Above the drone of the generator, I can hear the helicopters roaring past, taking Mugabe back to State House. Tsvangirai now has a motorcade & a portrait. What’s next – Chematama’s chopper?

On Friday the Tree of Life team sat with parents from Epworth and Whitecliffe communities and heard about their fears  for their children.

This time last year
when the youth militia rampaged through their neighbourhoods in ‘preparation’ for the elections
the children went through the most terrifying ordeals one can imagine.
They were taken to the militia bases,
they watched their mothers being raped,
their fathers beaten and tortured
and they were beaten and raped themselves
they watched their houses being burned down
and their parents killed

the fabric of their lives destroyed

and a year later they still live in the ashes
with old memories haunting their dreams

Nothing has been done for the children

‘They visited hell’ said one mother who had her 8 year old son taken for 3 months
‘and they still live in fear – for it has not gone away
they are still training the militia for the next elections’

And then we began speaking of the healing
and of Chiyedza offering her skills in drama and counselling
to go out to the communities to help teach new ways of working
We heard people offer their small houses as venues
and their time to learn techniques of counselling
These people who have been stripped of their livelihoods
volunteering to help protect the orphans
and repair the damage
what little they had – they were prepared to share.

‘For these children are the parents of the new generations’ they said

Utterly shaken we came out of the meeting
to the news that the years funding we had asked for
had been reduced to a bridging loan for 3 months

Throughout civic society
those groups who, on meagre budgets, have helped with the healing
and with gathering the orphans
the groups that help hold the dignity of the nation
are struggling to survive

“there is no money for Zimbabwe (global economic crisis/ unstable government/uncertainty/hold up in funding/etc.) sorry for that”

so we have to wait
wait for the children
a year
a lifetime

It is mid-winter
the leaves are falling
the grass is dry
beige-gold world  lit by the first crimson lucky bean trees
and filled with butterflies

I’ve been dipping in and out of the news around South Africa’s election, particularly around the curious ways gender and sexuality seem to have played out there.

Both the number of First Ladies to now be catered for, and the number of men in Helen Zille’s cabinet seem to be at issue. And somewhere at the core seems to be the ANC Youth League, shaking their fists and making their statements.

On the one hand, Jonny Steinberg reckons that Zuma is seen as “more of a man” by many young black South Africans, because he has more wives.

On the other hand, Marianne Thamm reckons that the real problem is that men’s and women’s experiences of sex, and particularly their understanding of what constitutes “good sex,” are so fundamentally different, it’s no wonder it’s hard for the one side to understand the other.

Meanwhile, we have Helen Zille explaining that she just didn’t have many women to choose from when it came to selecting her cabinet – and the DA is opposed to quotas.

In all of these various arguments and explanations, however, one thing is clear – it’s the arguments that make sense – the ones in which the author tries to Explain things – are the ones that are the most helpful.

Take, for example, a recent discussion with Radio 702 talk show host Redi Direko interviewing ANC Youth League Spokesperson Floyd Shivambu.

Direko asks Shivambu to explain what, exactly, the ANC Youth League meant by saying that Helen Zille appointed boyfriends and concubines to her cabinet. When asked to clarify, Shivambu says “There’s no other explanation you can give except to say that the reality and the truth; that these are her boyfriends that she continues to sleep around with and we stand by that particular statement.”

But what do you mean, “sleeping around,” Direko asks. “Is she having sex with them?”

Shivambu responds:

Sleeping around means sleeping around. There’s no other explanation that we can give except that she is sleeping around. Unfortunately, you can ask me a million times. We’re not going to change that explanation. We mean what we say and we say what we mean. Exactly that.

And it gets better . . . Read a transcript of the interview here. And the saga continues – you can also read Shivambu’s response to the interview on his own blog here.

Recently I was at a function in London when, upon introducing myself as a Zimbabwean, someone ventured to ask me a question I have become very much accustomed to now, ‘so, what has changed with this new government?’ In response I explained that as far as I was concerned, there had been no fundamental change in political direction and that the levers of power remain firmly in the hands of those who wielded power in 1980 and as such, we are not really in a new political dispensation as yet. The person who asked the question was clearly unimpressed, he pointed out that in fact he had information that ‘a lot of positive changes’ had taken place in Zimbabwe and cited the so-called miracle reduction of inflation from 231 million percent to just 1.1 percent as an example some of the positive changes that are not being highlighted. He then noted that Zimbabweans in the Diaspora and international media have a tendency of reporting only negative news on Zimbabwe because, he quipped, ‘good news does not sell.’ It appears this is a generally held view among some international observers which I wish to address in greater detail here.

