Khama III

Infobox Monarch
name =Khama III
title =King (Kgosi) of Bechuanaland


caption =
reign =1872, 1875-1923
coronation =
othertitles =Ruler of the Bangwato people of central Botswana; 10th Paramount Chief of the bamaNgwato 1872/1873; 12th Paramount Chief of the bamaNgwato 1875/1923
full name =KHAMA III Boikanyo
predecessor =
successor =
suc-type =
heir =Sekgoma Khama, Kgosi Sekgoma II (1923-1925)
queen =
consort =
spouse 1 =Mogatsamotswasele (Elizabeth MmaBessie)
spouse 2 =Gasekete Gaseitsiwe of the baNgwaketse, d. 1889, daughter of Paramount Chief GASEITSIWE
spouse 3 =Sefakwana, m. 1895, div. 1899
spouse 4 =Semane MmaKgosi, 1878-1937, m. 1899
spouse 5 =
spouse 6 =
issue =2 sons and 9 daughters by 4 wives:
Bessie Khama, 1867-1920, married Chief Ratshosa (descendant of Chief Molwa)
Sekgoma Khama(1869-1925)
Bonyerile Khama, b. 1901
Kgosi Tshekedi Khama (1905-1959)
royal house =
dynasty =
royal anthem =
father =Kgosikgolo Sekgoma, Kgosi Sekgoma I (1815 - 1883)
mother =Keamogetse
date of birth =ca. 1837
place of birth =Mashu, Bechuanaland
date of death =Feb 21, 1923
place of death =Serowe
date of burial =
place of burial =|

Khama III (1837?-1923), also known as Khama the Good, was the "kgosi" (meaning chief or king) of the Bamangwato people of Bechuanaland (now Botswana), who made his country a protectorate of the United Kingdom to ensure its survival against Boer and Ndebele encroachments.

Sometime in the 18th century, Malope, chief of the Bakwena tribe, led his people from the Transvaal region of South Africa into the southeast territory of Botswana. Malope had three sons – Kwena, Ngwato, and Ngwaketse – each of whom would eventually break away from their father (as well as from each other) and form new tribes in neighboring territories. This type of familial break between father and sons (and then between sons) was historically how tribes proliferated throughout the southern African region. Splitting off and then reforming was not an uncommon occurrence among tribes.

In this particular instance, the break between Malope and sons was precipitated by a series of events – the death of Malope, Kwena’s subsequent assumption of the Bakwena chieftanship (as the eldest son of any African tribe customarily does), and ultimately a dispute between Kwena and Ngwato over a lost cow. Shortly after the lost-cow incident, Ngwato and his followers secretly left Kwena’s village under the cover of darkness and established a new village to the north. Ngwaketse similarly moved south.

Unfortunately for Ngwato, out of Kwena’s sight was not necessarily out of his mind. Kwena warriors attacked Ngwato’s village three times, each time pushing Ngwato and his tribe of followers (now known as the Bamangwato) further northward. Somehow (this episode is not explained by Bessie), they held on, and by the time of Chief Khama III’s reign (between the years 1875 – 1923), the Bamangwato had grown (both through natural population increase and the influx of refugee tribes from the South Africa and Rhodesia) to become the region’s largest tribe.

Khama III (or Khama the Great as he was more affectionately known) is perhaps Botswana’s most memorable chief. At a young age he made bold decisions governing how he would live his personal life; decisions that would later transform tribal custom in quite substantial ways.

In his early twenties, Khama was baptized into the Lutheran church via the London Missionary Society (LMS) along with five of his younger brothers. The brothers were some of the first members of the tribe to take this step; a step that would soon be joined by a fairly large percentage of Khama’s followers. It was no small step for Khama. By this time in his life he had already gone through bogwera (the tribe’s traditional initiation ceremony into manhood) with members of his mephato (age regiment). Historically, bogwera entailed rigorous endurance tests, which included circumcision. The ceremony culminated in the ritual slaying of one of the mephato’s members as a kind of purification rite.

Initially, Khama’s father, Chief Sekgoma I, grudgingly accepted his son’s affiliation with the church, although he did not embrace church doctrine himself. Eventually their divergent beliefs and values brought Sekgoma and Khama into open conflict. At the time, the tribe was based in the village of Shoshong, which is located near present-day Mahalapye.

