Zimbabwe: The Blame Game

R. Mwanaka

Description

The Blame Game is a cycle of creative non-fiction pieces, pulling the readers through the politics of modern day Zimbabwe. Like in any game, there are players in this game, opposing each other. The game is told through the eyes of one of the players, thus it is subjective. It centres on truthfully trying to find who to blame for Zimbabwe�s problems, and how to undo all these problems. Finding who to blame should be the beginning for the search of solutions. It encourages talking to each other, maybe about the wrongs we have done to each other, and genuinely trying to embrace and forgive each other. In trying to undo the problems in Zimbabwe, it also offers insight or solutions on a larger platform � Africa: particularly South Africa; that it might learn from other African countries that have imploded before it, how to solve its own problems.

Informations

• Publié par: Langaa RPCIG
• Date de parution: 13 mai 2013
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9789956790081
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

 is a cycle of creative non-�iction pieces, pulling the readers through the politics of modern day Zimbabwe. Like in any game, there are players in this game, opposing each other. The game is told through the eyes of one of the players, thus it is subjective. It centres on truthfully trying to �ind who to blame for Zimbabwe’s problems, and how to undo all these problems. Finding who to blame should be the beginning for the search of solutions. It encourages talking to each other, maybe about the wrongs we have done to each other, and genuinely trying to embrace and forgive each other. In trying to undo the problems in Zimbabwe, it also offers insight or solutions on a larger platform – Africa: particularly South Africa; that it might learn from other African countries that have imploded before it, how to solve its own problems.

TENDAI RINOS MWANAKA was born in Nyanga, Zimbabwe. , a collection of poetry on Zimbabwe’s political situation and exile in South Africa, was published by Lapwing publications, Northern Ireland, 2010. Keys in the River, a novel of interlinked stories on life in modern day Zimbabwe was published by Savant books and publications, USA, 2012, (novel), will be published by Aignos publishing company, USA.

ZIMBABWE: ZIMBABWE: T HE B T HE B LAME G AME LAME G AME Tendai R. Mwanaka

Tendai R. Mwanaka

Zimbabwe: The Blame Game

Tendai R. Mwanaka

Langaa Research & Publishing CIG Mankon, Bamenda

Publisher: LangaaRPCIG Langaa Research & Publishing Common Initiative Group P.O. Box 902 Mankon Bamenda North West Region Cameroon [e-mail] www.langaa-rpcig.net Distributed in and outside N. America by African Books Collective [e-mail] www.africanbookcollective.com

ISBN: 9956-728-91-8 ©Tendai R. Mwanaka 2013

DISCLAIMER All views expressed in this publication are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Langaa RPCIG.

Table of Contents 1. The Prologue………………………………………….1 2. Silence………………………………………………... 5 3. Zimbabwe’s Political Minefields……………………… 9 4. Rantings of a Raving Pen…………………………….. 25 5. Farm Invasion Episode………………………………. 37 6. Two Weeks before 27 June 2008…………………….. 55 7. Laughings of the Mad Dog……………………………63 8. This Could Be Why Tsvangirai Had To Withdraw…… 77 9. 27 June 2008…………………………………………. 81 10. Coconut Republic……………………………………83 11. The Blame Game…………………………………… 87 12. Point Of Contention: The Police……………………. 97 13. The World’s Best Central Banker…………………… 105 14. There Is No Cholera In Zimbabwe…………………. 111 15. South Africa Vs United Nations…………………….. 117 16. Chinese Imperialism for Political Protection?.............. 121 17. Wona Katerere……………………………………… 123 18. Hunger Strike……………………………………….. 129 19. Undoing Mugabe……………………………………. 133 20. A Recipe on How to Create a Holocaust…………… 149 21. An Unfinished Circle………………………………... 153 22. Doors……………………………………………….. 157 23. Mother’s Body……………………………………… 159 24. First Impression-Letter from South Africa………….. 165 25. There Is No Xenophobia in South Africa…………… 169 26. Exile………………………………………………… 175 27. Malemania…………………………………………... 179 28. Doing South Africa…………………………………..185 29. Post Power-Sharing Deal Rhetoric…………………... 199 30. Mugabe Is Still the Problem………………………… 203 31. The Portrait Of………………………………………213

