The Gwom Rwei of Zawan, Da Christopher Mancha, at the 2016 Zawan Annual Cultural Festival, tagged MANDIENG, which held on Saturday in Zawan, called on the community to support the efforts of the present government to diversify the fortunes of this nation in the area of agriculture.

He challenged his people to return to the land, saying, “Everyone should go back to his or her farm so that we should overcome hunger in our community.”

The Da Gwom Rwei further appealed to relevant government organisations and their collaborators to empower the people by providing all inputs and technical support needed to make it a reality.

While appreciating the present government’s policy direction in the area of creation of chiefdoms, district and village areas, he reiterated that Zawan, by virtue of its strategic location, which spans from the present Zawan to the city center of Jos metropolis, has met all the conditions and criteria needed for the creation of more districts and village areas out of it.

According to him, “The observance and celebration of Mandieng by our fathers before us kept the people united and indivisible such that any attempt made from the outside world to divide them was met with great skepticisms.”

He explained that the occasion was a continuous platform whereby the people of the different villages come back home to share and express their common fraternity against such little sentiments that tear and set the people apart.

According to him, “On this special day, our fathers in faith used to invoke the blessing of the Supernatural Power on high to supply plenty rains that will nourish their crops and ensure bumper harvest. Now, more than ever, we need the intervention of God to not only provide food in abundance to our teeming population but to also protect us from the different calamities we experience in our various communities today.

“The world over is bedeviled by terrorism, emergences, hunger and strife; we need prayers to avert this entire catastrophe from our land. We need rain to make our crops prosper this rainy season; this will free our people and children from hunger, malnutrition and all other forms of diseases,” the Gwom Rwei said.

Speaking also, the chairman planning committee, Mr Michael Pam Zi, said despite the enormous and nearly frustrating challenges, God has made the festival a complete success. He said it has become necessary for Zawan people to preserve, maintain and protect their cultural heritage, which they are known with since ages past.

According to him, the significance of Mandieng to the entire Zawan people has been a unifying factor, which takes place at the beginning of rainfall. “The significance of this cultural festival entails that, the Zawan people should seek reconciliation with one another in whichever way we would have offended each other so that the Almighty God will have mercy and forgive us our sins.”

He said, “The essence is for us to have a good rainfall to mark the beginning of the new farming season, praying and hoping that God will bless us with yet another bumper harvest.” According to him, during this festival, people slaughter goats, dogs, chicken, and cook better traditional food to observe this important season in Zawan Kingdom.

He said, in recent years, there was a loss of attitude towards holding Mandieng festival, not until 2007 – when the festival was held last – and said there is the need for Zawan people to protect, maintain and preserve Mandieng Festival annually, so that, the future generation will learn and take over from their ancestors as their legacy.

Mr Zi further called on all sons and daughters of Zawan to embrace each other, irrespective of their political differences, and concentrate on the development of Zawan Kingdom.

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Gwom Rwei of Zawan calls for creation of more districts