It has often been said that the greatest battles are fought in the mind. This is certainly true in the case of Zimbabwe, particularly in our tortured struggle for democracy, good governance and human rights. If the struggle is approached with a mind already defeated and not open to possibilities, as is often the case, then there is small wonder how a very small group of predominantly old and frail men can subjugate millions of people for decades without as much as a whimper from the long-suffering masses.

Much like a bird caged and kept in captivity for most of its life, even when the cage is removed, the bird refuses to fly away, because, in its mind, the cage remains, making the physical absence of a cage irrelevant.

The Zimbabwean education system further compounds the crisis of a defeated mindset by lacking the ability to produce people who are critical and analytical, but perfect academics who regurgitate what they are fed by the teacher who is supposed to know all, but remain blinkered to the world around them. I will explain, lest one take offence at what, at first, may seem a reckless statement.

Our education system and socialisation has broken our collective spine, and prepared us to be meek subjects who shall obey authority without question and not empowered citizens with rights and ability to challenge authority. The MDC in government should seriously consider putting forward a proposal to inject civic education and critical thinking into our educations system from primary school level.

Back in the days as a student activist at the University of Zimbabwe I was often exposed to this attitude that to question authority is sheer madness, foolishness or utter stupidity. Whenever I pointed out the shortcomings of the then ZANU-PF government, often I would be dismissed with the following words: Ndivo vafana veku univhesiti vanoitira weti mumafiriji, havatendi hurumende inovapinza chikoro, musavatevedzere (These are the university boys who urinate in fridges, they are an ungrateful lot, do not listen to them) – this was in apparent reference to a students demonstration at the university of Zimbabwe where some students had, according to the State run Herald newspaper, overturned fridges at the institution and urinated in them in protest against poor catering services there.

To be fairly critical of authority’s misdeeds is to label oneself a pariah. Everyone must conform to the norm. Do not put your head above the parapet, or it will be chopped off, or so the advice goes. To many in Zimbabwe, decency is about being careful not to rock the boat, not to ruffle feathers, but to avoid any confrontation and get through life quietly, meekly.

The late iconic Zimbabwean singer Leornard Dembo, perfectly captured this mindset in one of his songs entitled Manager, where he admonishes those who confront the manager at work because they forget they have families to feed. A relative of mine also reflected this mindset during my days at the university when she advised me thus: “Don’t you forget your background. Your parents struggled in abject poverty to send you to school, and you have seven siblings – don’t you start trouble at university. The moment other students start demonstrating, take the first bus out of campus and come home and lie low until it’s over.” It is advice I gladly ignored, but which, I am sure, was not uncommon.

This mindset focuses on short term gains of being safe in the crowd but, sadly, compromises on the bigger picture. It normalises the abnormal and celebrates fear and mediocrity. The few people who keep trashing our rights can do so with impunity because the majority have accepted as normal that which is obscene. Joseph Chinotimba can boast, with all the audacity, that he “farms people” and no-one bats an eyelid. Muchadeyi Masunda, Harare Mayor on a Movement of Democratic Change ticket can use government resources, in such difficult times, to buy himself a US$152 000 luxury vehicle – and that is normal! To make matters worse, there are people within the purportedly progressive democracy movement who will be upset when the issue is raised. Why? Because leaders should not be questioned, they are always right! Or some such load of rubbish.

But what I find most astounding about this mindset that has crippled Zimbabwe’s democracy and human rights movement is the quite illogical expectation that someone must fight on their behalf to bring about change. In beer halls, in churches, in schools, at work, Zimbabweans analyse, they know exactly what is wrong with governance, they are fully aware of the root causes of our multilayered crisis. But that is as far as it goes. A learned colleague has found a term for this phenomenon: paralysis of analysis. They do not want to take action themselves, at an individual level. But moan that not enough is being done to liberate Zimbabwe! Of what use is your thorough and superior understanding of the crisis if you are not prepared to act on it?

