It is good to be rich, but . . .

remaining energy in their bruised bodies to run away on just seeing a well-known businessman.
Being rich in most African communities is as if you have committed a crime. Every sickness, misfortune or death is blamed on you.
“Aipona nei ivo VaChibhanzi vange vauya kuzoona kuti zvaita here?” you hear people saying even without proof. If a suspicious animal is seen close to your shop, you are accused of using muti.
It can be even much worse if your pet is a black cat.
Coins, chicken feathers, spider webs and general lack of hygiene are also perceived to be proof that one dabbles in muti. Kutadza kugeza chaiko kunokuparira.
Disaster follows if anyone close to you dies in an accident involving your car, property or animal.
“Auraya,” “Muchinda ndiye adya munhu apa,” “Ndozvazvinoita zvinhu zvacho zvinoda ropa,” people will say behind your back though they will appear to commiserate with you in your presence.
The moment one becomes rich, people to spend money with increase while hatred seems to dwarf that.
Hama kani, hama we-ee
Hama kani, hama we-ee
Pane chirwere chirikurudzi rwedu vatema,
Chirwere chacho abudirira tinouraya,
Avekuda kuratidza ruzivo tinouraya,
Avekuda kusimudzira rudzi tinouraya,
Vese vakafa vakafira ruzivo, rwavo,
Vese vakafa vakafira kugona basa, sang Marshall Munhumumwe and his trailblazing Four Brothers.
And the song was not without meaning.
It points to the trials and tribulations most successful people go through in the communities in which we live.
As, I commit pen to paper gentle reader, most businesspeople do not envy the situation they always find themselves in even all they have is the result of hard work.
“Eh . . . eh . . . you may enjoy those drinks, but I’will not get near them. Do you think he can give us food out of the blue?
“He surely knows something about the death of Simon,” purred an old lady as she threw her wrinkled hands about. So destructive were the old woman’s words that the gullible toed her line and forced even the thirsty to abandon the drinks.
Isolated as this case might be, it highlights some of the challenges businesspeople are facing in the communities in which they operate.
“Muzvinabhizinisi”, “Ngamura”, “Njonda”, “Ngwena” and “Mhene” are names that have been coined in               reference to businesspeople. So exalting are these tags which are, however, not without hidden costs to the bearer.
If you offer some community members a lift, they will refuse or hide in the bushes on seeing your car approach for fear of unfounded ritual murders.
“Munochekereswa mai mwana. Vapfumi varoyi,” you hear people lying through the skin of their teeth.
A businessman, in the eyes of the majority, represents evil in its worst colours. Apart from being accused of lining their pockets with the poor man’s poverty, a businessman is accused of all bad things anyone may think of.
Those that meet him at church, accuse him of following up on their wives or trying to use his influence to make the church part of his empire.
“The guy is so into women. How on earth can someone leave all the refrigerators full of food to come and sit on these stones in the name of prayer?
“He is after something and we will hear that before time,” some parishioners abandon business of the church to say of the businessman.
Whatever contribution or mistake the business              man makes is construed to be the result of too much money.
“Vanhu vane mari ndozvavanoita. Hameno kuti pfungwa dzavo dzinombotora sei. Ibasa chairo kuswera navo,” you hear people saying.
Gentle reader, if you are a businessman, things seem to be calculated to make you come second best.
Some men will go out of their way to impregnate your daughter in the hope of taping into your                      riches.
Asking them to pay for their misdeeds invites serious tongue-lashing or even a fistfight.
“Why are you concerned about such a simple              issue.
“You have a lot of money and there is no harm                     in absorbing the costs,” you are told straight in the                    eye.
Businesspeople are often pulled down by their relatives and friends in poor economic circumstance.
These will present all sorts of sob stories on the promise to pay later, but nothing is ever done.
Even when going for a funeral, the poor expect to be ferried free of charge and asking them to pay is worse than setting dogs on them.
They will start accusing you of being segregate when it does not even require a rocket scientist to appreciate that a car needs fuel to move from point A to B.
“Murume wacho haaite. Kudada, hanzi dirai petrol when I have not been working for the past donkey years. Where does he think I get the money. Ndiri kutodyiwawo nemadhadha.”
Gentle reader, businesspeople are also presented with tough choices whenever their poor peers need someone to represent them.
They will abuse your influence to facilitate their marriage unions which never last before accusing you of going behind their back to seduce the wife.
If can be much worse if you employ a relative in the business. Every argument is presented to the elders in a                  way that makes you appear ruthless and those that spend money on harlots start accusing you of paying them less because of their misfortune of being related to you.
“He is not paying me anything these days. He said I should cover for the bunch of keys I intermittently forgot in a commuter omnibus and the other part of my cash is being used to raise fees for his children in the US,” you hear relatives saying.
In most cases, wives of businesspeople are accused of being the real devils.
“James is a good bloke. Were it not for that wife of his. She controls him a lot and I am sure she is behind all these troubles we are facing as a family,” you hear people saying while downing opaque beer and curried madora at the bottle store.
It is good to be rich, but not so in the real sense.
Inotambika mughetto.