The conflict included its share of intrigue – an attempted assassination (of Khama by Sekgoma), Khama’s marriage to a Christian woman named Mma Bessie and his subsequent refusal to take a second wife according to the custom of polygamy, Khama’s withstanding of Sekgoma’s sorcery, Khama’s forced exile with the tribe’s Christian followers into the hills surrounding the village of Shoshong, and finally Khama’s return to Shoshong after Sekgoma’s second botched assassination attempt and the concomitant installing of Sekgoma’s brother, Macheng, as the new chief of the beleaguered tribe (Sekgoma headed into exile).

It was not long before Macheng and Khama clashed as well, leading Macheng to attempt his own assassination of Khama, which likewise failed miserably. Khama then ousted Macheng and, in what was either a selfless gesture of goodwill or simply a dogged adherence to tribal custom, re-installed his father, Sekgoma, as Chief of the Bamangwato. Unfortunately, the truce between father and son would again falter after a few short months.

This time Khama and his followers, who now represented the majority of the tribe in Shoshong, relocated northward to the tiny village of Serowe and prepared for war with Sekgoma. The war lasted one month, culminating in Sekgoma’s defeat and Khama’s ascension of the chieftainship. Khama was now free to leave his mark on the history of the tribe.

Khama was a charismatic leader, to say the least. He is probably best remembered for having made three crucial decisions during his tenure as chief. First, although he abolished the bogwera ceremony itself, Khama retained the mephato regiments as a source of free labor to build missionary schools and churches. The scope of a mephato’s work responsibilities would later expand considerably under the rule of Khama’s son Tshekedi into the building of primary schools, grain silos, water reticulation systems, and even a college named Moeng located on the outskirts of Serowe, which under Khama’s reign had become the Bamangwato capital. In concert with the mephato, Khama introduced a host of European technological improvements in Bamangwato territory, including the mogoma, or oxen-drawn moldboard plow (in place of the hand hoe) and wagons for transport (in place of sledges).

In today’s world the mephato might be considered an exploitative form of community self-help. The young men of Serowe were required to participate in assigned work projects when their regiments were called to service. And called they were, in the literal sense of the word. An appointed person from the village would climb to the top of Serowe Hill and literally yell out the name of the mephato that was scheduled to begin work. All members of the mephato would drop whatever they were doing and begin their six-month tour of duty, without any material support from the village (in particular without any organized contribution of food). The mephato was generally expected to fend for itself during its work assignment.

After Khama became king in 1875, after overthrowing his father Sekgoma and elbowing away his brother Kgamane his ascension came at a time of great dangers and opportunities. Ndebele incursions from the north (from what is now Zimbabwe), Boer and "mixed" trekkers from the south, and German colonialists from the West, all hoping to the seize his territory and its hinterlands. He answered these challenges by aligning his state with the administrative aims of the British, which provided him with cover and support, and, relatedly, by energetically expanding his own control over a much wider area than any "kgosi" before him. Khama converted to Christianity, which moved him to criminalize sectarianism and to deprecate the institutions favored by traditionalists. At Khama's request stringent laws were passed against the importation of alcohol.

New International Encyclopedia

The British government itself was of two minds as to what to do with the territory. One faction, supported by a local missionary named John Mackenzie, advocated the establishment of a protectorate, while another faction, headed by Cecil Rhodes, adopted an imperialist stance and demanded that the country be opened up to white settlement and economic exploitation. The resolution came in 1885, when the territory south of the Molopo River became the colony of British Bechuanaland, while the territory north of the river became the Bechuanaland Protectorate. The colony was eventually incorporated into Britain's Cape Colony and is now part of South Africa.

Rhodes continued his campaign to pressure the British government to annex what remained of Khama's territory. In 1895, with two other chiefs from neighboring tribes, Khama traveled to Britain in 1885 to lobby the Queen of England herself for protection from the dual pressures of Cecil Rhodes' British South African Company – located in what was later to become Rhodesia to the north – and the Afrikaner settlers creeping up from the south. His efforts were eventually successful and the Bechuanaland Protectorate, which was later to become the independent nation of Botswana in 1966 under the leadership of Khama’s grandson Seretse Khama, was established. The colonial administration conceded after the ill-fated Jameson Raid of 1896. Had Khama been unable to convince the British authorities of the need to protect the Bamangwato, it is very likely that much of what is today Botswana would have been absorbed into Rhodesia and South Africa.

