Farewell to Elenga Enene Daniel Shooya

Chief Daniel Shooya of the Uukolonkadhi Traditional Authority, whose traditional title is Elenga Enene, has died at the age of 100.

The late chief served as leader of the Uukolonkadhi Traditional Authority since 1985 and was one of the longest serving traditional leaders in the area at the time of his death.

When a Gondwana Collection Namibia team visited the chief at Oshika, near Onesi, in February 2020, we found him sitting in a chair with a .22 rifle slung over his shoulder at the entrance of his residence.

As he was sitting with his back towards us, dressed casually in a white T-shirt, we very nearly mistook him for a security guard!

We received a warm welcome and he invited us to follow him to his house. Despite his age, the 96-year-old Tatekulu Shooya was in good spirits and looked exceptionally well.

Once inside the house, we were introduced to his wife, Meme Selma Shooya, and other members of the family, and made to feel welcome. Meme Shooya explained that her husband was very fond of shooting and assured us that he was an excellent rifleman.

Eager to share more about his life and experiences, Tatekulu Shooya took us down memory lane. Like many young men in northern Namibia, he walked to Ongwediva to seek employment in 1942. The journey took the 17-year-old boy several days, but he got his first job as a contract labourer on a farm in the Bethanie area in southern Namibia.

He recalled how he collected stones while herding livestock, and stacked them on top of the other to build a shelter. A piece of canvas served as the roof. He later also worked in a bakery at Usakos.

Tatekulu Shooya became active in politics in the early 1970s. When the area became self-governing, in line with South Africa’s Bantustan policy in 1973, he was appointed ‘minister’ of public works in the ‘Cabinet’ of the Owambo Legislative Council.

He was appointed as ‘minister’ of the interior (similar to home affairs) in 1975 and was a member of the Owambo delegation to the Turnhalle Constitutional Conference from 1975 to 1977.

He joined the Christian Democratic Action for Social Justice (CDA), which was established in February 1982 by Peter Kalangula after the Democratic Turnhalle Alliance (DTA), an alliance of different political parties, refused to form a single party.

He served as an additional executive committee member of the CDA in the Owambo administration.

He was appointed chief of the Uukolonkahdi Traditional Authority in 1985, a position he held for 39 years until his death. Uukolonkadhi is the western-most of the eight Aawambo communities. It consists mainly of two small communities: the Aaunda, who also live in southern Angola, and the Aakolonkadhi.

Unlike the Aawambo kingdoms, they did not have a centralised system and settled in the same area. The Aakolonkadhi owe their name to the practice of cutting small (woman-like) steps down to their wells and were referred to as ‘Aatsi yiikolokadhi’.

The area is also inhabited by Ovahimba, Ovazemba and Ovakwankala.

The late Elenga Enene Daniel Shooya is survived by his wife, Meme Selma Shooya, 10 children and grandchildren.