Online Reporter
Communion with Bishop Lazarus
By now, the world has figured out what Donald Trump is all about.
He is an open book, whose raw feelings and unadulterated emotions are routinely shared unfiltered on social media for the world to see.
Bishop Lazarus knows, and so do many others around the world, that Trump is probably sulking after being snubbed by the Nobel Peace Prize.
Before the award to little-known Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado on Friday, Trump had been openly canvassing — grovelling even — for the honour, outlandishly and mendaciously claiming he had helped end seven wars around the world, among them the conflict in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo.
It all came to naught.
But get it from the Bishop, we have not heard the last on this from Trump, who tends to agree with Vladimir Putin’s assertion that oftentimes the prize has been awarded to people “who did nothing for peace”.
As someone who was born with a silver — if not golden — spoon in his mouth, he is predictably petulant.
While it is true that the recipient, Machado, has done absolutely nothing for peace, awarding it to Trump would have been worse.
It would have been akin to giving an arsonist the Firefighter of the Year award.
Trump does not stop fires — he starts and fans them.
Well, perhaps, in a twisted way, it would have been fitting for Trump to win the award eponymously named after inventor, entrepreneur, scientist and businessman Alfred Nobel, a man who famously invented the dynamite — a weapon of war, not peace — in 1867.
Here in our teapot-shaped Republic, we know of the devastating impact of dynamite all too well.
Twenty-nine years after it was invented by Alfred, the colonialists were already using it to break the resistance of local heroes.
We will never forget how it was used by the invading force, led by Major Watts, to breach the Gwindingwi fortress of Chief Chingaira Makoni and break the dogged resistance of his forces around September 1896.
Chief Chingaira Makoni was subsequently captured, tried before a kangaroo court, assassinated and beheaded by the invaders.
On his part, Trump has been aiding and abetting the genocide of Palestinians in Gaza by Israel by supplying lethal aid, particularly bombs.
So, he is equally culpable of the egregious human slaughter that we are currently witnessing in the Middle East.
However, as they say, every cloud has a silver lining.
Who would have thought that our bank balances and vaults would be swelling with every wild and absurd policy coming out of the United States?
You see, as has been the norm for millennia, when investors become fretful, like when Trump announces one of his many zingers, they often channel their money to gold, which is a time-tested safe haven.
And, of late, absurd policies — be it abruptly closing USAID, requiring truck drivers to speak English, seeking to bar Chinese students at US universities, imposing unreasonably steep tariffs or cancelling visa services in countries that do not agree to accept foreign deportees — are being churned out of the White House with obscene regularity like never before, sending the world into a tailspin.
Gold prices have been skyrocketing as a result.
Last week, prices rose to an all-time high, above US$4 000 per ounce.
This translates to roughly US$128 per gramme.
You can imagine the frenzied activity in artisanal mining right now.
The figures have been quite telling.
Last week, we were told that gold deliveries for the January to September period had jumped to 32,9 tonnes, an increase of close to nine tonnes from last year.
Artisanal miners accounted for 24,4 tonnes, which is more than the total haul by the gold mining industry for the whole of 2024.
No doubt, this trend is being driven by the glitter of record prices of the yellow metal.
For just one gramme, one can pocket a bill that has Benjamin Franklin and his famous permed hair.
It is just wild.
Happily, as gold prices soar, our exports have been growing and our trade deficit narrowing.
In the eight-month period to August this year, our exports have risen to US$5,62 billion from US$4,56 billion in the same period last year, driven by the mining sector, which weighed in with US$4,61 billion.
Gold, whose exports more than doubled from US$1,34 billion in 2024 to US$2,75 billion, anchored the strong performance.
So, Bishop Lazi is definitely toasting to Trump.
Here is to more craziness ahead.
Hopefully, it will be benign.
There is definitely something about Trump and gold.
His affinity for gold is well-documented.
Before his presidency, his private Boeing 757 — “Trump Force One” — was a flying golden monument.
The interior featured gold-plated seatbelts, sinks, fixtures and tables finished in 24-karat gold.
Even the bathroom towels were monogrammed in gold thread.
His triplex in Trump Tower in Manhattan was also famously decorated with gilded ceilings, doors and furniture, creating an overwhelmingly golden ambiance.
So, long live gold.
Misdirected Energy
Well, in the world of politics, there is Mr Donald Trump and then there is Cde Energy Mutodi.
In the grand, often surreal theatre of Zimbabwean politics, few characters deliver a performance as reliably consistent as this Cde.
The man is a human fireworks display — a brilliant burst of light and sound, followed inevitably by a misfire.
He has once again been shown the exit.
This time, from the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Budget, Finance and Investment Promotion.
The charge? The same old tune: a case of the runaway tongue and a severe allergic reaction to thinking before tweeting.
But here is the twist that elevates this from a simple political blunder to a Shakespearean tragedy with a data plan: Cde Mutodi has four university degrees — a PhD in Business Administration from the University of Cape Town, a BA in Geography and War Studies, a Bachelor of Laws Honours degree and a Master’s degree in Business Administration from the University of Zimbabwe.
Let that marinate.
Yet his political career has the lifespan of an ice sculpture in the Kariba sun.
You can have a PhD, but if your primary method of communication is setting your own career on fire and live-tweeting the ashes, the budget committee is probably not the place for you.
So, let Cde Mutodi be a lesson to us all.
Stack your degrees, frame your certificates and fill your mind with knowledge. But for the love of all that is holy, pair it with some good social skills.
James 3:5-6 teaches us: “So also the tongue is a small member, yet it boasts of great things. How great a forest is set ablaze by such a small fire! And the tongue is a fire, a world of unrighteousness.”
Proverbs 18:21 adds: “Death and life are in the power of the tongue, and those who love it will eat its fruits.”
In the real world, your emotional intelligence is not an elective — it is the core curriculum.
And it appears Cde Mutodi is still, tragically, stuck in remedial class.
Most importantly, Cde Mutodi’s tragicomic political misadventures should teach the comrades in the ruling party that ZANU PF is the formidable and time-tested political behemoth that is here today because of its iron-clad discipline and obsessive insistence on party protocol.
It is discipline that has sustained the party for the past 62 years and it is discipline that will sustain it into the future.
The bigger picture is on achieving President ED’s overarching goal of a prosperous, highly industrial and modern Zimbabwe that we are all proud of, and this will be at the core of deliberations at this week’s conference in Mutare.
Sideshows will not cut it.
Unity, peace and development — which are ZANU PF’s timeless creed — should be the guiding light to the future we all want and deserve.
We have a vision to deliver and a people to serve.
Bishop out!
