Our team got together for the first time since Christmas in
Zimbabwe to share our stories
where had we been?
what had we done?

3 funerals . . .

R’s nephew drowned in the sea at Mozambique
2 and a half weeks to negotiate borders and bribes and restrictions
before the family could lay him back in the earth.

Stories of visits to the mortuary
– without electricity,
filled with bodies
waiting for relations to get together enough money
to pay the cost to retrieve them
searching for loved ones through maggots
the indignity brought into our lives and deaths.

Of relations back from Namibia
visiting their home in Buhera for Christmas
the purchase of a cow and the sharing of this feast with the community
their first meat for months.

Of people resorting to the old foods of the ancestors
leaves of black jacks and pumpkins and forgotten fruit from indigenous trees

Of one desperate family exchanging their young daughter
for seed – to survive another year

Of green fields in some communities who had received seed donations
exploring new ways of dry planting with cow dung and compost
in the absence of fertilizer
and of their determination to never starve again
drawing people into shared work.

Of an estranged family together for the first time in years
old connections, broken and remade
the slaughter of a goat in celebration
the joy of belonging.

Riding the edge of the wave with the immediacy of the moment
and keenness of attention
learning of survival when our reactivity or despondence is our worst enemy.

This is the grey time of unending ‘coping’
and waiting until we can dance again.

Dr Alex Magaisa looks for laughs, and takes a completely different tack from the usual political commentators, in this recent piece on the Government of National Unity (GNU). Bobby, an 84, soon to be 85 year old  man writes to Aunt Rhoda, Zimbabwe’s resident agony aunt, for some advice on his September marriage and how to deal with his new wife.

Letter to Aunt Rhoda

Dear Aunt Rhoda,

I am an 84 year old man, soon to be 85 and desperately need your help as I’m am going through a very sticky patch.

After an on-off relationship and a tempestuous courtship, I finally married my girlfriend in September 2008, a mere two months after our engagement. I had to get it done quickly before she could entertain a change of mind, as has happened before, to my extreme discomfort.

It was a beautiful wedding, presided over by a long standing and loyal friend who flew all the way from South Africa. It was right that he be there, as he had been forced to call upon his powers during the latter period of the courtship. However, problems re-emerged on the very night of the wedding, when my new bride indicated that she was not ready to join the matrimonial home. She insisted on extensive renovations and comprehensive clean-up of the household to ensure that she would have total control of the all maters to do with the home. I appreciate that in my time (and at 84 it’s been long) I have entertained different types but I thought she would use her vantage position as vahosi (the wife-in-chief) to do all she wanted upon her arrival in the house. Her reaction was an unpleasant surprise that caused me enormous shame and humiliation among my peers.

Normally, I would have dispensed with her company there and then. The trouble is I desperately need this woman at this point in my life. She is the bridge between the looming penury that I face and the greener pastures that only her company can provide, although this is a fact that I will not admit publicly. My business empire is crumbling and I stand to lose everything, so I have had to literally beg her. I have tried to put some pressure through my usual tried and tested ways but this has, so far, yielded nothing. Absolutely nothing but pain and sleepless nights! I have to admit that I am in the biggest fix of my life.

I am very sure that my new wife loves me otherwise she would not have put that signature on the marriage certificate. This much I know because her parents, my new in-laws absolutely hate me. They did not even attend the wedding. They have never liked me one bit and think that I am old and tired. The reality, auntie, is that even though I’m 84, I consider myself a ‘young old man’. I don’t see myself appealing to the walking stick any time soon and I am fitter than a 30 year old. Her friends have not been helpful; in fact, some of them are just consumed by envy and jealousy so all they do feed her lies about me. Just recently she spent two months ensconced at one of her friends’ home. That friend is one of those unmarried types who have never been seen in male company and I fear she might cause my new wife to do a ‘cross-over’ (you know what I mean auntie) and do all those things that even pigs dare not attempt. It is that fear which fills me with real rage and I have had to exercise the greatest patience to restrain myself.

Auntie, my new wife is not exactly in the build or looks of Cleopatra nor is she a female version of Einstein when it comes to the intellect and I thought she had done a wonderful thing to accept my favour. If she did not have those bags of silver and gold, I very much doubt that any man, let alone I, would look twice at her. But I want her to know that I love her very dearly. In fact, her hard-to-get antics have caused me to value her very dearly. What I cannot do however, to confide in you auntie, is to display this affection too publicly and to be seen to be publicly grovelling for her company. As a man of my stature I have to maintain my dignity by not publicly conceding to all her demands. I have too many friends and hangers-on who might think I have lost my power – for it this power that I have applied to maintain my personal empire. If they think I have lost my power, my new wife could face very difficult times ahead because even I will not be able to give her the comfort and protection that she will need.

