Panel: BLACK MUSLIMS IN AFRICA: REPRESENTATIONS, ENCOUNTERS AND EXCHANGES



370.5 - THE IMPLANTATION AND DEVELOPMENT OF ISLAM IN ZIMBABWE. A FOCUS ON THE VAREMBA PEOPLE AS THE FIRST BLACK MOSLEMS IN ZIMBABWE

AUTHORS:
Zangairai F. (Arrupe Jesuit University ~ Harare ~ Zimbabwe)
Text:
The coming and implantation and development in Zimbabwe did take a long route from as long as the 15th Century at the coast when the country was under the Monomotapa dynasty. The first Moslems were traders in ivory and mercantile. This period also coincided with the presence of Fr. Goncalo da Silveira a Portuguese Jesuit missionary who intended to evangelize the Monomutapa of the day, the young king Negomo Mupunzagutu. It is from this interaction which forms the bedrock of presence of the first Black Muslims in Africa and particularly Zimbabwe who eventually spread to as far as the Varemba land or the vaMwenye people. Through the interviews, questionnaires and participant observation, I carried in the Varemba or vaMwenye land, the first black Zimbabwean Muslims emanated there as the remnants of the contacts between Muslims and traditional Zimbabweans before the coming of the Portuguese in the 16th century. To be specific I will narrow this research from the establishment of the Varemba (the first black Muslims) in Zimbabwe to independent Zimbabwe. I had the following research Questions: 1. Is Islam as it exists today in Zimbabwe borrowed or unique to Varemba land? 2. If it is a migrant religion, what period could we look at as the inception of this religion? 3. Are there any pioneering Black Muslims who were heroic or championed its implantation and flourishing? 4. If any, what challenges were met in the confrontation of Islam and Indigenous religions and culture?