Push to save dying Suba language now gathers momentum

When public meetings are held on Mfangano Island of Homa Bay County and elders are invited to pray, it is not strange to see younger audiences laughing.

The elders usually pray in Olusuba, the language spoken by the Abasuba community. To the elderly, the language is clear and most of them understand it.

But to the youth, what the senior citizens say is foreign and out of fashion. Some of the words they speak may have a different meaning from what most youths know. Just a handful understand a few words in the prayers.

“It was only my grandfather’s first brother who could speak the language fluently, but my siblings and I only speak Dholuo; we were never taught Olusuba,” Suba North MP Millie Odhiambo said in a past interview.

Children in Mfangano and other regions inhabited by the community, including Rusinga, Gwassi, Kaksingri, Kasgunga and Nyatike, fail to learn their language at infancy. This makes most of them foreigners in their own land as language is one of the primary forms of cultural identity.

Abasuba are Bantu and are believed to have migrated from Uganda to Kenya more than 500 years ago, before settling in their current location on the shores of Lake Victoria. Some of the areas they settled in were already occupied by the dominant Nilotic Luo with whom they intermarried .

Today, most people think that the Suba are a subset of the Luo  as most of them prefer Dholuo to Olusuba. This is having an effect on the current generation and may lead to extinction of the language in a few years, anthropologists and elders warn.

The situation has informed many initiatives to try and save ‘the dying tribe’. Among them is the proposal to have Olusuba taught in schools.

Abasuba Walamu lobby group chairman Lawrence Magwar said his community wants the Ministry of Education to introduce Olusuba in the Competency-Based Curriculum, to be taught as an indigenous language. In a petition presented to the Senate by the group, they are asking the Kenya Institute of Curriculum Development to introduce Olusuba  in schools located in areas dominated by the community.

“Schools in Suba are supposed to teach Olusuba, while the rest teach Dholuo. The petition was successful but has not been implemented,” he said, adding that teaching materials are ready.

Initially, the plan was to have 10 schools in Suba conduct a pilot programme for learners in lower primary, but the period elapsed.

Mr Magwar said he is hopeful that the government will heed to their calls to keep Olusuba alive.

The same interventions are being pushed by elders who said if the language is not preserved well, it will be lost. Suba Council of Elders secretary Joab Ikawa told Saturday Nation that education and intermarriage is what is threatening the language.

When formal education was introduced to the community, he  said, the government posted Luo teachers. This had an impact on children from the community who started learning Dholuo and abandoned theirs.

“Women who were married to men from the community could not speak our language. Their children were affected and it is having a ripple effect on different generations,” Mr Ikawa said.

Unesco petition

He added that the community has petitioned the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (Unesco) to keep the tribe alive. In the petition, the community wants funding to engage in activities that keep the ethnic group vibrant.

“We want to engage in adult education where we will organise classes so that people can learn the language,” Mr Ikawa said.

Other interventions include an annual event called Rusinga Cultural Festival where members of the community showcase their traditional way of life. Every year, during the week just before Christmas, the festival is held for two days at Kamasengre Grounds on Rusinga Island. Members of the community play different games like tugs of war, wrestling and boat racing.

Abasuba women also dress in traditional attire made from animal hide. They also cook and display traditional food for visitors.

Ms Anne Eboso, one of the organisers, said the event is meant to celebrate their culture. “We are trying to put ourselves in a position where we are not swallowed by other tribes. We also open up Suba for tourism,” she said, adding they also showcase the region as a tourist destination.

During the 11th edition last year, the government pledged to support the event to protect the Abasuba. Tourism Cabinet Secretary Peninah Malonza said her ministry would market some of the tourist sites around Lake Victoria to make them known to foreign visitors. She said the government had initially not put focus on the event. “Part of our plans includes mapping out all tourist attraction sites and letting them be known by the global market. Rusinga Festival is among them.”

Ms Malonza encouraged local and foreign tourists to visit Suba and learn about the tribe to help save it from extinction.

“Instead of going to the coast, just visit the lake, which, equally, has sandy beaches and first-class hotels. We will support the Western tourism circuit and more particularly activities around the lake,” the CS said.

Rusinga is the birthplace of African statesman Thomas Joseph Mboya, who was assassinated in 1969 in Nairobi. His mausoleum was built in the shape of the bullet that killed. The festival is held at the mausoleum grounds.

Prof Okoth Okombo was another prominent son of the soil. He was the founder of the scientific study of sign language in Africa.

To further try to remedy the situation, community members in Mfangano came up with a radio station to not only teach the language but also propagate the culture. Ekialo Kiiona (EK FM), meaning the whole world, broadcasts in Olusuba and Dholuo. Station manager Samule Karan said they have programmes where elders educate the community by translating English and Swahili words to Olusuba.

“Other programmes deal with history and culture where listeners are educated about the traditional practices of the tribe, including agriculture,” he said.

Prof Herman Batibo of the African Linguistics University of Botswana concurs with Unesco’s study, saying in his book, Language Decline and Death in Africa: Causes, Consequences and Challenges: “African policymakers, and now that Africa can no longer blame it on any foreign influence or force, should be at the forefront of (saving endangered languages)...”

In Kenya, the Yaaku dialect (also known as Mukogodo), Kinare and Lokorti are considered extinct. Currently, there is a push to hive off a county from Homa Bay and call it Suba County.

Other groups pushing for the same include people from Kuria who want a new county hived off from Migori County. They want Kuria East and Kuria West constituencies to form a new devolved unit to be occupied mainly by the community.

The Constitution of Kenya (Amendment) Bill, 2022, proposes five new counties in regions where minority communities are stifled by dominant ones. It seeks to create Kuria, Teso, Mount Elgon, East Pokot and Mwingi counties while expanding the size of Parliament.

During a meeting with ICT CS Eliud Owalo in December last year, Suba South MP Caroli Omondi said he had presented his proposal to Parliament for his community members to have their own devolved unit.

His idea, if included in the petition by Kuria East MP Marwa Kitayama, means the number of counties will be increased to 53.

Already, he has the backing of Suba elders.

If the proposals sail through in Parliament followed by approval by voters at a referendum, the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission will be tasked to create new counties from Migori, Busia, Bungoma, Trans Nzoia, Baringo, West Pokot, Homa Bay and Kitui.

Mfangano, Rusinga, Remba, Takawiri, Ringiti, Ngodhe, Kibuogi and Kiwa are among islands in Suba North and South constituencies. Some members of the Suba community live in Nyatike, Migori County.

Mr Omondi argued that the region has a population that is equal to other devolved units. “Counties like Lamu, Isiolo and Tharaka Nithi have a population that is equal to the area occupied by the Suba community. We need an extra county hived off from Homa Bay," he said.

The MP holds that Suba, which has been somewhat assimilated by the Luo, is marginalised, arguing that resources from the government hardly reach them.

“If we cannot get a county, then we shall have an extra constituency. We need to be empowered by getting more resources from the government," Mr Omondi said.

[email protected]