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Langalakhe Mabena
Art in any form has been widely used on different platforms as a weapon to fight and advocate for women’s rights across the world as well as amplifying women’s emancipation.
As the world celebrated Women’s Day on 8 March, with the celebrations further continuing to embrace equity through encouraging active engagement of the marginalised (women) to allow advancement in a meaningful, generation-changing way, the annually held Loziba Festival has proven to be instrumental in empowering women in arts.
In its third edition, the four-day festival ran from 6 to 9 March, under the theme “Arts addressing violence against women and mental health issues”. This was in light of its objective of creating widespread acceptance and support for young women’s art.
The arts industry in Bulawayo and beyond is male-dominated and it’s not a walk in the park especially to the “side-lined” women, as they are given fewer chances to prove themselves.
As we celebrate women’s month, empowering women in all spaces including arts must be a centre of attention with a renewed focus on positive portrayal of women in media and representations.
The society still measures female empowerment, by women’s attainments in the economic, political, and educational spheres, such as employment, access to the labour market, and the number of female legislators, ministers, parliamentarians, or other decision-making offices.
It is only recently that women’s participation in the cultural field has begun to gain recognition as an important barometer to measure female empowerment as lately, women have proven to be competitive in the artistic sphere.
This is because women use the vital platform to express their views about their identity and their rights within conservative societies not fully accepting the role of women as culture producers.
This is exactly what Loziba Festival was created for, to amplify women emancipation in the arts industry and in other spheres so as to have gender balance in the industry and the society.
This year’s edition of the Loziba Festival started their events through a “Young Women Luncheon” which was held at Pumula North Hall on 6 March.
At the luncheon, women were given a platform to freely converse about issues that affect them without boundaries and they grabbed the opportunity to discuss issues on gender-based violence, women emancipation as well as empowerment.
Councilor Sikhululekile Moyo who was spearheading the luncheon said as the council (City of Bulawayo), they were looking into ways to see how the girl child could be assisted in terms of digital innovation among other areas.
Other issues that she touched on are drug and substance abuse, and illegal abortions which have become a norm and cause for concern among the youths in Bulawayo and the country at large.
On 7 March, the festival moved to Pub Lagondola, where the entire focus was on performances of artistes through a poetry slam which saw Black Rose, Blessing Langa and Chichi taking centre stage.
In celebration of International Women’s Day (8 March), a round table conversation with young women in arts was held at the Youth in Innovation Trust offices, where female creatives gathered to discuss issues that affect them in the industry, and brainstorming on solutions which they could proffer towards overcoming their hurdles.
Closing the festival was a concert which was held at the National Gallery in Bulawayo with the main acts being Gwanda-bred Afro Soul sensation Pamellah, Stewie le Savage and Aejay August.
Loziba Festival media representative Thando Gwinji said since the festival was enacted, they were happy with the turnout they attracted. She said the goal was to reach as many women as possible.
“In our past three years of existence, people have shown interest in what we do, especially by adopting some of our cultural roots that have been long sidelined. Some of the members (artistes) that we started with eventually found their identity and were signed by entertainment promoters for other programmes. That for us was a big win.
“This year, we brought new members and hopefully, they’ll get the same exposure in their craft,” said Gwinji.
“The goal of the festival is to elevate female artistes from Bulawayo so that they contribute meaningfully to the city’s creative economy. We also want to celebrate and support their art so that they make names for themselves in the city and with time, penetrate the regional and international market.”
Loziba Festival which was coined after Queen Loziba, the senior Queen and King Mzilikazi’s wife in the Ndebele Kingdom, is a brainchild of some local female artistes who came together after seeing the need to support each other in order to rise in the male-dominated field.
They partnered Youth in Innovation Trust to come up with a concept that would honour the life of Queen Loziba while embracing the Ndebele culture and giving female artistes a breakthrough.
They have since welcomed new members and shared their experiences with other women in the country as a sisterhood.
Female creatives who have been part of Loziba festival including two-time National Arts Merit Award (Nama) winning all-rounder Qeqeshiwe Mntambo, multi-award-winning sensation Novuyo Seagirl and hip-hop superstar Noluntu J, among others.
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