THE HISTORY OF MAFIA ISLAND
Mafia Island is situated about 120 km south of Dar Es Salaam, only 20 km from the mainland in the Rufiji delta. It consists of one large island and several smaller islands, including Jibondo, Chole, Juani, Bwejuu, Mbarakuni, Shungumbili and Nyororo. Mafia Island is a District, as an administrative unit within Tanzania’s Coast Region. It is generally regarded as a somewhat undeveloped district, and is reputed to have been one of the last districts to get a secondary school. To reach the island from mainland Tanzania, one either has to travel aboard a small, wooden sailing boat for about two days from the mainland, or aboard on a small motorized boat for eight hours or fly on one of the daily flights from Dar es Salaam and land on the sandy airstrip adjacent to Kilindoni town. According to the 2002 census 40 801 people lived on the island. The main livelihood activities in Mafia are agriculture, livestock- keeping, fishing, industry and trade. Farming and fishing are seen as complementary activities, carried out by both men and women, though usually with different areas of responsibility. Women would collect octopus and bivalves, whilst men would go out in boats. Cash crops in Mafia include coconuts and cashew nuts, although the price of coconut oil has dropped in the last years, severely affecting the farmers in Mafia who describe these times as hard times . Mafia is the chief source of fish to Dar es Salaam, about 900 tones of various fish sources are fished annually. There is also commercial aquaculture on the island namely prawn hatchery, prawn farming and sea weed farming. Pearl oyster farming is also being pioneered. The only other main industry on Mafia is tourism.
Mafia has a long history of settlement, it also has a history of various invaders, rulers and slavery. The first records of settlement is of the Shirazi who had their headquarter at Kilwa during the 11th to 13th centuries, or 13th-16th century according to Moon (2004), they had settlements at Ras Kisimani on Mafias most western point. The half washed away Swahili/Islamic town is now an important archeological site and tourism attraction. According to narratives from elders of Chole the descendants from the Shirazi of Ras Kisimani intermarried with the coastal populations and a newer group of Arab immigrants and made up the elite of the inhabitants which left the remnants of Kua ruins on Juani island. The rivalry between the Kua and Kisimani Mafia is a common theme in historical narratives on Chole. Slavery was common in Kua and many statements and narratives on Chole describe the horrid treatments of slaves in those times. The Kua met their downfall in 1817-1818 due to an outbreak of smallpox and from raiders from Madagascar.
A historical narrative from Chole also
tells of the oppressed people of Kua where somebody escaped and went and
asked for help from the Sakalafa people of Madagascar to come and
overthrow the current rulers. Slavery in different forms has existed for
a long time on the east African coast, mostly as an extreme form of
patron- client relationships. The rise of the plantation industry
changed the form of slavery to a harsher form where the slaves were
dehumanized and looked upon as
commodities, this was also encouraged
by famine which resulted in an increased willingness to sell humans
into slavery. Many stories tell of family members selling younger
children into slavery to pay for food (Walley 2004). Mafia belonged to
Sultan Seyid Said who had his capital on Zanzibar. The main city on
Mafia was now moved to Chole, where the town was called Chole Mjini and
the main island was known as Chole Shamba (Chole farm or field).
Many ruins on Chole can be found from this time and later colonial periods (Moon 2000). In 1890, Britain declared a protectorate over the territory of Sultan Sayid Ali, but part of this territory, namely Mafia, was traded to the German colonialists who moved the headquarters from Chole to Kilindoni as it was more accessible. This meant that Mafia was administered as part of the mainland of Tanzania, unlike Zanzibar. The stories told from this period describe a harsh government that used beatings and hangings as means of punishment. Mafia was captured by the British again during World War 1 and slavery was abolished. Kilindoni remains the administrative and commercial capital of Mafia until today. In 1961, Mafia gained independence with the rest of Tanganyika, as Tanzania was known as then. Julius Nyerere was the first president elected in Tanzania. His goal was to develop a egalitarian socialist state, built on the philosophy of the African ujamaa, familyhood or togetherness.
Mafia is known as a more backward part of Tanzania, and is less developed in terms of infrastructure such as electricity, roads, and education (only one secondary school).this joint isolation and neglect have resulted in a development of more egalitarian social relationships. None were rich enough to hire other people to do work for them full time. There are different forms of social ties in different parts of Mafia as people descend from different groups. Some are descendants from the African mainland, some have different Arab influences, and there are also groups of Indian descendants in Mafia.
The social bonds on Mafia are very much formed by bilateral kinship ties that are spread out through all of Mafia and further off to other islands. It is a patrilocal society where the woman moves to her husbands’ home, so it is often the woman travel to be with her family. These ties are known as Ukoo on Mafia, and as they are bilateral each person has four groups, one for each of their grandparents, to maintain for means of economic and social support and security. This means that also women are independent social actors as they have a right to inheritance through their Ukoo ties, although this is often half of what the men get. Who is in your network or not is a very fluid and changing, especially due to the common practice of divorce and remarriage in Mafia . Women still argue that they are worse of than men though, as they work harder, girls are married off to early to men they do not choose themselves and thus, forced to drop out of school.
There are two sets of opposing social laws in Mafia. One is the Islamic sheria law brought by the Arabs, the other is not a law in itself, but it is mila, customary traditions brought from the mainland. Many of the laws of these two traditions are directly opposing. The sheria is looked upon as higher traditions and more cultivated, but the mila is seen as becoming more important at the expense of the sheria, such as women gaining more autonomy and not necessarily obeying their husbands (Walley 2004:121). A significant feature in the culture is the importance of consensus of public decision making. In theory everybody has the right to attend and speak their mind in village meetings, although mostly middle aged and older men dominate. After opinions are presented, the argument that convinced most people is informally accepted as the consensus. It is not expected that the opponents have changed their mind, but out of respect for elders, it is expected that they adhere to it. It is also important for the village to keep a united face to guests; it would be shameful to display disagreements to outsiders. http://www.umb.no/statisk/noragric/publications/master/2008_linn_marie_holberg.pdf