I was telling somebody that I want to have a driver’s license. It’s about time now. You will not believe what he said or maybe you will. He said in order for me to get a license I would have to go with an extra US$80 or so for me to get the license. That’s not all. He continued to tell me that after the provisional license I must be prepared to have another US$80 to pass the road test. But that is not the end of my story. I went and spoke to another gentleman and said to him; can you believe it, to get a license you need to be prepared to pay extra bribe money of about US$160. I can’t pay that. I vented to him that I am a Christian and I do not promote bribing and such lawless acts. Above all no wonder we have lots of car accidents and unnecessary deaths on the road. We have people that buy their way into the driver’s seat. You know what the second gentleman said to me. He said I should not view this extra US$160 as a bribe but as part of the Zimbabwe driving curriculum. In other words we should have it in black and white, a statement saying in terms of section 1.1 of the new drivers act, all excluding the ones related to driving inspectors, shall be required to pay an extra amount for the acquiring of a driver’s license. Failure to do this will result in you writing the driver’s license exam until you pay the required bribe. I was going to be afraid to write this piece in fear of not passing my driver’s test when I go next month. But I don’t want to be a part of this “bribe me” mentality that has infected our country. Rest assured I will read for the exam and hopefully start a new breed of people that want to do things differently.

Kubatana recently received this interesting opinion from Arkmore Kori:

I object to violence because when it appears to do good, the good is only temporary; the evil it does is permanent. (Mohandas Gandhi).

Recent political developments such as the impasse concerning the Government of National Unity with only four months before it expires and the constitutional stalemate have made it fashionable to talk about elections as the only solution to the Zimbabwean crisis.

Many, including Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai, believe that with the help of the Southern Africa Development Community (SADC), the African Union (AU) and the United Nations, peaceful elections are possible. Some have even called for either regional or international stakeholders to be deployed in Zimbabwe to safeguard peace during election time.

But our experience shows that SADC and the AU are powerless to stop any political or election violence in Zimbabwe. When they came for the June 2008 run-off, they just ‘observed’ both elections and the accompanying violence with the mild conclusion: ‘elections were not free and fair!’ In fact, it’s a bit ambitious to expect SADC or AU to make Zimbabwe a better place. President Mugabe did not join SADC, but is the only surviving founder of then Frontline States, which changed into the Southern Africa Development Coordination Conference (SADCC) before becoming SADC. This means he has a lot of influence in regional decision-making. At the same time, it’s SADC that advises AU on regional issues, including the Zimbabwean question. This means any decision made on Zimbabwe at either regional or continental level, is indirectly made by Mugabe.

Indeed, except for Operation Gukurahundi of the 1980s, which had an external influence in the substance of North Korea, the political and electoral violence that has been occurring in Zimbabwe, particularly after the year 2000, has been home grown. It has been organised and perpetrated by four community based conglomerates – traditional leaders, war veterans, youth militias and the ‘women’s league’ – that work together.

Against their traditional role of safeguarding our culture, providing food to the needy (remember Zunde Ramambo?), mediating conflicts and preserving peace, traditional leaders have become an extension of the deteriorating ZANU PF structures. Their mandate in Zimbabwe’s internal conflict is ‘selling out’, pin-pointing and compiling lists of ZANU PF opponents for the salaries and numerous benefits, including houses, vehicles and electrification provided at the tax payers’ expense. The youth are responsible for administering the list of opponents and effecting ‘punishment’ according to instructions they receive from war veterans. The ‘women’s league’ provides moral support: ululating, singing and clapping during torture or murder sessions.

The way forward is to destroy this network. The removal of the youth from this violence equation would make elections safer. Real war veterans and traditional leaders are too old to torture or kill. Recently in Bikita the youth refused to be ‘used’ in violence by war veterans. Communities must discourage the youth from cooperating with violence mongers. Instead, the youth should become the defenders of their communities against the ‘intrusion’ and violence, especially caused by ‘imported youth’ from other villages or districts.

Surely, we don’t need SADC, AU, United Nations or international forces to stop us from beating or killing one another?

I suppose we have all become accustomed to, and to some extent, accepting of, the torrents of water gushing freely from broken municipal pipes or streetlights that are lit at midday. Perhaps we might grumble about this wastage to friends and family but let’s face it, we are not known for doing much else. We are certainly not going to hold a march against it, or even pen a letter of complaint. Blatant wastage of limited public resources is a given and many of us have resigned ourselves to it.

What I do find a bitter pill to swallow is wastage on a smaller scale, done by individuals, within our homes and in our daily lives. I’m referring to situations where security lights and water sprinklers are left on for the whole blessed day! A look at the piles of refuse littering our open spaces reveals shameful amounts of discarded food and clothing. And I know you are all familiar with that idiot driver who burns fuel speeding at 120km/hr to the red robot just ahead. I find this behaviour especially disturbing because I recall the dire times Zimbabwe has recently emerged from. We’ve been through commodity shortages, endless queuing, power cuts, water cuts, etc. Given our first-hand experience of being without, one would think that people would be more appreciative of what we now actually have. Good sense would advocate for conservative usage of our limited resources especially since we are not out of the woods yet.

