adminMonica Cheru-Mpambawashe
Urban wear designer, personal coach and self-development expert, certified screenwriter and director, creative and inspirational writer as well as experience in helping set up various businesses, each of the talents would be enough for any ordinary person, but to come in one package surely should be a superlative. But it is not, because Lee Murwira is all that and more.
Murwira says that he has set his eyes on changing the film industry in Zimbabwe. Everyone knows that from a promising bud in the eighties, film in the country has suffered a terrible demise with only a few glimmers of light to keep hope alive.
Murwira says that he has 12 scripts and he is sure that the first one will hit our screens before the end of 2015.
“I am working with a local production company and before the end of 2015 there should be something. The script I am looking at right now is based on alcoholics and the 12 stage recovery steps. Looking around I can see that hard drinking is a lifestyle but I wonder if many realise that it is a disease.”
Murwira assures us that although the story is about a serious issue, viewers should expect to be entertained and not subjected to a documentary about alcoholism. Message driven productions have played their part in putting off audiences from films. He also pointed out that many local productions failed to develop from the writers’ idea to the director’s final product which compromises the quality.
But just who is Lee Murwira and why should you place him on the list of Zimbabweans to watch?
Born in what he describes as a disadvantaged background, Murwira left the country for the UK in 2002, a move that he describes as a mixed blessing:
“The Zimbabwe I left and what I found were like two different worlds. But knowing what I know now it is not negative but positive. If I knew what I know now about 13 years ago, I would not have left Zim,” he avers.
And the big secret that he knows now?
“We sometimes go to faraway places looking for success thinking that mere physical placement in that promised land things will happen. But now I know that the Promised Land is Zimbabwe. But the knowledge that I got there is invaluable and I will now use it right here at home.”
This gels with his favourite quote from TS Elliot: “We shall not cease from exploration, and at the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.”
Murwira says that unfortunately this is a realisation that each individual must come on their own at the right time. “A lot of our citizens who are outside the country are just doing things that can be done right here. If they were all to return and utilise the knowledge and skills gleaned from out there you can only imagine what would happen to the country,” he says.
This is not the talk of the some idealist but a pragmatic man who holds an Economics, Finance and Banking (EFB) degree from the University of Portsmouth.
During his days there he won the University Enterprise Challenge consecutively, setting a record for the university and worked extensively with the university’s enterprise wing.
In 2008, he embarked on a masters degree in finance at the same institution.
After completing his studies he worked with several businesses helping in the setting up thereof. Somewhere along the line he also found the time launch his hip-hop fashion label Street King.
This developed as a direct result of seeing how youths in Portsmouth did not have access to trendy wear. Before that he had launched a hair salon dedicated to catering for the special needs of Black people from Africa and the Caribbean after noting that although the local barbers were friendly, they just did not understand the needs of that segment of the market. His story was featured in an UK magazine as an illustration of innovation.
The man’s entrepreneurial streak was not founded abroad but right here at home. At the age of 17 while living in some dusty parts of Harare, his uncle who was in the business of picking and cleaning up empty containers for resale gave the young Murwira a small capital to start up his own venture, whetting his appetite for self-employment.
When he went to the UK, Murwira started on the same road that many other emigrants have taken. He was a caregiver in a nursing home for about two years. But reporting to supervisors was not what he wanted to do in life so he started looking for business opportunities which led to the establishment of the barber shop and his road to success was suddenly clear and straightforward.
Not content with his economic leanings, Murwira decided to reach out to the creative side of him which was begging to be expressed. He trained with a London film institute and qualified as a screenwriter and director then worked on several successful productions in both capacities.
His venture into the world of writing was almost incidental. He says his first title “From Mean to Ends” was a documentary of his own experiences. He added two more inspirational titles “Magnum Opus” and “The Business of Life”. All the three books force the reader to take their own life apart and analyse it from a philosophical business perspective.
His two creative works Nhamo and Mary are about disadvantaged children surviving trying times. He says that he is driven to write about the wretched because he did not start out with a silver spoon but that has not stopped him from reaching for his dreams.
“Growing up I thought I was disadvantaged in some ways and if I had stopped dreaming I would have fallen into a dead end. I did not know how things would work out in future, if there was a future. But things beyond my expectations happened, for which I give credit to divine ways. So I feel pushed to tell everyone that no matter where you are born or bred, that does not determine the future,” Murwira passionately preaches.
All his books are available on Amazon and should be available in hard copy locally within a few weeks.
Murwira has recently founded “From means to Ends” a venture which specialises in self development videos and seminars (with the site www.frommeanstoends.com set to launch shortly).
Online Reporter