A Case study of
Mpongwe. MA (Gender Studies) dissertation.
I wrote my doctoral dissertation on the history of the coastal
Mpongwe of Gabon, using archives from Protestant and Roman Catholic missionaries and commercial agents, mostly from France and Britain.
Above all, for du Chaillu, meal times indicate the success of the local missionary station in elevating the
Mpongwe people into a community in which he is able to enjoy 'the comforts of civilized life and the consolation of a Christian social circle' (4).
Pretorious Nkhata, a farmer from
Mpongwe district in the Copperbelt Province of Zambia, explains what happened to him and his community (quoted by Nebert Mulenga in "Foreign farmers undermine food security in Zambia," http://farmlandgrab.org/post/view/21246):
The nation, which is well known for destinations that include the Makoma Dam (Luanshya), Lake Kashiba (
Mpongwe Rural), Chimfunshi Wildlife Orphanage (Chingola) and many more, is now taking the lead from the UN to develop tourism using sustainable measures.
The collection contains Bibles written in a variety of African languages, including Igbo, Hausa, Twi, Yoruba,
Mpongwe, Dikele, Ga, Sechuane (Setlapi dialect), Amharic and Bulu.
His regular entourage was made up of a small number of Senegalese veterans of the French colonial army, some Omyene-speaking
Mpongwe people from Libreville, and a manservant from the Kru coast of Liberia.
So, too, his sweeping pronouncements on the "character" of the
Mpongwe people, for instance, are uttered with the assurance that only class prejudice joined to racism can account for: "The men are deficient in courage, as the women are in chastity, and neither sex has a tincture of what we call morality" (Gorilla Land I: 105-6).
Among the plantations currently producing and selling estate coffee of high and consistent quality are: Isanya Estates in the Northern province in the old town of Abercorn (now called Mbala), close to the Tanzania Southern Highlands;
Mpongwe Estates situated in Luanshya in the Copperbelt province; Mutuwila Estates, in the Central province; Chamba Valley Estates on the plateau of the Lusaka province; Munali Coffee Estates, in the Southern province, named after and sharing a boundary with the hills discovered by David Livingstone; Terranova Estates in the Mazabuka Highlands in Southern province.
The Zambian agribusiness
Mpongwe Company (MDC) is a star in the crown of CDC Capital Partners' (formerly Commonwealth Development Corporation) agricultural holdings.