Online ReporterAnd, so there was a place of vice near my village, soon after independence.
There, the bizarre and the unknittable used to happen and in the thriftiness of time, the bizarre became normal mishaps.
You might not have heard about the normal abnormal or abnormal normal, or worse still, the normal mishaps. This villager, the son of a peasant will tell you that these are jewels of mischief, that end up plunging many people into trouble as ripple effects of one’s action.
Chirasavana
It was the fad of the time. Soon after independence, this was a weekend thing for worker. Workmen broke early from work and boarded buses to their families in the village. On Friday afternoons this bus in particular was confronted by kilometre after kilometre of apparently empty bush, then a scattering of mud-and-pole huts, dotted European-style houses, a few criss-crossing gravel paths, cattle grazing on the verges of the road, and precious little else.
It normally arrived in the stealth of the evening.
The groggy diesel engine of the AVM (Amalgamated Vehicle Manufacturers) bus was resilient. It carried its cross: a buffet of groceries and trinkets plus esoteric workmen sipping beers, chugging drinks and smoking, albeit the no-smoking insignia plastered on the bus walls. It was noisy and the driver was oblivious of the fact that at the end, he would deliver both parcels and men to the final destination.
Leonard Dembo, Leonard Zhakata, Thomas Mapfumo and John Chibadura were the driver’s favourite musicians and indeed they provided the opus. Indeed it was the fad of the time.
At the final destination, a cluster of old shops and bars, where an array small one-or two-roomed houses back-benched.
It is in these backbenches that sex workers of all shapes and sizes; from the pencil slim to the chubby ones and the short and tall came in colourful plumage in clothes and faces.
There was a security guard who kept or parcels while the workmen imbibed and indulged. Many men never went home.
Many parcels never got home. many men never got home, too.
On Monday, families would here that their bread winners ended the journey at the shops and never got home. They would hear that their husbands, finished the groceries at the backbenchers and not the front-seaters (the wives), They called the place Chirasavana. Literary transplanted to where families were abandoned.
Early on Monday mornings the bus returned to Harare, carrying men with sullen faces, often sleeping and yawning intermittently. They were never as lively as they used to be on Friday nights. The combination of lathers, fatigue and thoughts of the families they abandoned and the call-girls experiences, clouded the mind. But this was regular occurrences. Men never learn. Many families were destroyed this way. Chirasavana.
Our independence
Zimbabwe is not an ordinary country. After attaining independence in 1980, Zimbabwe has been a leader in many issues.
Zimbabwe did not end with the attainment of independence. The ruling party has understood that Zimbabwe needs liberation and not simple independence. Liberation is a process, always changing with the times.
So, about two decades ago, Zimbabwe pulled out of the Commonwealth because there was vast disagreement on the land reform programme. Zimbabwe, under Zanu PF, had to choose between Commonwealth and the liberation of the land from a few white minority colonial settlers to the majority black people. This is a feat no other African country has achieved.
Zimbabwe was subsequently placed under sanctions, albeit, illegally by US and its allies over the land reform. But Zimbabwe has stood firm and life goes on. The Second Republic is even more resilient on the land reform and coming up with tittle deeds. That is what liberation is all about. It is not stagnant.
Now does this ring a bell? Rwandan President Paul Kagame has expelled all Belgian diplomats from his country, for what he calls interference with the independence of his country and soiling the image of Rwanda.
If you know Belgium, it is the Capital of the European Union, an organisation known for torpedoing African empowerment and pushing white supremacist ideology. On That one Kagame has been bold enough. Kudos to him, for, he is doing what is good for his people, something that Zimbabwe is good at. Kagame must have borrowed a few notes from Zimbabwe.
Sahel Region
Real liberation is coming to the Sahel region as the French hegemony, based on colonial big brother mentality is being dismantled. Niger, Burkina Faso and Mali are leading the fight, with tenacity. This is liberation. Real liberation not piecemeal.
Niger has withdrawn from the global French-speaking group the International Organisation of Francophone Nations (OIF), amid continuing efforts to sever ties with its former colonial power, France.