Sometimes I come to the conclusion that we get the leaders and type of governance we deserve. Do we honestly believe that ZANU-PF, so comfortable in the seat of power, will voluntarily give up power? Or that democracy and fundamental rights will be presented to us on a silver platter? To entertain such hopes is to dream in broad daylight. We must say, “Enough is Enough,” and then, at an individual level, commit to playing each his or her part to liberate the country. I will borrow this statement from the English and say, “Zimbabwe expects each man to do his duty.” Be the change that you want to see in Zimbabwe. The mantra should be, “None but ourselves!” If not yourself, then who should act on your behalf while you remain in your comfort zone?

For democracy, good governance and a culture of respect for human rights to thrive it does not just happen. There must be a critical mass of people prepared to advance and defend these ideals at all costs. The collective mindset must accept that it is right, a sacred duty even, for one to defend principles and ideals of democracy and to openly declare that position without having to look over the shoulder. The collective mindset should focus on the greater goal of justice and freedom for all ahead of short-term personal security which, in any case, cannot be guaranteed even if one thinks that the safest way out is to collaborate with the oppressor.

Unless there is a radical transformation of the mind, individually and collectively, which leads to action from within Zimbabwe, then victory for democracy and human rights will be postponed indefinitely. Even if new leaders or new political formations come on board, without a change of mindset, which catapults us from meek subjects to bold citizens with rights and who know and stand up for their rights, the result will be the same. That is, a few people in power will continue to trample on the dreams   and rights of the majority and get away with it.

Already Muchadeyi Masunda, the rogue Harare Mayor, has shown that his MDC jacket does not stop him from taking people for granted, but, is it not with the implicit consent of Harare residents?

As you reflect on our individual role and contribution, to either aiding or resolving the crisis in Zimbabwe, ask yourself: Am I a subject or a citizen? What action will I take as my personal contribution to the development of a new Zimbabwe?

It’s August 31, 2009 at 5:19pm and I am … I’m enough! I’m enough! I am SO enough of this! Zvakwana.

Let me explain. This afternoon I had a coffee date with a dear friend. It was nice. It had been a while since we’d seen each other so it was lovely to do some catching up. Post-coffee, I wait along 2nd Street Extension hoping a combi will soon come by. It’s getting hotter every day and as you can imagine waiting for public transport is not user-friendly in this kind of weather. I see a combi approaching, hand stuck out of the window pointing toward the city centre, and a voice shouting, “City! Copacabana!” I obligingly gesture that I want a ride in the death-trap into downtown Harare. I’m in and we’re off. I’m trying to remain very salala with the ‘hwindi’ (conductor) yelling to other passengers in my ear while straddling the poor man to my left. The poor guy also has the unwelcome privilege of having the hwindi’s armpit not too far from his nose.

I hand the hwindi a lovely crisp portrait of George Washington. For those of you who are unfamiliar or are new to ‘rolling’ in a combi, let me break it down for you quickly. For one trip, e.g. Mount Pleasant to downtown Harare, it costs US$0.50 or ZAR5.00 or Z$3 trillion (I don’t know how many zeroes are involved in that one!). I am yet to board a combi that takes Euros or pounds. However, I will keep you posted on any developments in that area. Remember how I gave the hwindi a dollar-bill? Yes? That means that he owes me change of US$0.50 or ZAR5.00 or Z$3 trillion, right? There are a couple of other passengers who are waiting for their change, too. Then lo and behold what befalls my ears? That awful, awful refrain of “handina change vabereki” (I don’t have change).

We arrive at my final stop and there are four of us who are still waiting on our change. The hwindi calmly and unapologetically hands us two one-dollar-bills and tells us to figure out how to split the bills between ourselves, on our own. I try to explain to him that I am going in the opposite direction of the chick with whom I’d be partnered to split the dollar. She Chitungwiza and me, Greendale. The hwindi blank-stares me, shrugs his shoulders and tells the driver to drive off. There I am on Park Street, seething about what just happened but this doesn’t help because I am still without my money!! I know, I know it seems a tad overboard to react so intensely about FIFTY cents. But people, let me tell you something: when you use public transit frequently, fifty cents is a BIG deal. Trust me. See, it’s not just `combis that are stealing from people and short-changing them. Think about how many times you’ve gone to the store and they ask you to purchase a sweet, a razor-blade or a box of matches just so they don’t have to give you change. Or credit notes! Oh my freaking gosh! There are more credit notes than cash in my wallet at any given time. How long have we been using Obama bucks in this country – officially and unofficially? It’s been a while, correct? Then explain to me HOW and WHY no one ever has change for me… and you… and you…and you, too! It’s unacceptable.

