Hosana Wosana musical plays at Mantlwaneng

Arts and Media Company, The Campus Group, will showcase its first production under the Botswana Blue Performing Arts Series. The series will comprise of close to 20 performance arts events aimed at celebrating Botswana’s 50th Anniversary.The events, according to a press release vary from theatre, music, folk arts, fashion shows, poetry and many more and will take place from December 2015 ending in September 2016.

In the first phase, ten events are pencilled to take place from next month until August 2016. The second phase will comprise of a carnival of ten events all happening in the month of September. The series will be launched in January. The release also highlights that the company is expected to host its first event on December 10th at the Mantlwaneng Theatre Hall. The event, titled Hosana Wosana is an expressive musical theatre production, and it was originally written as a film script and adapted to theatre. The dramatic event will see a cast of 45 (ranging from individually commissioned Kalanga dancers from the North East) as well as KTM choir providing the hymnal and western section of music, forming a fair part of the production.

Also working on the production are ten University of Botswana Theatre students, who are placed in the technical and performance sections of the production. On the same night, Barwa Kgodumo Ya Leselebe Traditional Group will showcase a 40 minutes production of Balete Traditional folk music. “Hosana Wosana is a musical celebrating Botswana through Kalanga spiritual music systems of Hosana, Sangoma and Mancomane,” says the release. It is set on the backdrop of faith and religion at a time when Christian missionaries made their first contact with Southern Africa.

The release also points out that it explores local social communities’ values and needs, and that the story covers a fictious nation of Baka-Habangana community whose village chief became the first tribal leader to convert to Christianity.
“This happens at a time when the Chief’s daughter is due for Ukuthwasa as a Hosana. At the advice of the newly commissioned local pastor and her nuns, the chief refuses this putting to test a long standing kalanga tradition that refusal warrants pain, suffering and subsequent death of the due Inthwasa or Bonga,” the release explains.

Adding to the woes of the tribal leader is the fact that all these events are taking place at a time when his village is facing the harshest drought of the century, testing his new faith and challenging him to prove that his new God is mightier than the traditional Gods.