The West African country’s foreign ministry announced the decision on Monday.
“The Nigerien government has independently decided to withdraw Niger from the Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie,” the ministry said in a statement posted on X.
While rationale for the decision was provided, the move comes more than a year after the military authorities in Niamey suspended all cooperation with the Paris-based organization, accusing it of being a political tool for defending French interests.
The permanent council of the 88-member OIF suspended Niger in December 2023 months after a July coup which ousted former President Mohamed Bazoum, to pressure the country’s new leadership to restore constitutional order. The group had said it would continue cooperation on projects that directly benefit civilian populations and contribute to the restoration of democracy in the former French colony.
The OIF’s proclaimed mission is to promote the French language, support peace and democracy, and foster education and development in Francophone countries worldwide, many of which were French colonies.
Since taking control of Niamey, the Nigerian military government, known as the National Council for Safeguarding the Homeland, has taken several measures to cut ties with Paris, including expelling French troops who had partnered in fighting an Islamic insurgency in the Sahel Just weeks prior to the coup, Niger adopted a new national anthem, ‘The Honour of the Fatherland,’ replacing ‘La Nigerienne,’ written by French composers Maurice Albert Thiriet, Robert Jacquet, and Nicolas Abel Francois Frionnet in 1961, a year after the country’s independence.
Does Zimbabwe’s pulling out of the Commonwealth ring a bell here? We lead they follow. Independence and Liberation.
But you see, Niger, Mali and Burkina Faso are fighting genuine liberation. Independence was not enough for them. France still behaves like a colonial master and they have very right to disengage with it.
Ukraine
Russia has been liberating its people from Kiev, in the east. Russia has been fighting for its people not to be abused by NATO and the US. Russia is in liberation mood.
Talk of a man who has been fighting a lost cause. His name is Volodymyr Zelenskyy. In yonder Ukraine, things have not been well for President Zelenskyy after displaying some public heroism before US President DJ Trump.
In my village, elders with cotton tufty hair say a lizard that jumps from the tallest tree in public, and claim not to be injured, will certainly feel the pain, when alone at night.
After that infamous Washington debacle and far away from the madding media, Zelenskyy, felt the pain. Suffice it to say, social media goons made him a momentary hero, but soon he was to learn that he had made a fatal mistake.
Soon the US plugged off some military lifeline and Russian bombs rained like February precipitation during the Inter Tropical Convergence Zone. They rained cats and dogs and Zelenskyy had to swallow his pride, tuck his tail under between his legs and apologized. But it was too late. He was akin to another participant of Chirasavana.
It was apolitical act, bereft of tactic and knowledge and ended up with the death of many people, the displacement of many others and the suffering of more.
Trump, warned him, Russia had the card and Ukraine did not have. But Zelenskyy a comedian-turned president did not know when to act. He chose grandstanding.
Zelenskyy has no idea how to play politics, the same manner he provoked Russia and triggered the special military operation which has destroyed his country.
At least this week he sighs relieve after US President Donald Trump has expressed his readiness to meet with his Russian counterpart, after Vladimir Putin said Moscow is open to a US-proposed ceasefire in Ukraine, while raising a number of questions about implementing it.
The Russian president voiced support for a potential 30-day ceasefire in the Ukraine conflict on Thursday, but warned loopholes and strategic disadvantages, outlining Moscow’s concerns over how a truce could be enforced. But Zelenskyy no longer has the cards.
Even Ukraine’s attempt to join the European Union is now being rubbished by many, the latest being Hungary’s exception to the idea.
Admitting Ukraine into the EU would be an “unthinkable” act, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has stated, adding that accession to the bloc by Kiev could have severe economic and security consequences for Hungary.
So even if a permanent truce is achieved in Ukraine, Russia will never cede the about 2o percent it has gained. Zelenskyy fought for nothing.
His country now has billions of dollars in war equipment debt. His country has a mammoth task to rebuild. He has nothing to show for his provocation and subsequent war. His is a lost cause.