Let me tell you something: I worked for that 73 cents, and NO, I don’t want a handful of Dandy bubble gums or a mini Lunch Bar or a packet of peanut-centered Tumbles! How do you know that I’m not allergic to peanuts?!  Huh? Or maybe I’m trying to lose weight and here you are TEMPTING me! Just give me my freaking 73 cents! Can I tell you the ultimate? I was at St Elmo’s on Saturday with a friend. Great conversation, great pizza and delicious chocolate brownie with ice-cream. Yummy. It’s time for the bill. We pay. We are owed change. Without missing a beat our server says, “I can write you a credit note.” Are you kidding me?!?! Seriously?!  St Elmo’s is a restaurant that has hundreds of people patronizing it daily and our server wants me to take a credit note?!?!  That’s ridiculous.

The whole “hatina change, credit note” song-and-dance is old. It’s unacceptable. It’s fueling resentment. It’s a 20 cents here, 68 cents there, ‘no-change-for-my-combi-fare’ reminder of how Zimbabweans are stolen from daily. Please stop the madness. Zvakwana. I’m enough now…

This is Black Orchid sounding off.  I’m out.

I went through my first toll-gate the other day, Tuesday, August 18, 2009 at around lunch hour. On my way back from Kadoma CMED/VID (yes, I am still working on acquiring my driver’s license).

On the way out of town I did not witness the Zim-toll-gate experience because I was sleeping. A car is the most soothing place for me to fall asleep. It doesn’t take much, just the hum of the engine and the consistent wave-like pothole-dodging and I’m off to Sleepyland.

On the way back to Harare I was wide awake and chatty. We drove past acres upon acres of farmland that just lay dry and unused. There were feigned attempts at productivity here and there but the reality of the situation was blaringly obvious. I must say our dear Gov Gono’s land seemed to be semi-teeming with activity. Way to go, Gideon. If only you’d been that good with the Zim-kwacha…okay, okay, not right now.

We’re happily traveling along at a user-friendly 50kmph and then off to the left of the road I see mini-tents. In the space of about 100meters, I see about 4 or 5 mini-tents. I distinctly recall seeing one that had a big white ‘T’ in a blue circle and then another that had 60 written in the middle of a circle. As I was trying to process the sudden influx of roadside mini-tents, I suddenly see people in the middle of the road. I figured these people were important and were on ‘official’ business because of their clipboards and white, wide-brimmed canvas hats. Look, I don’t know who decides on the ‘officials’ wardrobe in this country but she needs to be fired! Nothing says “I’m on official business and take me seriously,” like a white wide-brim hat, a fluorescent yellow vest with a dangling ID…oh yes, and the clipboard!

The car I’m in slows down. It suddenly dawns on me – this is a toll chakuti-chakuti! Our driver, Doug, starts to dig around in his pocket for a dollar bill. In case you’re not aware, there are different amounts to be paid depending on the size of your vehicle. Our vehicle fell into the US$1 category. I wished I was on a motorcycle coz those guys get to go through for free! Blessed are ye who travel on 2 wheels, for ye shall not have to pay the toll!

Now from where I was sitting – in the passenger seat directly behind the driver – I couldn’t tell who of the wide-brims was going to accept the US$1 from our car. The place was crawling with wide-brims! Then a young lady with a good accent came to Doug’s window. (I’m an accent snob so I notice these things). The young lady was a ZIMRA official. (I’m not sure what ZIMRA stands for but I feel like they are people that I’m supposed to hate). The official young lady began to scrawl officially on a page of a receipt book. She asked Doug for the car’s license plate number. He obliged. She officially scrawled it down, officially ripped the page out of the receipt book, officially handed the piece of paper to Doug, officially took the 1 dollar bill and slipped it into her official-looking brown Postman Pat bag.

