Queen Nzinga: Warrior & Political Strategist (1583-1663)

When it comes to African women in leadership and political participation there is one African leader who is a role model for young African women, Queen Nzinga. Queen Nzinga of the Mbande and Matamba Empire ruled the land that is present day Angola. The legend of this warrior Queen precedes her. She was of the greatest leaders that Africa has ever known and serves as an example for young African leaders. She was a political, military, diplomatic and spiritual leader of the Mabande people.

History shows that when Queen Nzinga was ‘woke’ and understood her majesty. When her brother who was the Ngola/ King at the time; sent her to negotiate with the Portuguese Governor she protested the floor mat she was given upon her arrival. Queen Nzinga understood the optics of the ceremony and she understood that the Portuguese viewed her as inferior. Instead of accepting this demeaning mat on the floor she instructed her servant to act as a chair. This allowed her to negotiate with the Portuguese from a position of equality, eye ball to eye ball.

Oral tradition teaches us that Queen Nzinga was born with an umbilical cord around her neck, this signified for the Mbande people that she had a great destiny. It was prophesied to her that one day she would be King which was not the norm in the patriarchal Mbande society.

Queen Nzinga has been described as a military strategist. She received her military training from her Father who she often accompanied on the battlefield, something that was unusual in this patriarchal society. Queen Nzinga was very unique because her father mentored her on leadership and power, how to yield it and use it and how to execute strategy. Her military strategies earned her the respect and admiration of the generals who followed her to battle and inspired both men, women and children to preserve the African heritage.

Queen Nzinga was a relentless leader who championed human rights and defended African dignity. She fought bravely against the barbaric practice of slavery by the Portuguese who were shipping millions of Africans from Angola to Brazil for work on the sugar plantations.  Many attribute Queen Nzinga’s actions with halting the Portuguese expansion into Central Africa.

Between the years of 1641 and 1642, Queen Nzinga formed strategic alliances with the Dutch in order to obtain guns that would be used in warfare against the Portuguese expansion. The Mbande had a military wing comprised of elite warriors who studied and obtained intelligence on the differences and competing interests of the different European countries that were in African in her day. Queen Nzinga used these differences to negotiate for weapons that she used to defend her homeland. She used her political and military capital to defend her homeland against the invading Portuguese and Dutch forces that threatened Mbande security.