'Lost African tribe' set up home in Scots woodlands as locals left baffled
A couple who claim they are part of a lost African tribe say they are facing persecution - after setting up home in Scots woodlands.
The Kingdom of Kubala claim they have settled in a forest in Jedburgh, with the intention of reclaiming land that was stolen from their ancestors 400 years ago - and the tribe's King has today even claimed to be a descendent of the Messiah.
Their presence has left locals baffled although the tribe claim to live a simple life, bathing in a nearby stream, living in tents, and connecting with nature.
However, they said on Tuesday that they 'don't recognise local laws' and have faced persecution from those who don't understand their ways.
They have been served eviction notices, and have even suffered an attack on their camp when their tents were set on fire. However, instead of bowing to local law enforcement, they say they only recognise the laws of their God, named Yahowah.
King Atehene, 36, who was previously an opera singer under the name Kofi Offeh, leads the group, which consists of his wife, Queen Nandi, and their handmaiden Asnat. They claim they are a lost tribe of Hebrews, with their King descended from David the Messiah, and say their ancestors were cast out when Elizabeth I deported native black Jacobites.
The group say they live a simple life, and aim to fulfil a prophecy to establish their kingdom and bring other "lost tribes" back into the fold.
King Atehene said: "The prophecy said, after 400 years, when my ancestors are destroyed from the land of Scotland, from the land of Great Britain, they will go into captivity and lose their identity.
"But after 400 years, I will come and bring them back to the land of promise. I am following the ancestral call and the call of the gods. The calling from our creator to embark on this journey, is the most important thing in our life. It is a journey of hope - a pilgrimage."
His wife, Queen Nandi, 43, a mother of seven who was born Jean Gasho, said in a statement on social media: "We are the Lost Tribes of Hebrews and have returned to claim Scotland as our homeland, a land stolen by Elizabeth the first 400 years ago when she deported all black people from Scotland and England, who were not Africans but natives of the land.
"Jacobites were black, from their ancestor Jacob, Yacobho, a black man. According to our Prophet Atehene, Jerusalem is in Scotland, and that he is the seed and offspring of David, the Messiah.
"The old world is going, the Second Exodus has begun, only those who live off grid, in Tabernacles will be saved, as we enter the Millennium Kingdom of Kubala, and the world is left behind."
"We live a very simple life of returning to innocence," said King Atehene. "We connect to nature. We connect to the trees around us. We get grounded every morning. We bathe in the springwater.
"We are living a simple life of relying daily on the creator for food, shelter and clothing. We live in a tent without walls, but we are not afraid of anyone, for we have the protection of the creator, Yahowah.
"Many people do not have the eyes to see and the ears to hear. They see things and they judge without understanding.
"This includes the government of Great Britain, who say that culture and religion is tolerant in Great Britain, but the Kingdom of Kubala has suffered trials and tribulations at the hands of authories, who do not understand or tolerate.
"But the Kingdom of Kubala cannot be destroyed, for we are helped by the creator of the heavens and the earth, our God. Until then, no one will be able to destroy the Kingdom of Kubala.
"We follow the laws of the creator - everything belongs to the ones who made it. We do not believe that any authority owns the land. The earth belongs to the father.
"We do not know about any eviction - all we know is that we are here to stay and establish our authority and power, just like our ancestors did."
Scottish Borders Council said it had been 'working with Police Scotland' to the ongoing situation. A spokesperson added: "This has included the provision of advice and information about housing options and other support services."