And then we were off again. That was my first-hand experience at a Zimbo toll what-what.

Now, I have a question: why, pray tell, does a country that is SMALLER than the STATE of Texas need tollgates? Tollbooths? Tollroads? (Will somebody, please tell me the correct terminology!!) Seriously, I’d like to know. Oh yes, and were we actually consulted about the toll-thingies? Or was the whole thing dreamed up in another ‘how to drain Zimboes of their last pennies’ meeting? (Psst, oi! These are the same meetings where they decided the price of the license disc for your car. Oh, and the ‘car-radio’ license prices!) Where is the money going? To the ZIMRA officials who will stand out in the Sub-Saharan heat in the middle of ‘Aww-Hell-No”? Or is it going to purchase a new fleet of  vehicles for our government’s VIPs? Or will it actually go to maintaining the roadways? Have you been on the Bulawayo Road lately?!

What I witnessed at the toll-thingy on Tuesday was a perfect example of MINIMUM input for MAXIMUM exploitation! Little thought has been put into this – the long-term sustainability of the whole thing, its implications, the logistics. Seriously, how long will you have official-looking wide-brims handwriting EVERY SINGLE toll receipt? And security for the poor fools that have to do this at night? Need I mention that we have ZESA issues? And the elements? Mother Nature can be unforgiving.

Who comes up with these bright ideas? As long as ‘they’ can get money out of us for now, then it works for them doesn’t it? Never mind the mess that’ll need to be cleaned up in the future.

I was watching CNN’s Hala Gorani on her show International Desk. I like that show. I have to be honest though that I have struggled with some of the fancy camera angles that the International Desk team throw at me… but aside from that I am cool with it. Thanks, Hala. Good work.

So anyway, where was I? Oh yes, watching International Desk last week on Wednesday night. MJ’s doctor, Dr Murray (I think) appears on the show with the tagline: I told the truth! The man is trying to clear his name amidst accusations that he had something to do with MJ’s death, blah, blah etc, etc. But what caught my attention and that of my father’s as we watched this news story was the fact that this doctor was going to be paid US$150 000 a month! For what, you ask? For the duration of MJ’s rehearsals and UK concert tour. I repeat US$150 000 a month!!!! So should the whole process have taken 5 months…yes, that’s it- he would have been paid $750 000! This is coming from ONE patient PER MONTH … I’ll let that settle in your mind for a bit before I continue…

Earlier on that same Wednesday, I’d learned that our MDC Harare mayor Mr Muchadeyi Masunda was given a new car that cost US$152 000, and an inauguration party. My reaction to Masunda’s car was that of disgust and disappointment rather than “Dang!” (“Dang!” is what I uttered when I learned that MJ’s doc was going to earn a year’s worth of college fees for a month’s work).

You see even if my reaction to Doc’s earnings would have been that of disgust, I could still argue that it’s America and they are crazy over there. Nothing they do makes sense, yet we love them anyway. I could argue that though the ole U.S of A is going thru an ‘economic downturn,’ at least the country’s not falling apart at the seams which is why they can afford to pay private physicians obscene amounts of money.

With Masunda? I got nothing! No justification, no support, no argument that would make a US$152 000 price tag on a car ok. I got nothing!

Instead, I find myself disgusted, angry and betrayed. …and then I feel stupid. See, when I voted I was convinced that members of the MDC were different. Not just different, but BETTER. What Obama was to Bush, I felt MDC-M was to ZANU-PF. MRT and his MDC were my Barack Obama…yet here I am disappointed and ashamed.

Doctors are striking, teachers are threatening to strike, corruption continues on its merry way throughout the country, while the people I voted for in the name of ‘hope’are getting new cars and feeding their stomachs. Can you not see that this is a slap in the faces of so many suffering Zimbabweans?

Remember 2 or 3 years ago when Uncle Gideon bought the Mercedes Brabus for US$365 000? Remember that? He kept cooking up new currency at our expense but he was (still is) living like a king?!? Remember that, Mr Masunda? When will you stop the madness? When will you care?

