Dithubaruba Cultural Festival returns

 

All roads lead to Molepolole on September 2nd for the 11th edition of the annual Dithubaruba Cultural Festival. 

The event that is a melting pot of culture is organised by the Kgosi Sechele I Museum and takes place at the Ntsweng Heritage site. This Thursday, the first of two events that paves way for the main festival takes place at the University of Botswana. 

The event is none other than the Dithubaruba symposium that will feature talks from a number of historians and tribal leaders around the topic of Dithubaruba. This is the second year that organisers are hosting the symposium.

According to the Coordinator of the event, Power Kawina, the Dithubaruba walk, pencilled to take place on Saturday, will follow the symposium. Ambassador Earl Miller is the chief walker and the walk will begin at the Scottish Livingstone Memorial hospital and end at the Ntsweng Heritage Site. 

Kawina says they have invited the President of the country to officiate at the main event and that one of the exciting highlights this year is that they will have a ground breaking ceremony for a number of developments that they have in the pipeline for the heritage site. 

The developments, approved by the Board of the museum include the building of a museum as well as a park. 

On the day of the event, other highlights to look forward to include traditional song and dance. In total, there will be 20 groups and six individual artists performing through-out the day and night. 

Some of the artists include Solly Sebotso, Sbongile Kgaile as well as Ramontshonyane Ntsoane. “One of the exciting highlights is the healing dances that will take place in the evening. We have invited three groups to participate and they include the Giraffe group from D’kar and another group from the Okavango area,” he says. 

The healing dances will be followed by a showcase of Mmino wa sekwena. As is customary, the organisers have invited other Bakwena from outside the country to be part of the event and this year, they are looking forward to hosting Bakwena ba Phalane, Ba Phokeng as well as Ba Limpopo (all from South Africa), and Bakwena from Namibia. Bakwena ba Phalane will also perform on the day.