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26.1 (Spring 2002) The Kalahari San

World Bank Meets with San Representatives

On February 12-13, 2002, representatives of the various San organizations from across southern Africa met with representatives of the World Bank in Windhoek, Namibia to discuss issues surrounding the World Bank's indigenous peoples policy (see also CSQ 25:4). This meeting is one of several to be held with indigenous peoples' organizations in Africa by the World Bank, which is making a concerted effort to consult with indigenous organizations to assess their reactions to its revised policy.

WIMSA

At the Regional Conference on Development Programmes for Africa’s San Populations held in Windhoek, Namibia, in 1992, the San representatives resolved that "San peoples should be assisted to form committees to represent themselves at local, regional and international levels." (Government of the Republic of Namibia, 1992) This need was reiterated during a follow-up conference held in Gaborone, Botswana, in 1993, where the San delegates called on national governments "to support the formation of Basarwa national for a." (Government of Botswana, 1993) A needs assessment study in 1994, involvin

Will Tourism Destroy San Cutures?

The San were colonized both by the Bantu tribes who moved south from eastern Africa and by the Europeans who forced their way northward from the Cape. These land-hungry pastoralist groups dispossessed the San of their land base and natural resources. The dispossession continues, even under the independent governments of Namibia and Botswana, through so-called integration and resettlement processes.

Voices of the Dispossessed

The government’s intention to relocate the San out of the Central Kalahari Game Reserve (CKGR) was announced in 1995.

Tradition & Modernity in Contemporary San Art

San art at D’Kar and Schmidtsdrift is produced in each village by about a dozen artists, men and women, under the auspices of the Kuru Development Trust and the !Xu and Khwe Trust, respectively. Displayed as “Bushman art,” sometimes in conjunction with rock art (to which the contemporary art has a superficial resemblance but no cultural connection), San art becomes a mechanism for self-representation.

The ‡Khomani San Land Claim

In March 1999, the world media carried a picture of South African President Thabo Mbeki embracing Dawid Kruiper, leader of the ‡Khomani San. The ‡Khomani land claim, lodged under the legal framework provided by the 1996 post-Apartheid constitution and settled out of court by the South African government, is the only current example of a successful aboriginal land claim in southern Africa, and provides an area of 65,000 hectares to the San in addition to extensive land use rights in and to the recently renamed Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park (KTP).

The Osire/M'Kata Refugee Crisis

Since Namibia’s independence in 1990, the long-running civil war in neighbouring Angola has produced a steady southward flow of refugees. Most of them have been settled at Osire, Namibia’s largest refugee camp, located on a former White-owned farm in the central part of the country. Under the auspices of the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR), the population of Osire had swollen to over 20,000.

The Kuru Family of Organizations

Starting in 1986, Kuru developed a strategy of empowering the San through a holistic approach to development. The Trust’s initial input was directed at income generation and training programs to support groups coping with the difficulties facing hunter-gatherer societies entering a capitalist environment. Along with an adult education program, a preschool program was established to assist young children entering a formal educational environment. The training of teachers later became a focus of the Bokamoso preschool program.

The Kalahari Peoples Fund

Since its inception in 1973, KPF has responded to several requests for help made by San, Nama, and other rural southern African communities by raising funds and providing technical and advisory assistance. San and other Kalahari peoples are having to cope with rapidly changing conditions as populations have grown and development programs have expanded. Political, economic, and environmental conditions have changed significantly, and local peoples have undergone transformations in how they live and interact, both among themselves and with the governments of the states they live in.

The Human Impact

Despite an international campaign protesting the removals, the Government of Botswana has since 1997 moved more than 1,000 of 1,700 ethnic |Gui, ||Gana, and Kgalagadi residents out of the Central Kalahari Game Reserve (CKGR). As part of the government’s Remote Area Development Programme (RADP), two settlements were established. The main settlement is New Xade, called Kx’oensakene in |Gui and ||Gana languages. The name has an interesting origin.

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