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Daily Record
6 hours ago
- Daily Record
'Lost African tribe' set up home in Scots woodlands as locals left baffled
The Kingdom of Kubala claim they have settled in a forest in Jedburgh, with the intention of reclaiming land that was stolen from their ancestors in the Highlands 400 years ago. A couple who claim they are part of a lost African tribe say they are facing persecution - after setting up home in Scots woodlands. The Kingdom of Kubala claim they have settled in a forest in Jedburgh, with the intention of reclaiming land that was stolen from their ancestors 400 years ago - and the tribe's King has today even claimed to be a descendent of the Messiah. Their presence has left locals baffled although the tribe claim to live a simple life, bathing in a nearby stream, living in tents, and connecting with nature. However, they said on Tuesday that they 'don't recognise local laws' and have faced persecution from those who don't understand their ways. They have been served eviction notices, and have even suffered an attack on their camp when their tents were set on fire. However, instead of bowing to local law enforcement, they say they only recognise the laws of their God, named Yahowah. King Atehene, 36, who was previously an opera singer under the name Kofi Offeh, leads the group, which consists of his wife, Queen Nandi, and their handmaiden Asnat. They claim they are a lost tribe of Hebrews, with their King descended from David the Messiah, and say their ancestors were cast out when Elizabeth I deported native black Jacobites. The group say they live a simple life, and aim to fulfil a prophecy to establish their kingdom and bring other "lost tribes" back into the fold. King Atehene said: "The prophecy said, after 400 years, when my ancestors are destroyed from the land of Scotland, from the land of Great Britain, they will go into captivity and lose their identity. "But after 400 years, I will come and bring them back to the land of promise. I am following the ancestral call and the call of the gods. The calling from our creator to embark on this journey, is the most important thing in our life. It is a journey of hope - a pilgrimage." His wife, Queen Nandi, 43, a mother of seven who was born Jean Gasho, said in a statement on social media: "We are the Lost Tribes of Hebrews and have returned to claim Scotland as our homeland, a land stolen by Elizabeth the first 400 years ago when she deported all black people from Scotland and England, who were not Africans but natives of the land. "Jacobites were black, from their ancestor Jacob, Yacobho, a black man. According to our Prophet Atehene, Jerusalem is in Scotland, and that he is the seed and offspring of David, the Messiah. "The old world is going, the Second Exodus has begun, only those who live off grid, in Tabernacles will be saved, as we enter the Millennium Kingdom of Kubala, and the world is left behind." "We live a very simple life of returning to innocence," said King Atehene. "We connect to nature. We connect to the trees around us. We get grounded every morning. We bathe in the springwater. "We are living a simple life of relying daily on the creator for food, shelter and clothing. We live in a tent without walls, but we are not afraid of anyone, for we have the protection of the creator, Yahowah. "Many people do not have the eyes to see and the ears to hear. They see things and they judge without understanding. "This includes the government of Great Britain, who say that culture and religion is tolerant in Great Britain, but the Kingdom of Kubala has suffered trials and tribulations at the hands of authories, who do not understand or tolerate. "But the Kingdom of Kubala cannot be destroyed, for we are helped by the creator of the heavens and the earth, our God. Until then, no one will be able to destroy the Kingdom of Kubala. "We follow the laws of the creator - everything belongs to the ones who made it. We do not believe that any authority owns the land. The earth belongs to the father. "We do not know about any eviction - all we know is that we are here to stay and establish our authority and power, just like our ancestors did." Scottish Borders Council said it had been 'working with Police Scotland' to the ongoing situation. A spokesperson added: "This has included the provision of advice and information about housing options and other support services."
Daily Mail
a day ago
- Daily Mail
So how did a 'lost African tribe' end up living in woods… in Jedburgh?
A couple claiming to be part of a lost African tribe have left a town's residents baffled after setting up home in nearby woodland. The pair, along with their 'handmaiden', have made camp in Jedburgh, Roxburghshire, where they have founded the 'kingdom of Kubala'. King Atehehe, his queen Nandi and handmaiden Asnat, first settled on Scottish Borders Council property but were served with an eviction notice. The group claim their tents were then burned down by locals before they moved to another site, near a school. The self-proclaimed monarch is often seen loitering outside a nearby Co-op to use its Wi-fi. It has emerged that the tribe set up in Scotland after wandering over the Border from Stockton-on Tees, County Durham. The King – real name Kofi Offeh, is a 36-year-old from Ghana and Queen Nandi is Jean Gasho, originally from Zimbabwe. In a post on her blog Ms Gasho, 42, claimed that Buckingham Palace ordered her arrest to protect King Charles's coronation in 2023. The pair were also due to face a trial for child cruelty at Teesside Crown Court, but all charges were dropped earlier this year. Handmaiden Asnat, Lady Safi, is Kaura Taylor from Texas, who had been reported as missing by her family. But in a video message from the camp, she said: 'To the UK authorities, obviously I am not missing. Leave me alone. I'm an adult, not a helpless child.' The group claims Offeh is descended from King David and that the Biblical land of Zion was not – as traditionally thought – in the Middle East but in Scotland. In a video on her Facebook page, Ms Gasho fans Mr Offeh with a peacock feather while he appears to be in a trance. She says: 'All hail the King of the North, all hail the Messiah... the Holy seed of David. 'You are the chosen one. The one to usher us to the Promised Land, here in the holy land of Scotland.' He replies: 'The time has come to bring the captives home. 'The time has come for black power in Kubala.' In another video shot in the woods, Gasho said: 'If you do not live in a tabernacle today, if this is alien to you... then you are not called, and you're not going to make it into the new world we're right now literally stepping into. 'The old world has gone. It's now all about eating pasta in the wilderness, Kubala, Kubala.' However, their venture has not gone smoothly. They claim their first camp was razed to the ground. Ms Gasho said: 'Everything was burned to ashes. We lost everything apart from the clothes on our back.' A Scottish Borders Council spokesman said the authority had been 'working with Police Scotland' in relation to the ongoing situation. He added: 'This has included the provision of advice and information about housing options and other support services.' Locals have mixed feelings towards the Kubalans. One said: 'They do seem nice, but there's a sense of uneasiness. We don't know much about their culture.' But Keith Williamson, 54, said: 'The council offered them a house. They refused. 'Their claim on this land is what irritates everyone.'