See with you it’s worse because you led so many of us to believe in you. We believed that we’d turned a corner and left the old ways behind and we were moving on. Moving onto healing, moving onto justice, moving into the future with a leadership that cares about its people rather than itself. Moving forward in hope.

You see, you can probably dismiss this and say, “Relax, it’s just a car.” But it’s much more than that. You’ve made a statement by accepting that car. You’ve shown your true colours and you’ve compromised the trust of those who put you in that position.

I’m sad. This can’t be the MDC that MRT fought for and almost lost his life for on countless occasions.

Most of last week I was in the city of lights, Johannesburg, and because I was having so much fun being away from home, it completely left my mind that swine flu or A(H1N1) was reportedly resident, prevailing and spreading in South Africa. My work colleague and I traveled around and between Johannesburg and Pretoria for our various appointments. It wasn’t until the fourth day of our stay in South Africa when we were in a restaurant having breakfast and waiting to have a meeting with some of our partners that someone behind us suddenly started sneezing uncontrollably. In the wake of the swine-flu scare, the elderly woman was not even making an effort to cover her nose and mouth like anyone should who has got any flu, swine or not. My colleague and I just stared at each other, half realizing the risk of contracting swine flu and half annoyed and confused at the old woman’s carefree sneezing feat. Annoyed glances from around the restaurant went unnoticed by the chattering woman and I was half tempted to walk over to her table and admonish her for being so rude.

We are back in Zimbabwe but all weekend, I was pretty sickly with a sore throat, slight temperature and feeling restive. My family members thought I was just being paranoid when I insisted on being taken to the hospital in the thick of night on Saturday. I had had a genuine swine-flu scare and had been in the high-risk zones of  South Africa; the malls, restaurants, the airplane, and the airports. I was convinced I was going to die. It suddenly occurred to me that none of us really knew much about N1H1 in much the same way we had initially been indifferent to cholera until it claimed some of our own. It occurred to me that I had no idea where to go for testing, neither was I sure most of the doctors here were familiar with it or even knew how to recognize it.

Cases of swine flu have already been detected in Mutare. The state, which recently was unable to contain a cholera epidemic that killed more than 4000, and has a half dead health system claims it is on ‘high alert’ to combat swine flu.  Meanwhile, doctors are once again on strike. The country’s health minister, Henry Madzorera said health surveillance teams have been deployed to all entry points into the country (including airports) to look out for suspected swine flu cases among people coming into the country.  I do not remember seeing anything like that at the airport. The ministry has also not made it clear where individuals who suspect they have the flu can go for free testing, as should be the case. I seriously doubt the government’s ability or will to deal with a swine-flu outbreak.

The government of Botswana has put in place a toll-free number for reporting any suspected cases of swine flu. South Africa has established centers for testing all over the country and is on a mission to educate its population on recognizing symptoms, treatment and how to avoid catching it. If our own government has put any serious and practical measures in place, then clearly there hasn’t been enough publicity about them. But if you ask me what make cell phone was stolen off Chinotimba, I will tell you.

I never thought it possible to have patriotic Zimbabweans any more. Especially when it comes to young people of my generation. These patriots are young scholars based in the USA.They have come together to form a miniature Zimbabwean government. In it they appoint a Minister who gets to research on the field given to them. Not only do they research but they get to ask themselves what wrongs are being done in the real government and they propose policy ideas. If implemented they could really make a difference in our country. So when the young men addressing us told us they had put together a 100 plus paged document that has policy ideas, and suggestions to change the way the real government is doing work.  I almost stood to attention and said soldier on boys! Because I really think that with such innovative young minds, my beloved country can go back to her former glory and be called the “bread basket of Africa” again. But my mind went on a stand still when I heard them say they hoped to hand the document to the Prime Minister. One thing that came to mind as these boys were talking is what if they do not get chance to meet the Prime Minister, what happens to all those ideas? Who do they turn to, are they going to be considered a threat by the oldies in the real government? Then I remembered that we are in a new dispensation, and those old guys would be dumb not to consider the possibility of a break through from that document. I say this not because these guys are US based scholars but I sincerely have hope and believe in the power of young minds.