So, auntie, I want her to know that all she needs to do is to come into the matrimonial home and as soon as she is here she can do madiro akamba (whatever she pleases!). My friends and village elders have tried to persuade her but tete, arikutsika madziro (she remains adamant) zvekuti ndatopererwa ini (I am really stuck). I need whatever help you can give, even if it means you coming round to use your renowned powers of persuasion. Please, auntie – I await your response; I will be checking my email every two minutes.

Yours

Bobby

P/S I should also mention that we have a child together (we had her before marriage). The trouble is this child of ours has been fed wrong information about me and she, too, now hates me with a passion. To be disliked by your old child, auntie? It hurts!

Aunt Rhoda Replies:

Dear Bobby

Yours is a most unusual situation, Bobby and I can see that you are desperate. But you also sound like a man who is overpowered by his own arrogance. You say you love your new wife but if that is the case, why don’t you just be humble and accept her demands? After all she is going to be your wife, she will cook for you and share the matrimonial bed for life and, quite frankly, looking at the demographics that is not likely to be too long even though you prefer to describe yourself a ‘young old man’. Whatever that means, accept that you are old and as it is your arrogance is causing you to waste precious time. By the time she agrees, you might find that you will be unable to provide all that a young bride wants and she might end up finding other company, something that is sure to cause you ever greater heartache.

Forget about her parents or her friends and accept that it is your responsibility and if anything is wrong, it is purely your fault. You say you have a child together and that she hates you but again you blame it on others. Look yourself in the mirror Bobby, perhaps you have not exactly been the model dad to your child? With the pride you personally confess in your letter, I would not be surprised but you still want to offload all responsibility to others. That is your biggest vice.

Give your wife and child the respect they deserve and they might begin to warm towards you. The problem is you seem to be in the relationship for the wrong reasons; for convenience, to put it starkly and if that is the case, then she is right to worry about your intentions.

My advice is, be honest, be man enough to admit your mistakes and give your new wife what she wants. After all, you seem to be the one who needs her most.

Yours,

Aunt Rhoda

Author’s Note: This is a work of fiction. Persons named in this work do not exist, even if circumstances mirror any real life situations that readers may know, honest!

If homosexuality is a disease, let’s all call in queer to work: “Hello. Can’t work today, still queer”.
- Robin Tyler, American lesbian activist

Read about Obama’s plans to address the discrimination against members of the gay and lesbian community here.

The Global Political Agreement (GPA) is in a coma on a life saving machine and I am sure Zimbabweans are tired of the sound from the life support machines. We are requesting that someone between Mugabe and Tsvangirai pull the plug so we can cry, grieve and bury the GPA (read Zimbabwe) but at least move on with our lives towards our graves in one way or another. I am putting this request because I am tired of hoping. My mother in Buhera has told me at 84 she is tired and hopeless. My church mates have told me they no longer want to discuss politics anymore because they are tired. My husband has said he is alright with me doing anything to keep the Zimbabwe crisis on the radar but I should just not talk to him about it because he is tired of hoping. All my friends have said to me they too are tired of hoping. So can someone please pull the plug and stop this political rigmarole and sentence the entire Zimbabwean population to death because after this there is no hope of achieving any resolution at all to the Zimbabwean crisis.

Mugabe and Tsvangirai do you want to tell the whole world, especially Zimbabweans, that you have failed between the two of you to find a formula on how to work together for the greater good of the nation, the region and the whole world?

My second request is for both Mugabe and Tsvangirai to tell us of their Plan B if they have any. Mugabe has said he will go it alone which is the same as sending all Zimbabweans dead and alive to the grave at one go. As for Tsvangirai, the options are also limited according to the way I see it. If Mugabe surrenders in some way either Munangagwa, Mujuru or Chiwenga will spring from ZANU PF and the fight continues. There will be such a fight in ZANU PF around the succession issue that there will be so much bloodshed like we have never seen before. Chiwenga might try and pull off a coup but who wants a coup? Maybe new elections as some have proffered. How do you call for the elections? Where will ZANU PF have gone for us to be able to call for UN supervised elections? How will the UN intervene? Military intervention? Iraq and Afghanistan? Transitional Authority? How do you arrive at one when ZANU PF is in office?