Khama III was steadfast in imposing his Christianized will on the tribe. He banned alcohol from tribal lands (with varying success), put moratoriums on the sale of cattle outside the Bamangwato territory and tribal land as concessions to foreign mining and cattle interests, and abolished polygamy. The abolishment of polygamy was perhaps his most controversial move. Some argue that as Christianity later spread among the other tribes of the protectorate and polygamy was universally abolished, the societal ‘glue’ that kept families together (extended as they were through polygamy) dried up.

Khama’s eldest son from his marriage with Mma Bessie was named Sekgoma II, who became chief of the Bamangwato upon Khama’s death in 1923. Sekgoma II’s eldest son was named Seretse. Throughout his life Khama took several wives (each after the death of the former one). One of his wives, Semane, birthed a son named Tshekedi.

Sekgoma II’s reign lasted only a year or so, leaving his son Seretse, who at the time was an infant, as the rightful heir to the chieftainship (Tshekedi was not in line to be chief since he did not descend from Khama’s oldest son Sekgoma II). So in keeping with tradition, Tshekedi acted as regent of the tribe until Seretse was old enough to assume the chieftainship. The transfer of responsibility from Tshekedi to Seretse was planned to occur after Seretse had returned from his law studies overseas in Britain.

Tshekedi is also best remembered for three things during his reign as acting chief of the Bamangwato – his expansion of the mephato regiments for the building of primary schools, grain silos, and water reticulation systems; his frequent confrontations with the British colonial authorities over the administration of justice in Ngwato country; and his efforts to deal with a major split in the tribe after Seretse married a white woman named Ruth while studying law in Britain.

Tshekedi opposed the marriage on the grounds that under Tswana custom a chief could not marry simply as he pleased. He was a servant of the people; the chieftaincy itself was at stake. Seretse would not budge in his desire to marry Ruth (which he did while exiled in Britain in 1948), and tribal opinion about the marriage basically split evenly along demographic lines - older people went with Tshekedi, the younger with Seretse. In the end, British authorities exiled both men (Tshekedi from the Bamangwato territory, Seretse from the Protectorate altogether). Rioting broke out and a number of people were killed.

Eventually, once emotions had had enough time to subside, Seretse and Ruth were allowed to return to the Protectorate and Seretse and Tshekedi were able to patch things up a bit between themselves. By now though, Seretse saw his destiny not as chief of the Bamangwato tribe, but rather as leader of the Botswana Democratic Party (BDP) and as President of the soon-to-be independent nation of Botswana in 1966. He would remain Botswana's President until his death from pancreatic cancer in 1980.

The Bechuanaland Protectorate maintained its semi-independent status until 1966, when it gained full independence as the Republic of Botswana. The first president, Sir Seretse Khama, was the grandson and heir of Khama III, his first son from Ruth Khama, Seretse Khama Ian Khama would succeed Seretse Khama as the paramount chief of the Bamangwato and go on to become the commander of the Botswana Defense Force, as a Lieutenant General. On April 1, 2008, Seretse Khama Ian Khama, son of Sir Seretse Khama, and former Vice-President of Botswana, was sworn in as the fourth President of Botswana. Tshekedi Khama, the brother of Seretse Khama Ian Khama, had also entered the political fray by angling to take over the parliamentary seat of his brother in Serowe. Sheila Khama, a relative of Seretse Khama Ian Khama is the CEO fo DeBeers Botswana the largest mining company in Botswana and part of the largest mineral mining company in the world. Hence, the "House of Khama" still is firmly entrenched in Botswana society for future generations to come.

Publications

* Mrs. Wyndham Knight-Bruce, "The Story of an African Chief" (London, 1894)
* Edwin Lloyd, "Three Great African Chiefs - Khame, Sebele, and Bathoeng" (London, 1895)