony. This was just before the king died. Chief Buthelezi saw somebody carrying a bottle of whisky to the king, who was in his bedroom and changing into his scouts' uniform. Knowing that the king was a diabetic and that doctors had advised him to stop drinking, Chief Buthelezi entered the king's bedroom with the intention of asking him not to take any alcoholic drink.
When he entered, King Cyprian rebuked him for showing such bad man-ners as to enter his bedroom without permission. Chief Buthelezi apologised and left the room, but reported the incident to his mother, Princess Magogo. She took up the issue of the king's drinking with the king himself in a meeting attended by Prince Phika Zulu, Chief Buthelezi's uncle. The king dismissed their concern, to considerable jeopardy of his health and life.
From that incident onward, Chief Buthelezi became distanced from the king and their relationship cooled. In September 1968, King Cyprian died, barely 44 years old, in a diabetic coma. Chief Buthelezi had been correct in advising the king against drinking. After the death of the king, Prince Israel Mcwayizeni, also a son of King Solomon, became the regent, as the future king, Goodwill Zwelithini, was still at school.
[Side Note: As far as we are well informed by reliable sources as Izazi, King Cyprian ka Solomon died from tea poisoning, not diabetes, after refusing to sign certain documents in Pretoria; a meeting he had attended at the behest of Chief Mangosuthu Buthelezi. It is common for political assassinations by the CIA to be deceptively attributed to chronic diseases as a cover up. For example, when King Zwelithini proved incompliant with certain land issues, they assassinated him and attributed his death to Covid 19 in 2021.]
Almost from the day of his appointment, Prince Mcwayizeni excluded Chief Buthelezi from meetings of the royal council, in which he had participated during the life of King Cyprian. It was during this period, more than any other, that Chief Buthelezi was made aware that he was regarded by the Royal Council as neither a direct member of the royal family nor an automatic adviser to Zulu royalty. The only functional connection to the royal family was that he had been named in King Cyprian's will as one of the trustees of his widow's funds, which meant that he was part of the collective responsible for the future king's maintenance.
Prince Mcwayizeni Zulu
The negative attitude of Prince Mcwayizeni to Chief Buthelezi also merits explanation. A simplistic explanation given by some was that the Prince was closer to Pretoria and avoided Chief Buthelezi who was then regarded by Pretoria with suspicion. This explanation is unlikely. It is true that Prince Mcwayizeni was one of those members of the royal family who supported King Cyprian's quest for Zulu self-government.
He had even accompanied the king when he went for consultations in Pretoria over this. But the relations between Prince Mcwayizeni and the government were not good, particularly since the death of the King. The South African government did not want him to be the regent, but had chosen Prince Ndesheni Kamnyayiza Zulu for the role. The royal family defied Pretoria and appointed Prince Mcwayizeni.
It would be an oversimplification to suggest that the Prince and the government saw Chief Buthelezi as anti-government. How could Chief Buthelezi have been so considered when, less than a year after the death of King Cyprian, he was appointed by the South African State President (on 21 March 1969) to chair the Mashonangashoni Regional Authority? Anti-government chiefs did not receive such appointments. Indeed, anti-government chiefs were likely to lose their positions as chiefs and not gain promotions.
Perhaps the only logical explanation for the cold feeling between the two is that Prince Mcwayizeni regarded Chief Buthelezi's ambitions with suspicion, as perhaps King Cyprian had when he rejected the idea of reviving Inkatha in 1959. Prince Mcwayizeni did not attend Chief Buthelezi's installation on 21 March 1969, the occasion when, in the presence of JJ Boshoff, the then Commissioner-General for the Zulu, Chief Buthelezi claimed that "we Zulu people are law-abiding people ... I cannot foresee us easily losing this trait which is so ingrained in us."