The Guardian
2 days ago
- The Guardian
Decolonizing Language by Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o review – final words of literary giant
On 17 July 1979, the great Kenyan novelist Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o gave a speech in Nairobi in which he questioned the logic of an African literature in European languages. He had recently been released from prison, where he had been held after his critiques of corruption and inequality had touched a nerve among leaders of the recently independent nation. But his address provoked strong reactions for another reason: up until that moment, Ngũgĩ had been closely associated with the emergence of an African tradition of writing in English and acknowledged as a key figure in the rise of the novel as a major genre on the continent; his fictional work was often cited as an example of how English was being remade in formerly colonised societies. His early novels, from 1964's Weep Not, Child onward, struck a chord with a global Anglophone audience partly because they echoed the English novelists he had read as a student at Makerere University College, the Ugandan branch of the University of London, and Leeds University, the seat of 'Commonwealth' literary studies in the 1960s. By the time of his speech, Ngũgĩ was a member of the literary establishment in Africa, a leading figure in world literature, and a leader in postcolonial thought. And while it is true that he had challenged what he saw as the hegemony of English in a 1968 manifesto, On the Abolition of the English Department, co-written with two of his colleagues at the University of Nairobi, Ngũgĩ assumed that the abolition of English did not mean dispensing with the colonial language. In fact, for most of the 1960s and 1970s he shared a belief, common among the postcolonial elite, that a literature in the ex-coloniser's language could indeed be revolutionary. But now the novelist had decided to break away from English, to depart, as he put it, 'from Anglo-Saxon literature in order to reconnect to the patriotic traditions of a national and culture literature rooted among the people'. He would henceforth write in his mother tongue, Gĩkũyũ (known to Swahili and English-speakers as Kikuyu). It is therefore fitting that, in Decolonizing Language, Ngũgĩ, who died earlier this year aged 87, should return to the question of language as effectively his final statement. The 20 essays collected in the book rehearse positions first articulated in his earlier collections, Writers in Politics and Decolonizing the Mind; but the new book is notable for Ngũgĩ's attention to the dangers that mother tongues face across the world, from colonial Ireland to Sami Norway, New Zealand and beyond. Read together, the essays resonate as a manifesto for the mother tongue both as 'the very heart of our being and existence' and the ultimate firewall against 'spiritual domination'. The mission of Decolonizing Language, the 'revolutionary idea' encapsulated in the book's subtitle, is an incisive rejection of the notion that European 'languages are inherently global and best able to carry intelligence and universality' or that they function as the languages 'of power and normality'. Reading the book and reflecting on the many conversations I had with Ngũgĩ as he tried to come to terms with his exile after learning of threats against his life in 1982, I was reminded of how different the situation was in 1979, when the author made his 'epistemological break' with English. I had graduated from the University of Nairobi a few months before, and had taken up a job as a trainee editor in the local office of Heinemann Educational Books, which was at the time a major publisher of African literature. My first task at Heinemann was to edit Devil on the Cross, Ngũgĩ's first novel in Gĩkũyũ. The famous author had two demands of his young editor: he insisted that his novel be edited to the same standards as the works I was editing in English and that it be directed at common readers, not elites. I went to work on the manuscript, which he had written in prison; when it was all done, and as I sat back and watched the big smile of satisfaction on his face, it dawned on me that for Ngũgĩ writing a novel in Gĩkũyũ had been a kind of homecoming. The book's initial reception stayed with him for many years: 'It was read in groups at homes and factory grounds, on public transportation even, the literate becoming the 'present' author of the story,' he noted in 2010. Ngũgĩ's decision to break with English provoked strong reactions: it was hailed by writers and cultural activists working in African languages who had felt left out in postcolonial debates that privileged English; it was criticised by prominent African writers, including Chinua Achebe, the 'founding father' of African literature, who insisted that English was a necessary linguistic tool in holding together multiethnic nations. Ngũgĩ refused to concede; instead he embarked on a global crusade defending mother tongues as indispensable tools in the decolonization of the mind. In this context, Decolonizing Language can be read as the author's final take on the overriding theme of this critical project, a clear diagnosis of the challenges mother tongues face in a world defined by linguistic hierarchies. On a more personal level, the book is Ngũgĩ's last account of his displacement from his own native ground, an acknowledgement of the heavy burden that those who write and speak the language of the other have to carry. The arguments made in the book are exhilarating; reading them in the author's absence is undeniably poignant. Simon Gikandi is University Professor of English at Princeton. Decolonizing Language and Other Revolutionary Ideas by Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o is published by Allen Lane (£20). To support the Guardian, order your copy at Delivery charges may apply.
