Natala by Kithaka wa Mberia

Maua Kwenye Jua la Asubuhi is a play that confronts the challenges of the so-called tribal clashes in an un-named African country fostered by petty ethnic politics. Two ethnic groups – the Watange, on one side and the Wandiku on the other are poised against each other. The Watange claim that the land upon which they live is their ancestral land and that the Wandiku just acquired land there recently thereby infringing on Watange’s property rights.
Chebwe, a Mtange who is full of dislike for the Wandiku, will do anything including using all the finances he can marshal to evict Wandiku from the disputed land. Similarly Kabitho who is a Mndiku is driven by the blind anger from the pain of seeing his people being evicted in what they consider their rightful property. His community has lost property during the war in which hundreds of women and children were their children killed.

While Kabitho and Chebwe are organising and preparing for war, their children Waito (Mndiku) and Nali (Mtange) are deeply in love and intend to get married. Now then, where will this love cultivated on the foundations of hate, amidst the looming protracted fatal war lead? Will the land be saved by the love from the young generation or will it be destroyed by the hate of the old generation? The answers to these questions are to be found in the play, ‘Maua kwenye Jua la Asubuhi’ ( Flowers in the Morning Sun). The scripting of this play was commissioned and funded by the International Committee of Red Cross (ICRC) who had commissioned the author to use drama to disseminate information on the ‘Do’s and donts’ of war, according to the Principles of the International Humanitarian Law .Besides funding the scripting,ICRC lalso met the cost of over 100stage shows in Kenya and Tanzania in including the refugee camps in Ngara,Kigoma Tanzania ,where there were thousands of refugees fleeing from conflict in Rwanda Burundi and the DRC .The play has also been staged in Bagamoyo Institute of Arts,Dar-es Salaam University,Moshi and many places in Kenya including the Adminstration Police training collenge in Embakasi.