Can someone tell me how you are going to be able to get rid of ZANU PF as an obstacle when we have failed to remove it for the past decade or so through elections, sanctions and any such struggle? I want to rally my friends, my church mates and everyone around me as long as there is a clear well defined and sustainable Plan B because otherwise I fear that in the forthcoming struggles for democracy the opposition will be all alone as people have just lost hope.

Motivate us around Plan B so that when you give a clarion call we can act accordingly.

Instead of relying on inspirational quotes from famous people someone I know gets her friends and guests to give her their quotations sharing their view of the world. Then she puts them up on her fridge. She sent me a long list of quotes yesterday, together with this story she’d heard:

A friend visiting from Australia came to see me after Christmas. She told me how the family bought the Christmas hams; and this provides a brilliant example of just how creative we have become in Zimbabwe, and what constitutes ‘normal’ financial transactions. They transferred £ from a UK account to Mukuru.com, where it was used to purchase fuel coupons. The family collected these at an office in Harare and proceeded to Colcom, where the coupons were translated into ‘units of pig’. They bought their hams, and at the check out, the teller informed them of the amount and that Colcom owed them change. However, as there was a shortage of Zimbabwe notes and no small denomination US$ notes, the teller instead offered them two pork sausages! (In ‘normal’ countries, suggesting change in pork sausages would result in calls for men in white coats).

Whilst the MDC continue to dilly dally about What To Do, Geoff Nyarota has come up with a plan of action. And I reckon it’s not half bad:

Mugabe has neither respect nor faith in Tsvangirai. I suspect that feeling is mutual between the two. If Tsvangirai thinks he can return from self-imposed exile to sit down with the very man he fled from and negotiate genuine strategies to bring our nation back on track, then he may not be as astute a politician as his followers have assumed. He has the greatest error of the Late Dr Joshua Nkomo, the Unity Agreement, to draw salutary lessons from.

1. The MDC should, without qualm, opt out of the proposed GNU.
2. Zimbabweans, not just the MDC, should come up with a Plan B.
3. The cornerstone of Plan B would be a new initiative that seeks to unite the people of Zimbabwe as one progressive force fighting dictatorship.
4. The GNU should be replaced by a transitional arrangement with neither Mugabe nor Tsvangirai as leader.
5. A transitional leader would be identified and appointed. There is certainly no shortage of patriotic Zimbabweans of good stature and excellent credentials. For example, the name of Wilson Sandura, recently lauded for his many good qualities, immediately comes to mind. If Mugabe could emerge from the bush to take over at State House, I personally don’t see why any other citizen with a reasonable academic background, an understanding of affairs of state and a heart in the right place cannot run Zimbabwe, especially if they have the ability to build a team of appropriately qualified and experienced people around them. There is an abundance of such people both in Zimbabwe and in the Diaspora.
6. Meanwhile the current crop of political leaders, particularly those whose political stature is now tainted by their recent performance will be prevailed upon to swallow their misplaced pride and throw in their lot with the rest.
7. The transitional arrangement would lead to new elections supervised by the United Nations and observed by who ever wishes to – the more the better. They will bring in much needed foreign currency, in any case.
8. These will be free and fair elections. Even Arthur Mutambara, if he still wishes and if he plays his cards well, can become the next President of ZImbabwe, not merely Deputy Prime Minister through the back door, as he is currently and impatiently trying to do.
9. Above all, Zimbabweans wherever they are, must declare a commitment to the transitional arrangement. Let us all join hands, whether we are Shona or Ndebele, white or black, Zanu-PF or MDC to work in unity to liberate ourselves from the yoke of colon..sorry… post colonial oppression, injustice and humiliation. Mugabe has partly survived by driving a wedge between Shona and Ndebele and another between white and black.
10. Once we have achieved our new independence let a referendum be held so that Zimbabweans can decide whether they want to pardon Mugabe for his many sins or to prosecute him.
11. The international community would support this whole process with clean hands as it were. Some African leaders believe the West has become part of the problem of Zimbabwe through their alleged tendency to prescribe the course of political events in Zimbabwe. By their very attitude and actions or lack thereof, the African leaders have themselves also become part of the problem of Zimbabwe.
12. We need the support of the outside world as we strive as a nation to polish our tarnished jewel, Zimbabwe.