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1 The Prologue imbabwe: The Blame Gameis a collection of what I might Z term interlinked creative non-fiction pieces on Zimbabwe. It straddles different types of non-fiction writing like the journalistic, academic, and general non-fiction types, but always with a creative twist. Why an overly creative non-fiction book? I feel I wanted to interest the general readers more than, say, the academic establishment. With this is mind, I thought to follow the rigours of academic or journalistic type of writing might put off the general readers that I was targeting, and that’s why I thought of writing the story of Zimbabwe in this simple, creatively focussed, easy to read, sometimes laid back way. General readers might not want to deal with technical, fact embossed, and stuffy matter you would find in academic or even journalistic writing. Such that, most of the writings in this book, explore the story telling genre to describe or explain what I am trying to achieve in these writings; and I am using these stories to create depth that I should have created with technical or factual analysis of the issues. Zimbabwe: The Blame Game ,  in the beginning, came out as an off- shot to my earlier manuscript,Mad Bob Republic.When I was writing Mad Bob Republic, I also wrote some non-fiction pieces, that I thought didn’t fit into this manuscript.Mad Bob Republicwas a manuscript of short stories, so I had to take out the non-fiction pieces from this collection and added a whole lot new material to createZimbabwe: The Blame Game.As the titleZimbabwe: The Blame Gamesuggests, it centres on finding who to blame for Zimbabwe’s problems and the processes of undoing Mugabe. It specifically deals with the whys, and whos of Zimbabwe’s problems. I know some people might feel to blame someone for Zimbabwe’s problems won’t get us anywhere anymore. This should be the beginning. We should realise how each of us has been to blame, have caused these problems, and in that way, we

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could have a good headway in trying to find the solutions. Our problem, as a nation, is we have acculturated in our psyche this idea that we can simply walk through any dark period, without having to talk about it. We did that with the liberation war. We just lied to each other that everything that happened then was forgiven. We faked a reconciliation that didn’t hold much further after independence. And in doing that we have always created some power-sharing entities that never really work because we don’t simply trust each other, to begin with. We have had four power-sharing governments in the last 34 years, and none of which have solved the things that caused the enactment of those power-sharing entities. What does that tell us about our psyche? Are we incapable, as a country, as a people, as a party, to stand on one foot? Another easily seen phenomenon, of these power-sharing governments, (three of which) is that, it has involved the same individual or party. The question should be why the same person or party? In 1978, Bishop Abel Muzorewa and Ian Smith entered into the first power-sharing government, for their own ulterior motives. In 1980, ZAPU and ZANU entered their own power-sharing arrangement. It didn’t last as they accused each other of something that, up to now, nobody has ever explored or talked about: an arms catch found on a farm that belonged to ZAPU. In 1987, Joshua Nkomo and Robert Mugabe entered into another unity government, mostly to stop the war in the Matebeleland regions. But the question is; did it solve some of the problems the Matebeleland people have always complained of? In 2009, we entered into another power-sharing arrangement between the MDC and ZANUPF, which both parties have always been complaining, that it isn’t working. The prime cause why all these unity governments have never worked is because we just enter into these arrangements without first talking or even afterwards. We simply don’t talk to each other. Maybe; about the wrongs we did to each other and genuinely embrace each other and forgive each other. The only talks we do is in making these power-sharing entities, i.e. on who is going to take this and that ministry, and nothing else. There are those who always say there are some things that we shouldn’t talk about, that some things have to be caged inside, that 2

