Who made Paramount Chiefs—our ancestors or the colonial state?
…A Lala elder’s reflection on the Mukuni paramountcy petition
By Dr Lawrence Mwelwa
IN our first reflection, we asked why the Mukuni paramountcy question has returned after generations. This week, another question follows naturally: did our ancestors create Paramount Chiefs, or did colonial administration formalise that ranking system?
That question matters because Africans had rulers long before Europeans arrived. We had kings, chiefs, priestly authorities, councils, clans and territorial leaders, but their titles, powers and relationships differed greatly from one community to another.
Colonial government did not create African authority from nothing. What it did was classify, recognise and reorganise existing authorities so they could fit within an administrative system deliberately designed to make indirect rule workable properly.
That distinction must remain clear. Saying colonialism formalised paramountcy does not mean every powerful African ruler was previously equal. Some societies were centralised kingdoms; others were confederations, independent chiefdoms, or decentralised communities with different authority.
By the 1930s, Northern Rhodesia had legislation governing Native Authorities, while Barotseland operated under a distinct administrative framework. Colonial officials increasingly translated diverse African political institutions into categories that government could recognise and administer officially.
Here we should ask: when an African ruler was entered into a colonial register as Paramount Chief, did the register create his greatness, or merely give an administrative name to authority already recognised traditionally before?
And when another ruler was recorded simply as Chief, did that necessarily prove he had always been subordinate, or could colonial convenience have reduced a more complicated indigenous political relationship into one bureaucratic category officially?
These questions sit directly beneath the Mukuni petition. The Bene Mukuni Royal Dynasty Committee argues that Mukuni’s present classification does not reflect the historical and customary standing of the institution it represents today fully historically.
But if the answer depends upon custom, whose custom must speak? Is Bene Mukuni tradition alone sufficient, or must neighbouring peoples also be heard where the claimed historical domain reaches into their own traditional territories?
The Constitution gives us an important starting point. Article 165 guarantees chieftaincy and traditional institutions according to the culture, customs and traditions of the people to whom those institutions actually apply in Zambia today constitutionally.
That language is powerful because it shifts attention away from political favour and towards customary legitimacy. Government cannot simply manufacture a chief because it likes him, nor erase one because political relations have changed suddenly.
In Mulubisha versus Attorney-General, the Constitutional Court held that sections three to seven of the Chiefs Act conflicted with Article 165, because presidential recognition powers were inconsistent with the amended constitutional order then in force.
The Court stated that each chiefdom must follow its established customary system for selecting and removing a chief. That judgment therefore strengthened the principle that chieftaincy originates from people and custom, not presidential discretion alone.
But does that principle answer the paramountcy question completely? If a community says its ruler has always possessed paramount status, who determines whether that status existed historically, particularly where neighbouring chiefdoms dispute its reach today?
This is where law meets history. Judges may interpret constitutional provisions, but courts still require evidence about custom. Historians can describe the past, yet they too must distinguish memory, genealogy, colonial records and later reconstruction.
The African elder approaches such disputes differently from the politician. He asks not only, “Who has the title?” but also, “Who followed this throne, who paid tribute, who installed whom, and who could withdraw allegiance?”
A title without a people is only a word. Paramountcy without recognised subordinate authority raises another question: paramount over whom? If nobody historically acknowledged that superiority, can the title alone create the hierarchy afterwards today?
Yet the opposite danger also exists. Suppose colonial officers deliberately reduced a ruler whose authority was widely recognised before their arrival. Should modern Zambia preserve that classification merely because it survived in official records thereafter?
If colonial paperwork distorted African history, justice may require correction. But correction cannot be achieved by replacing one untested narrative with another. Restoration requires proof, especially where another people’s inherited autonomy may be affected today.
For the Lala, this distinction is crucial. We should not oppose Mukuni because he seeks recognition. Neither should we assume that recognising Mukuni’s historical stature automatically confirms every territorial or hierarchical claim associated with it.
If Mukuni’s tradition says his forebears exercised authority over Lala territories, then Lala tradition becomes relevant evidence. What did our Kankomba remember? What did Muchinda, Shaibila, Chitambo, Chibale, Mulungwe and neighbouring establishments understand historically then?
Did they acknowledge Mukuni as a superior ruler? Did they send tribute? Did Mukuni install their predecessors? Could he remove them? Were there marriage alliances, military relationships, migration links, or temporary political arrangements instead historically?
These are not disrespectful questions. Africans have always settled serious matters through careful listening. When two families disputed a boundary, elders did not begin with insults; they followed old paths, trees, graves and witnesses carefully.
Perhaps this case is forcing Zambia to confront something larger. Have we preserved colonial rankings so faithfully that we sometimes mistake administrative convenience for African tradition? Or are we too quickly dismissing genuine precolonial hierarchies?
Kapya Kaoma has publicly argued that paramount chieftaincy was heavily shaped by colonial administration, while Fred M’membe similarly questions colonial ranking. Those are arguments in public debate, not yet conclusions of the Constitutional Court itself.
The Mukuni petition itself reportedly seeks recognition with powers and authority associated with paramount status, including authority concerning subordinate chiefs within the claimed domain. That makes defining the domain more important than debating prestige alone.
For Lala chiefs, therefore, the safest question is not, “Do we support Mukuni?” It is, “Does the historical and legal case being advanced place any Lala chiefdom within Mukuni’s claimed customary hierarchy at all today?”
If the answer is no, much anxiety may disappear. If the answer is yes, then fairness requires Lala royal establishments to examine evidence, preserve their histories, and ensure their customary understanding is properly represented publicly.
Our elders taught that when two drums sound differently, one should not immediately declare one broken. First discover who stretched each skin, which dance it accompanies, and whether both are speaking different traditions from history.
So the question remains: who made Paramount Chiefs? Perhaps neither answer alone is sufficient. Our ancestors created authority; colonialism classified it; independence inherited classifications; and constitutional Zambia must now determine what genuinely belongs to custom.
To be continued