The rift between Chief Buthelezi and Prince Mcwayizeni became so wide that the regent finally pushed for the chiefs exclusion from the board of trustees of the late king's funds. This happened in November 1968 and, by this decision, Chief Buthelezi was excluded from participating in all the matters concerning the royal family. He did not participate again until he was elected to the position of Chief Executive Officer (Prime Minister) of the Zulu Territorial Authority in 1970.
If Chief Buthelezi's hereditary position had been a matter of such significant tradition among the Zulu people, why did some people in the royal family itself not note a traditional irregularity in his exclusion? Why did other chiefs of Zululand not intervene on his behalf and ask the reasons for his exclusion? Why did even his mother, Princess Magogo, not try to claim the traditional rights of her son? Why did the Chief himself not resort to the courts?
The reasons are obvious. During this period between 1968 and 1970, Chief Buthelezi busied himself with his rightful traditional position as the chief of the Buthelezis at Mahlabathini. Had he been a traditional premier chief, or even a 'prince', he would surely have taken other action.
This experience was to teach Chief Buthelezi many lessons about power in KwaZulu, which he had to settle in his favour during the drafting of the bantustan constitution. He was determined not to allow the King to have more power than himself. That is why when the matter of the KwaZulu constitution was discussed with the South African government's legal team, Prince Mcwayizeni and Chief Buthelezi adopted diametrically opposed approaches.
The Prince (Mcwayizeni) told the officials that the royal family would like to see a form of Zulu government in which the future King Zwelithini would have executive political powers. Chief Buthelezi on the other hand strongly advanced the view that the king should only perform ceremonial functions, and 'should hold himself aloof from party polities'; 'the king must personify the unity of the Zulu nation'; 'the king must be kept out of the heat and dust of politics', etc.
[Side Note: So that Buthelezi could use politics to play the role of King Zwelithini. Very opportunistic CIA approach to politics in Africa. They don’t give ceremonial duties for their Queen in England, instead, they take orders from her. She manages the British purse and decides the salaries of politicians but in Africa they do the opposite. They take an ordinary person, turn him into a politician and put him above the Royal thrones.]
That view prevailed and was reflected in the final constitution gazetted on 30 March 1972. This of course did not make for good relations between the heir Zwelithini, and Buthelezi.
The preparations for King Zwelethini's coronation were made without the participation of Chief Buthelezi. He was away on one of his periodic trips to the United States [Side Note: Where he was coached and groomed]. However, when he learned of the coronation he came back immediately in the hope of participating in the preparatory events.
On his arrival in South Africa, news spread that he was to be the Master of Ceremonies at the coronation itself. Actually a decision to that effect had been taken. It was a responsibility that would give him great prestige among the tens of thousands of Zulus who were expected to attend the coronation, and it would help confirm his claims that he was the Prime Minister. However, the manner in which the royal family treated Chief Buthelezi showed that they did not see him as such.
This became evident when Prince Herbert Zulu was chosen by the royal family to replace Chief Buthelezi as the Master of Ceremonies. As Temkin notes, 'for Chief Buthelezi, the days preceeding the coronation of the young King were very trying'.
The word 'trying' was an understatement. According to reports in the Natal Mercury (3.12.72), King Zwelithini refused to accept a golden crown said to have been chosen for him by Chief Buthelezi. The press in Natal in those days reported on the mounting tension in KwaZulu between the Prime Minister and the royal family. The press speculation on the 'golden crown' was not substantiated, and could have been untrue. When Chief Buthelezi was asked to comment on the report, he flatly denied it. However, it is clear that tension was high, and this could not have been otherwise when the leader of the KwaZulu government was being offered no role at all at the coronation functions.
To counter this exclusionist strategy, Chief Buthelezi travelled to the royal residence in the company of Peter Becker to 'greet the future monarch'. On arrival at the royal residence, he was kept waiting for a long time before he was allowed to see the king. Growing impatient over this long period of waiting, he once again requested permission to greet the King. He was then told that he could not speak directly to the King but could only do so through Prince Clement Zulu. Fed up by this treatment of him, he stood up defiantly and went straight to King Zwelithini and greeted him.
