Afar tribe keeps customs

Press, 24 April 1986, Page 34

Afar tribe keeps customs

By

ERIC SAUVE,

Agence

France-Presse, through NZPA Doki Modiato Ethiopia The nomadic Afar tribe of central Ethiopia, respected and feared for its prowess in combat, has maintained its customs in spite of the imperatives of drought and hostilities with neighbouring peoples in the region. Night-time visitors to this village of huts, named after the Afar tribe settled in the remote region of northern Shoa Province a year ago, are brought by all-terrain vehicle across bumpy trails criss-crossed by hyenas and foxes. But their arrival in the area, already long signalled by guards posted

round the village nestled at the foot of a mountain, hardly raises a stir as the village is caught up in the deafening beat of animalskin drums and unbridled dancing late into the moonlit night taking in all the tribe’s unmarried men and women. Dehilu Bussa, the village “chief” clad in a large white toga, extends his hand and exchanges kisses on the hand with his visitors. Dangling from his leather belt is a sheath from which only the silver scabbard of a long curved dagger can be seen. The dancing becomes more and more frenzied — a young woman, her half naked body gyrating to the beat, seizes a rifle,

alternately brandishing it menacingly or caressing it almost passionately. Her woman companions, resplendent in their finest jewels, thinly braided hair and brilliant pearls, encircle her, rifle still in hand. “She is the one the demon has chosen and it is her body and soul that has been possessed,” whispers our driver, Ato Mulatu, a native of Addis Ababa who has become fascinated by his country’s diversity since becoming involved in the international aid effort against famine. The dancers begin panting furiously, their entire bodies seized by uncontrollable shaking. The young woman with

the rifle suddenly breaks out of the circle. Greasing the weapon thoroughly, she then presents it to her chief who exhorts her to “kill many enemies during the forthcoming battles with the Oromos,” a neighbouring tribe. A group of young men, each enrobed in a sheet of cotton fabric, then takes the visitors to a series of huts made up of layers of straw and dry branches. Visitors and tribesmen squat in a tiny dwelling and then gather round a fire of brushwood as the young men perform a melancholic chant. The Afars, according to Ato Mulatu, were particularly hard hit by the famine that devastated Ethiopia last year, and for

the moment have abandoned their nomadic ways to settle in Doki Modiato. Some 1500 have abandoned their traditions as warriors and animal breeders to begin tilling the land. Late into the night, the dancers long past the point of exhaustion, three armed men take the visitors to a straw bed set aside for them in the open air. Three of them, described as braves, are to stand watch over the guests through the night. With the coming of daylight, the village women will be off in search of dead wood to keep the fires burning. “It is a sacrilege for Afars to cut down a living tree,” says Atu Mulato.