some things, they feel by talking about them, it would result in more disagreements and conflicts. If these things are that important, there are exactly the things that we should be talking about. If we can’t talk about them, we will never know where we went wrong, and most likely, we are going to repeat the same mistakes in the future. Talking is the beginning of the search of solutions, and the implementation of the solutions, and through talking, we get to understand each other, and let the hurt, sorrow and pain be dealt with, and try to genuinely forgive each other and move forward. But we haven’t been doing all that, and so, years later, these enforced reconciliations won’t hold. This is what I am trying to encourage in this book, that we start the process of talking. We need to face each other with an open mind, honest engagement, with real love that doesn’t just run along the path to judging, with forgiveness, with real reconciliation. For us to do that we need to start to talk to each other, but this collection goes further than Zimbabwe, than encouraging talking. The Blame Game could be applied into other perspectives, other countries. It still tackles Zimbabwe, even as it tackles life in exile, especially for those Zimbabweans who left for South Africa; what they had to deal with, especially the xenophobia of year 2008. There are also two particular pieces that deals with South Africa, what I think is happening in South Africa, where I think South Africa is heading towards. It is the Zimbabwenisation of issues in South Africa that I am trying to explore, above everything else. The biggest import of those pieces on South Africa was to not only indict, but to give advice, so that; maybe South Africa might regurgitate safely through its problems. The last few pieces in this book deal with Zimbabwe after the GNU negotiations and a look at the future for Zimbabweans and Zimbabwe. It also throws a light on Mugabe, his portrait now. The piece that holds the book together and which the book borrows its title from isThe Blame Game, which delves deeply into who is to blame for Zimbabwe’s (and Africa in general) problems and demise. Though I had to draw from a number of experts and from Newspaper articles on the analysis and indictment, of the problems and the solutions, I also had to put across a lot of my own 3

thoughts and opinions, understanding and observation of these issues. What am I attempting to achieve in this manuscript? Assigning blame is the first thing I am attempting to do, but undoing Mugabe is the biggest thrust of this book. Nobody in his rights senses would disagree with the fact that Mugabe was the problem, is still the problem, would be the problem in the future, and that undoing Mugabe from our country’s body politic and lives should be everyone’s mission. Only by undoing Mugabe will Zimbabwe be free and renormalize again. Here it’s not about whether I like or don’t like him, whether he represents interests of this or that group of people. It’s because he is the most divisive person in the country, or even in the whole of Africa. He is now more of a liability than an asset to the country, even to those who support him. It is only for this reason that I think it should be everyone’s task to make sure that he goes…, but he should go in a way that won’t take the country to the brink again.

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2 Silence or some years I have been a great desert of silence, green F silence, screaming silence, painful silence; building extensions into my own heart, making many divisions (departments, ministries and organisations) of silence. I had been logging silence like a seed into the embryo of silence in every of those divisions of my heart. My heart had been galloping with me, filling itself up with silence. No one was astriding it. Read this book, perhaps you will figure out how the plot will unfold, or fold back into itself? Perhaps this silence in my heart will put present’s fear of the past, and of the future, out of my heart. I still have this unwavering idea that it’s up to me, not to anyone else, for me to free myself from this harsh and demanding bandage of silence. This silence simply has to oblige me. Of course, silence has been very calculating, in buying me into submissiveness, into quietness, too. Now the words inside my heart are cursing themselves without even saying a single thought. So, this goes on and on for some long minutes. I have happened upon this silence. This is the silence: the silence of inner landscapes. It is eternal silence. How much can I be able to let you see? I start to measure silence for you. Frame it well inside the walls of my heart. No mouth opens in my heart, no window opens, nothing inside my heart is removed, and nothing is added inside me. Everything is the voice of silence; my silences are many silenced words. The silence in my heart is like pins and needles. I am a silent being. I am not becoming. The inside of my heart is now the most silent place in my whole being. Only I can decide to share it with you. There is now no speech flowing through these divisions in my heart, but only murmurs of un-speech. The murmurs are so soft and seem to take me inside my heart by hand. Yet, they do not silence the borders of these divisions, of silence, in my heart. These are the

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