Pop psychology does provide some explanation. Apparently, when societies emerge from situations of deprivation – à la Zim 2007/8, the Second World War, Communist regimes – there is a tendency towards one of two forms of reaction. People have been observed to become either ultra-economical, like the survivors of the Second World War, or else, like China’s new nouveaux riche, they develop really extravagant tendencies. (Closer to home, remember the stories of how our previously disadvantaged war veterans lavishly spent their compensation money). In light of this I’m more related in spirit to the WWII survivors, who would also probably be irked by my neighbour’s 24-hour flooding of his lawn.

My neighbour, whom I suspect might be a relation of a billionaire Chinese, may ask, “What’s my extravagance got to do with you? It’s my water/car/floodlight/ etc and I’m paying for it with my own money!”

This is true and I am definitely not questioning the right to use it, or the ability to pay for it. What I am trying to do is to appeal to humanity and an innate need to live for something more than you. We don’t live alone; we have to be mindful of our neighbours, countrymen and fellow Earthlings. Our individual actions will have an effect on the next person, directly or indirectly, immediately or eventually. Personal efforts to conserve our limited resources will ultimately provide a better life for all beings on the planet, human or otherwise.

So, if we find wastage by public bodies reprehensible, why don’t we question what happens in our own homes? While we can’t come together to stop the waste by the powers that be, surely each of us can switch off a light, close a tap and drive more slowly? Ultimately our individual actions to use limited resources more conservatively will combine to achieve a greater good. Now, that’s a civil action that I think most politically inactive Zimbabweans can civilly engage in!

From the Mail & Guardian, here’s a bit of beautiful writing for you from the Malawian poet, Frank Chipasula:

I will pierce the silence around our land with sharp metaphors/And I will point the light of my poems into the dark/nooks where our people are pounded to pulp

Mona Eltahawy writing for The Africa Report discusses the power of new media in an article called Facebook Against Faceless Authority. Here it is:

Khaled Said was not the first Egyptian to be brutally beaten by the police. What was unprecedented was the number of Egyptians who have protested police brutality since the 28-year-old businessman died on June 6 – up to 8,000 at one silent protest in his hometown of Alexandria alone. On July 27, the two policemen initially connected to his death stood trial on charges of illegal arrest and excessive use of force. If convicted, they face three to fifteen years in prison.

Social media – Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and blogs – were central to organising those protests and to bringing together activists and many ordinary Egyptians who turned out to demand justice for Said. Around 3.4 million Egyptians use Facebook, meaning that Egypt has the largest subscriber base in the Arab world and 23rd-largest globally. One of the many Facebook groups launched in Said’s memory now has almost 250,000 fans.

Social media have connected Egyptians and amplified both the voices and the courage of those who want to protest against President Hosni Mubarak, who has been in power for 29 years.

Across the Arab world, these forums have given a voice to the voiceless, providing a platform for the most marginalised to challenge authority, be it political, social or religious.

Long ignored by the state-owned media, young people and women are using the Internet to reach those who had been most eager to ignore them.

In Saudi Arabia, which fuels most of the world’s cars but bars half of its population from driving, women’s rights activists have used Facebook and email to collect petitions against the driving ban. One of the activists, Wajeha al-Huwaider, posted a video on YouTube of herself driving as she narrated an open letter to the Saudi interior minister.

In Lebanon, Meem – a group of lesbian, bisexual and transgendered women – uses a website and Twitter to offer shelter and support.

The desire to take on both the current regime and the old guard of their own movement compels young Muslim Brotherhood members in Egypt to blog. One of them, Abdelmonem Hahmoud Ibrahim says that he started his blog Ana Ikhwan (I am a Muslim Brother) “so that I can show my true self”. The desire to express oneself and to circumvent censorship has created a thrilling equation in the Arab world: one person + the Internet = one very angry president.

Regimes throughout the region intimidate and arrest bloggers, which begs the question: what do all those rulers, in power for so long, have to fear?

Back in Egypt, young people who have known no other ruler than Mubarak and who realise that any one of them could have been Khaled Said, seize the chance to challenge the state and its once-absolute ownership of the narrative.

The majority of the Arab world is younger than 25 years old. The power of answering back – that is now the power of social media.

Following on from my Community gets involved in cleaning up Newlands Shopping Centre blog, I was pleasantly surprised to note that the following Friday morning of the 24th September 2010, the City of Harare was themselves painting the zebra crossings with a fresh coat of paint within the shopping area. I have no doubt that the communities work the previous week had got their attention and they felt they had to go out there and continue the good work that the surrounding businesses had already started. We now have a very fresh, clean looking shopping area in Newlands. Unfortunately this is not the case around the rest of the country and I am saddened every time I pass vacant areas of land and see copious amounts of plastic litter dumped right on the road. We need to do something about this continuing waste problem and get everyone to do their bit for their earth!