On coronation day, the tension between the King and Chief Buthelezi was made worse by a number of events. First, with the chief marching at its head, the Buthelezi regiment was snubbed when it tried to advance towards the King to salute in homage. Then, the Minister of Bantu Administration and Development, Mr MC Botha, told the audience that precautions should be taken to ensure that their King was not 'relegated to a mere figure-head'.
Thereafter, the outgoing Regent, Prince Mcwayizeni, announced that a Royal Council would be formed to assist the King which would be constituted personally by the King on the advice of senior princes. There seemed little doubt that Chief Buthelezi would not be amongst its members. To make matters worse, soon after the coronation the new King sent a delegation to Swaziland to study that country's constitution and how King Sobhuza exercised power in relation to the Swazi parliament. The significance of this delegation was not lost on Chief Buthelezi.
All this hostility to Chief Buthelezi on the part of the King and senior Princes hardly serves to bolster the Chiefs claims to have won the premiership by traditional inheritance rights.
The real showdown with King Zwelithini began in 1975 when Chief Buthelezi accused him of having involved himself in party politics on several occasions [Side Note: This is the year the IFP was formed]. This accusation was made publicly and in the presence of the King. Later the KwaZulu government decided that all invitations to the King must first be scrutinised by the cabinet and any visits which the king might wish to make outside of the Nongoma Tribal Authority must first get cabinet clearance.
In 1979, dissatisfaction with the King's activities was revealed in the KwaZulu Legislative Assembly following Chief Buthelezi's allegations that the King had advocated requesting Frelimo's assistance because talking to Whites was a waste of time, and that the King had referred to Chief Buthelezi and the KwaZulu government as the 'lackeys of the Whites'. (Daily News, 6.06.79). Chief Buthelezi had also alleged earlier that a member of the royal entourage, Mzamo Zulu, had threatened to shoot him (Post, 3.08.79).
In a week-long debate, Legislative Assembly members outlined the back-ground to the dispute, alleging torture in the Nongoma district and that the King and close relatives had conspired with a certain employee of the Iron and Steel Corporation (Iscor) to form a political party, the Inala Party. [Side Note: This was a lie and barefaced smear campaign. This political party was formed by (Chief Mhlabunzima Maphumulo, one of the Chiefs he had ill-treated and abused in a series of well documented incidents during the Legislative sitting in Ulundi merely because he didin’t subscribe to his political party iNkatha.] According to Chief Buthelezi, the aim of the Party was to give the King greater political power so that he would have the right to appoint the Chief Minister of KwaZulu.
Chief Mhlabunzima Maphumulo
During the debates, the King refused to attend the Assembly despite three invitations requesting his presence. After he failed for the third time to attend the meeting of the Assembly to answer to allegations against him, a delegation was sent to his Royal Palace at Nongoma. On their arrival the King snubbed them, receiving them in silence. When the delegation reported back to the Legislative Assembly, the members, obviously angry, called for the reduction of the King's salary to R8 000 per annum (a cut of more than R13 000), and called for an official inquiry into the allegations relating to his 'unconstitutional' conduct.
[Side Note: To this day, Buthelezi is still used by his foreign handlers in the CIA in this fashion to undermine traditional leadership and deal with his political opponents. Hunger, unemployment, destroying your business and coercing every IFP affiliate not to support you in everything you do is his trademark. This is satanism. This is how Satan tried to force Saint Job in the Bible to follow him, by trying to starve him to death. He went on to destroy Job’s family by turning his wife against him. By the time Job recovered from these satanic challenges, his wife had already left him and he had to start afresh. This is exactly what he has been trying to achieve by destroying Sbu Ngubane, Izazi Team leader since 2007, making sure he loses every job he gets and every business he starts. This is devil’s work. He seems to have a very evil spiritual duty to deal with every Zulu who do not worship the British Queen.]