Well, I do not see how my grandmother in Bikita would take comfort in the miraculous reduction in inflation because she still does not have access to foreign currency. The switch-over to use of foreign currency which cured inflation in one stroke may be significant to political elites but certainly makes little difference to ordinary men and women in Zimbabwe who continue to suffer. It is like focusing on improving working conditions for those who are employed when 94 percent of Zimbabweans are unemployed!

Personally, and I am confident many other Zimbabweans share this view, I desperately desire to hold great hope and optimism that Zimbabwe’s future is bright and that political change has come. I want to be able to proudly tell the world that Zimbabwe is open and ready for business. I want to tell anyone who cares to listen that my country is a beacon of democracy and persuade investors to rush to Zimbabwe and do business with my countrymen. It is my wish that l should tell the world that violence, human rights abuses, police brutality and repression belong to the past. Unfortunately, sadly, that would be untrue; I would be telling blatant lies if I were to lay claim to such things. Creating false hope and false images of change does not bring the desired change to Zimbabwe.

It appears to be that the desire to be ‘positive’ about Zimbabwe and project a positive image of Zimbabwe may have led some of our erstwhile colleagues who now occupy high political offices to massage the truth and polish the rough edges of reality in their presentation of the situation in Zimbabwe. All of a sudden, themselves victims a compromised and corrupt court system, because they are now part of government, they believe there is rule of law and that their colleagues who face various politically motivated charges must face trial by ‘impartial courts.’ One minister from the smaller MDC faction, when asked why farm violent farm invasions were continuing unabated responded, ‘government is broke, we do not have financial resources to deploy police to stop the invasions.’ Was this not precisely the same political excuse given by the police in 2000 when farm invasions began?

Clearly, but for reasons as yet unclear to me, many former advocates of rule of law and democracy who are now in government have become shameless liars quite ready and comfortable to sing from the same hymn book with those who once persecuted them.

Being frank and truthful about the minute changes that have taken place in Zimbabwe does not make one a pessimist. My great hope and optimism for Zimbabwe lies in the hope that there are many who will realize that the struggle for democracy and good governance does not end when one gets a seat at the high table; that is precisely when the struggle begins. Only the truth will set our leaders free, and, in the same vein, set us all free.

“There is life beyond politics and I hope with a bit of luck to experience that myself,” said British Defence Secretary John Hutton on announcing his resignation from the government of Gordon Brown on June 5, 2009.

And these are the same British chaps lampooned over the years by the Zanu PF cabal, the same Africans who have chosen politics as a career where wild riches are amassed beyond their wildest dreams. Take them out of the political office what do they have? Kind of reminds one of Africa’s career politicians doesn’t it? Once one is elected into office, you are in it for life. And this obsession is exactly what has fed or fanned political violence as unpopular leaders stoke the emotions of poor people and refuse to leave office and therefore politics.

For some reason they can never pursue other interests outside gladiatorial politics, those who left without putting up a fight have for example been appointed to mediate in some of the world’s hot spots, yet those who came after them have seen no reason why they should leave and pursue other interests.

Thank God for those nations who continue resisting attempts by idiotic leaders who seek to rewrite their constitutions in a bid to extend their rule as if that itself is informed by having done a swell job. On the contrary. They still want to amend constitutions even though the people they claim elected them into office are fed up and seek fresh minds to steer them away from perennial poverty.

So what do these career politicians who seek to amend constitutions and those who lose elections do? They unleash their supporters and the security forces on their perceived opponents to “quell unrest” and the blood on the streets thus defines African politics as informed by their unwillingness to make themselves useful elsewhere other than the realm of politics. It is a crying shame. Wacko Jacko sang about blood on the dance floor: these politicians have blood on their hands but they continue dancing! D for dancing ministers, right?

