A Time to Mourn

While Northern Rhodesia was preparing for independence as the
Republic of Zambia in 1964, impoverished villages in the remote north
east of the country were divided by a bitter conflict fuelled by
apparently irreconcilable political and religious convictions. This book
describes the origin of the dispute and how it led to skirmishes,
defiance of authority, massacre, torture and displacement: a previously
unreported mutiny. It is as such an important contribution to Zambian
history, with a significant proportion of the material being published
for the first time. The author was a district commissioner at Isoka
during the time of the massacre and was personally involved in the peace
settlement. He argues that the situation need not have escalated had
the authorities acted to prevent it; and that for different reasons,
both the colonial government and its independent successor tried to
distort the gravity of what occurred.