Aletha barred from wreath-laying

The OvaMbanderu Traditional Authority succeeded in barring the widow of their late chief Munjuku Nguvauva II from laying a wreath on his grave without their consent.
Aletha Nguvauva sought to lay a wreath on the grave of Munjuku Nguvauva II without the involvement of the traditional authority.
The authority had intervened and asked the High Court in Windhoek to issue an interdict that would forbid Aletha, her son Mutima Rikarera Nguvauva and any other person acting under their directions or on their behalf from entering the gravesite where the late chief and his revered predecessor, Kahimemua Nguvauva are buried at Okahandja.
The traditional authority wants to have their authority established as she was threatening to disregard their functions and duties vested in them by the Traditional Authorities Act.
Acting Judge Collins Parker yesterday in his ruling found that the OvaMbanderu Traditional Authority, the applicant, was responsible for maintaining and preserving the gravesite and is also responsible for supervising and ensuring the observance of the customary law of the OvaMbanderu traditional community.
“In that case it was the traditional authority’s right to facilitate, in terms of the tradition and traditional values of the community, Aletha’s laying of a wreath on the grave of her late husband at the gravesite,” he said.
He emphasised that Aletha cannot proceed to enter the grave site in disregard of the right of the traditional authority.
He ruled that the OvaMbanderu Traditional Authority has established that there was an act or threatened act of interference with the Traditional Authorities Act and that they cannot obtain adequate redress in some other form of ordinary relief.
The traditional authority in terms of the Traditional Authorities Act instituted an application to interdict and restrain Aletha Nguvauva from carrying out acts that in their view interfered with their statutory right.
The applicant is the traditional authority of the community of which Aletha is part.
Consequently the grave and the gravesite are a cultural site of the community and are considered a sacred place to the community.
“I have no difficulty, therefore, to hold that in doing that she must proceed according to the traditions and traditional values of the community,” Parker ordered.

FRED GOEIEMAN