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| Title: | Rebellion or massacre? The UNIP-Lumpa conflict revisited |
| Author: | Gordon, David M. |
| Book title: | One Zambia, many histories: towards a history of post-colonial Zambia |
| Year: | 2008 |
| Pages: | 45-76 |
| Language: | English |
| Geographic term: | Zambia |
| Subjects: | Lumpa Church rebellions United National Independence Party Church and State |
| Abstract: | The Lumpa Church was founded in 1953 by Alice Mulenga Lenshina. Most of its converts were from the Chibemba-speaking population in the Chinsali and Kasama Districts of the Northern Province of Zambia. The event known officially in Zambian history as the 'Lumpa uprising' arose from friction between the church and the United National Independence Party (UNIP), which then controlled the government, even though the colonial administration was still responsible for security. At least 1000 people died in the attacks between 26 June and 15 October 1964 ordered on the followers of the church by President Kenneth Kaunda. The worst single atrocity was the massacre in the village of Sione on 30 July 1964. When news of this reached them, most Lumpas abandoned their villages and fled into the bush. Some actually sought refuge in the Congo. Lenshina was captured and, although never formally prosecuted in connection with the events of 1963-1964, she was forced to call upon her supporters to surrender. Later she escaped to Angola but was caught and returned to Zambia where the government felt threatened by a pan-Bemba Lenshina-Kapwepwe alliance. Many Lumpas returned to Zambia after Alice Lenshina's death in 1978. After the end of UNIP rule in 1991 they formally reconstituted themselves into the Jerusalem, New Jerusalem and the Uluse Kamutola (Praise the Temple) Churches. The legacy of the Lumpa Church and its uprising against the government are still palpable in Zambia. The Manichean division of the good of Christianity versus the evils of witchcraft, Lumpa hymns and music have influenced not only the United Church of Zambia but also the Roman Catholic services. Frederick Chiluba's 1991 declaration that Zambia was a Christian nation, the popularity of evangelical Christianity among the Zambian political class, and the wattle-and-daub churches in villages which provide the most prominent organizational counter to political party structures, all demonstrate that the politicization of religion and the theocratic nature of politics are still a feature of Zambian political life. Notes, ref. [ASC Leiden abstract] |