Outlining the allegations against the King, Chief Buthelezi said that these included the King's participation in political activities, advocacy of violent means to overthrow the political status quo and assaults on various people. On the day of this session, the King attended at last, but when Chief Buthelezi enumerated all these allegations, the King immediately left the Assembly in a rage (Post, 8.08.79).
In a way, the King's leaving the Assembly ended the crisis, as the Assembly afterwards unanimously passed a resolution ending the inquiry and restoring the King's full salary. Chief Buthelezi later announced that the royal family had spoken to the King and the whole matter had been settled amicably.
In 1980, following this dispute, Chief Buthelezi once again announced that the King would no longer be permitted to give interviews on his own to the press. In future, he said, the King's private secretary, SJ Mkhize, and the KwaZulu Minister of Justice, CJ Mthethwa, would make all arrangements for press interviews and would also attend them.
This decision to muzzle the King was apparently taken after he had told Pace magazine that he had been 'showing the way' in practical fashion to his people, but that the contribution of the KwaZulu government politicians 'unfortunately sometimes consists only of rhetoric' (Sunday Tribune, 3.02.80). The King also referred to his leaving the Assembly the previous year, and said that he did not know why he had been accused of misdemeanours as nobody had 'been able to prove anything against him.'
In August 1980, it was announced that the king had attempted to join the South African Defence Force (SADF). Observers interpreted this action as the King's further challenge to Chief Buthelezi and speculated that it was the King's expression of support for armed struggle, and that, had the ANC and Umkhonto We Sizwe already had a military presence in KwaZulu, the natural thing would have been for the King to join the People's Army in the bush.
As soon as the King's application to join the SADF was received by the magistrate at Nongoma, he forwarded it to the KwaZulu cabinet for approval. Following a meeting of the cabinet, Chief Buthelezi announced that the cabinet had turned down the application (Rand Daily Mail, 13.08.70).
[Side Note: This shows how desperate King Zwelithi was to get out of Inkatha’s jail. There has never been a friendly relationship between Buthelezi and King Zwelithini. Where they appear smiling together in media photos, it was all for the purpose of managing public relations.]
These were new times in Zululand. Never before in the history of the Zulu had their King been subject to the control of a chief. Yet the bantustan system. [Side Note: the apartheid government and the British monarch) was able to make it possible.
From time immemorial, the social cohesion of the Zulu state had centred in all its facets on the King. Tradition sanctioned this symbolic nature of Zulu unity in him. As Max Gluckman has written, 'he stood as final judge who was bound ... to defend legal rules which helped control Zulu social and ecological relations. For Zulu moral values stood the King, not only the symbol of social cohesion but also its artificer."
Chief Buthelezi's precedence over the King underlined the new powers that were vested in the chiefs by the laws of the South African government. It was the same situation in the Transkei where King Sabata Dalindyebo, the head of the Tembu, was subordinated by Chief Matanzima, a minor chief traditionally junior to the King, but who, because of his support for the bantustan system, was given constitutional powers to override King Sabata.
It is significant that the methods Chief Buthelezi used to silence King Zwelithini were similar to those that were employed by the Chief Native Commissioner and his Department to punish King Solomon ka Dinizulu. In 1930, when the Governor-General of South Africa, the Earl of Athlone, visited Eshowe to meet the Zulu chiefs, King Solomon stood up at the meeting while the Governor was still talking, pointed a finger at the white officials who sat next to him and said:
'You are doing a bad thing here. What right have you to all these people? I am the King of Natal ... What do you mean by turning the King of this country into a dog?" And as the Governor continued to talk, King Solomon sat down but looked at him shaking his head, showing his disapproval of what was being said. For this behaviour, the Chief Native Commissioner recommended to Pretoria that half the King's annual stipend of £500 be withheld.
History constantly repeats itself.
[Side Note: This shows where Buthelezi receives orders from to perpetrate crimes against humanity. He is the hand of the worst devils on two legs on earth, the British monarch. The picture below confirms this...]
Princess Camilla and Chief Mangosuthu Buthelezi exchange gifts as British King Charles III looks on