Within Zimbabwe’s context, it is interesting that the people who presided over the country’s ruin are celebrated for their education and insist on being addressed as such – remembering of course that some of the PhDs are honorary. So one would imagine they would easily find use elsewhere where no punches are thrown and no verbal WMDs are hurled.

Yet because they have destroyed all sectors of gainful employment, they find that they too will never find “proper” jobs outside active politics so they stick it out in bloody politics come hell or high water and urge supporters to cudgel anyone who chants a different political slogan! That is the odium African politics carries in its baggage thus we see that drive to personalise whole nations as leaders refuse to leave office and declare themselves life presidents – as if there was ever such a thing. But then African politicians typically live by that old dictum: make hay while the sun shines. And they sure do.

Who said this when asked about farm invasions and violence on farms?

There are incidents in which it is reported that there are invasions on one or two farms but it’s all blown out of proportion. We have investigated examples of those so-called farm invasions. We have asked the Minister of Lands to give us a detailed report of what has been happening over all these so-called farm invasions and the outcry over that.

That’s Morgan Tsvangirai, although you could easily have thought it was a Zanu PF stalwart.

Meanwhile, here’s a report by Jan Raath writing for the Mail & Guardian (SA), 28 May

President Robert Mugabe’s controversial “land reform programme” took a new twist on Wednesday when a court ordered the eviction of a man who is not a farmer. Ian Campbell-Morrison (46) lives in the Vumba Mountains in eastern Zimbabwe, next to a hotel where he is the green keeper. He and his wife live in a cottage on a plot not much bigger than a suburban garden, where she tends flowers. The Campbell-Morrisons used to farm tobacco and coffee, but the government seized their land and the farmhouse and gave it to a government official, leaving the couple their cottage and the garden around it, said Hendrik Olivier, director of the Commercial Farmers’ Union, made up mostly of Zimbabwe’s remaining 350 white farmers. A magistrate in the nearby city of Mutare nevertheless sentenced Campbell-Morrison to a fine of $800 for “illegally occupying state land” and ordered the couple to be off the property by Saturday. The Campbell-Morrisons are one of 140 white farming families facing eviction from their land in the latest tactic in Mugabe’s violent, lawless campaign to force white landowners – numbering about 5 000 when it started in 2000 – off their farms. The action is in the name of a redistribution of land to black Zimbabweans, but which has instead made a million former farm workers homeless and set off the collapse the once-prosperous country’s economy. Mugabe has declared all white-owned land to be state property and banned farmers from taking the government to court.

The evictions and violence have continued despite the establishment in February of a power-sharing government between Mugabe and former opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai, with an agreement to restore the rule of law and to “ensure security of tenure to all land holders”. Tsvangirai, now prime minister, began by promising to end the lawlessness, promising that “no crime [by invaders] will go unpunished,” but the police – under the control of staunchly pro-Mugabe security chiefs – continued to refuse to act against the mostly well-heeled Mugabe loyalists grabbing productive farms and selling their crops. Western governments have refused to provide finance for the recovery of the country’s economy from world-record inflation and decimation of production under Mugabe, until there are “clear signs of reform” in the re-establishment of the rule of law. The restoration of peace and security on the farms is cited as a key condition. But there was shock this week when Tsvangirai, referred in an interview to “isolated incidents of so-called farm invasions” that had “been blown out of proportion”. Said a Western diplomat: “He’s talking like Mugabe now.”

Throughout Tuesday night on Mount Carmel farm in the Chegutu district, farmer Ben Freeth and his family were terrorised by a mob of invaders who rolled blazing tyres at their thatch-roofed homestead. At the weekend, an 80-year-old woman was assaulted by police, who were removing her son from his farm. On Friday, another farmer was beaten by a Mugabe supporter. “There has been absolutely no resolution or even recognition that there is even a problem,” said CFU president Trevor Gifford, who is trying to stop a government official cutting down what is left of his timber plantation, and is selling it to the government of neighbouring Zambia for telephone poles. Gifford is due to appear in court on Friday for “illegally occupying state land”. “This is happening in a country that has become the world’s most dependent on donors for food,” he said. “Until this government respects the rights of its own citizens and investment agreements, no one will look at this country.”