I recently found some interesting facts on the I Save Earth web site:

As we become more technologically advanced, we produce materials that can withstand extreme temperatures, are durable and easy to use. Plastic bags, synthetics, plastic bottles, tin cans, and computer hardware- these are some of the things that make life easy for us. But what we forget is that these advanced products do not break down naturally. Plastic bags are difficult and costly to recycle and most end up on landfill sites where they take around 300 years to photo degrade. They break down into tiny toxic particles that contaminate the soil and waterways and enter the food chain when animals accidentally ingest them. But the problems surrounding waste plastic bags starts long before they photo degrade.

When we dispose them in a garbage pile, the air, moisture, climate, or soil cannot break them down naturally to be dissolved with the surrounding land. Our planet is becoming increasingly contaminated by our unnecessary use of plastic carrying bags. Big black bin liners, plastic carrier bags carrying advertising logos, clear sandwich bags, vegetable bags and a variety of other forms used to carry our daily food items and other items are all polluting our environment. Just take a look around you. Plastic bags can be seen hanging from the branches of trees, flying in the air on windy days, settled amongst bushes and floating on rivers. They clog up gutters and drains causing water and sewage to overflow and become the breeding grounds of germs and bacteria that cause diseases.

We produce 6 billion tons of plastic a year. We use it for everything it seems. One reason why plastic was invented was to reduce ivory use. Plastic recycling is difficult, and not profitable, leading to only 3-5% of the plastic produced to be recycled.

Closer to home, social activist Peta Searle shared this information with Zimbabweans recently:

Over the years plastic has become the “clean, safe” and accepted method of packaging and carrying goods. The problem is that plastics are non-biodegradable. When they are carelessly thrown away, they collect around the city, choking drains, threatening small animals, damaging the soil and polluting our beautiful country. A study in Ghana showed that plastic wastes have virtually choked the drainage system in the urban centre’s of the country to such an extent that it takes only the slightest of rainfall to precipitate floods in major cities.

Plastic poisons and pollutes

Plastic is made from oil and coal, materials that are both unsustainable and non-renewable. Mining, transport, energy production and petrochemical processes all damage the environment. In this way, plastic production contributes to problems such as oil spills, toxic emissions, and global warming through the release of greenhouse gases. If you decide to burn plastic to try to get rid of it, there are also problems. Dioxins (any of several toxic hydrocarbons that occur as impurities in petroleum-derived herbicides, disinfectants, and other products) and furans (a colourless flammable toxic liquid heterocyclic compound, used in the manufacture of cotton textiles and in the synthesis of nylon) are two highly toxic chemicals created unintentionally during plastic incineration.

Plastic wastes choke seas across the globe. This form of pollution is one of the biggest environmental problems we face, and it’s only getting worse as plastic production continues to grow.

What can we do about the plastic problem?

Reduce, re-use, and recycle!

Plastic bags are everywhere and they don’t disappear when we throw them away and where is away. God gave us an earth to line on and every little speck of it is our responsibility, so I ask you again, when you throw it away where is away? Away is out of sight, out of mind, but global warming is all of our responsibility and it is time you played your part. So make the effort, only good can come of it. Reduce, reduce, reduce the use of plastic bags. Have a box in your car and load the groceries from the trolley into the boot. Carry a green bag to load up the groceries. Don’t put all the vegetables in to plastic when you have it weighed, bring your own big bag and weigh the vegetables separately and put them all in one packet. The more people who bring their own re-useable non-plastic bags to the shops, the less plastic bags are needed. If you already have plastic bags, you could re-use them several times yourself. Thick plastic bags are easier to re-use, and they are also easier and more profitable to recycle.

Campaign!

Campaigns to change the law about plastic bags have been very effective in many African countries. Botswana launched a plastics petition campaign, asking that shops only stock plastic bags thicker than 60 micron. Stronger, thicker plastic bags are re-useable and easier to recycle than thin bags. Shoppers should pay for the stronger bags, so that they would be more likely to re-use them than throw them away and manufacturers should make sure that plastic bags are made of materials that can be recycle more easily. The result is that several large shop chains now sell thicker re-useable plastic carrier bays.

The Eritrean government has also taken a firm line on plastic bags. Since January 2005, those who import, produce, distribute or sell plastic bags are fined, and Kenya may soon follow suite.

If you have to dispose of your plastic, throw it in a hole and bury it don’t burn it. Dioxin a gas released from the burning of plastic is highly carcinogenic and will affect an unborn baby. Appeal to your councilors to dig a deep hole in your neighbourhood where plastic can be disposed of and most importantly reduce and reuse.

Meanwhile we need to lobby to our governments to take strong action against toxic plastic products. I encourage anyone in local groups or organisations involved in this issue to join the expanding coalition – making strong connections in Zimbabwe is the next step. So get involved! It is our world that we have to keep clean and beautiful for ourselves, our children, our grandchildren and generations to follow.

Let’s make Zimbabwe beautiful.