I’ve heard a range of comments about the Harare International Festival of the Arts (HIFA) opening show Dreamland. Some feel, particularly as the opening show, it should have been more upbeat. Others feel it was important to not hide the realities of Zimbabwe. I had a hard time formulating an opinion because I was in awe the show happened. Everything and every minute of the show were overtly critical of the government.

The one thing that has stayed in my mind is the performance of Dudu Manhenga. She’s a wonderfully talented singer/performer, no doubt about it. But in this case, more what’s been on my mind is song selection. Dudu performed one of my favorite songs – a relatively unknown song from 1988 by American singer/songwriter Toni Childs. If my math is right, I was 23 years old in 1988 – young and naïve. I remember the song as one of the many things which opened my eyes and mind to the world around me. Generally, my interest in music is to know what lyrics mean, the message of the song, and to develop my own interpretations of the words. The lyrics of Toni Childs prompted me in 1988 to research more about the Zimbabwean Unity Accord of 1987 and the violence during the years before. I may have been wrong in thinking the 1988 song was commenting on Gukurahundi. But I can’t help but think at HIFA 2008 the song was selected as a commentary on the ways history unfortunately repeats itself – not always in exactly the same ways – but with the same painful and unjust results.

I found another blogger thinking about this 1988 song and the lyrics are below.

what you gonna do zimbabwae
what you gonna do zimbabwae

zimbabwae is a man who tried
to teach his children what was right
but then there came a time when war
split the family from inside
he said no fighting no more

what you gonna do zimbabwae
what you gonna do zimbabwae

the old man sits and shakes his head
while the multitudes insist
where is the cause of unity
with just one thought there could be peace
men gathered in silence the same

can there be some peace on earth
can there be a love
greater than the world we see
greater than us all
it’s the last station home
it’s the last station home

you ran your heart in those days
when no-one could see days
you want to run in the wind
you want to go back inside
see no more crime in your lifetime
zimbabwae, zimbabwae
no more crime in your lifetime
zimbabwae, zimbabwae

– Toni Childs

Matonga is at it again. There he was shooting his mouth in the government mouthpiece, the Herald of June 07 that “All NGOs have been ordered to apply for new registration permits as part of measures to clamp down on the incidences of civil society meddling in the country’s politics ahead of the June 27 presidential run-off.”

This in direct contradiction to what the former minister of Public Service, Labor and Social Welfare, Mr Nicholas Goche issued in a letter calling for the suspension of all ‘field work’ by PVOs. One can almost imagine Matonga confidently making his announcement with that annoyingly wide and pompous Cheshire-cat grin of his.

This is at a time when most Zimbabweans are in desperate need of food aid and ARV treatment, clean water and other services provided by NGOs. But some Minister just wakes up one day and decides all NGOs are banned from conducting humanitarian work, ironically at a time when the outgoing president is attending a summit discussing various food security issues including the fight against hunger. That thousands will probably die from hunger or needless lack of medication seems irrelevant. What is important is to thwart potential underground activities by NGOs to support the MDC under the banner of carrying out humanitarian aid.

NANGO (an association of Zimbabwean NGOs representing over 1000 members countrywide) convened an emergency meeting with PVOs to discuss implications and the way forward on June 09, 2008. A representative from Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights (ZLHR) gave a preliminary legal position that the letter is not legally valid, as the Private Voluntary Organizations Act does not empower the Minister to suspend an NGO’s operations.  Also, section 10 of the Act, cited in the letter, empowers the PVO Board, not the Minister, to take action to de-register an NGO. Whatever the legality of this instruction, it is a political reality.

There is also the question of whether Goche has any right at all to be issuing such statements. If cabinet was dissolved just before March 29, he and his colleagues must therefore be operating from the perspective that since their outgoing president is still operational; they too can continue to execute duties as before.

It is fast becoming a sad reality that the regime is refusing to go and will employ any means possible to ensure they stay in power. It is another sad reality that this is not the first time such careless, baseless announcements have been made each time the government feels threatened about something. Another sad reality is that we have a government in place that simply has this ‘thing’ against people helping other people, even when humanitarian assistance is non partisan and is inclusive of their Zanu-PF people. Never mind that humanitarian workers’ sole mission is to provide assistance to any people in need.

It appears that most members of civil society have chosen to distance themselves from solidarity with other directly affected PVOs, under the misconception that only humanitarian field workers in food distribution are being targeted. Some do not realize that the regime has a plethora of some uneducated overzealous agents who are prepared to start maiming and killing to enforce the directive, legal or not. Much as we find for instance that Mr Goche’s announcement is legally null and void, we are also confronted by the fact that there is no respect for the rule of law in this country.

I caught the words of one representative from ZLHR that it may be in the best interests of PVOs to just comply with the directives, even though this may imply that they concede that their existence is illegal. He gave the example of the Daily News and the fact that the paper lost its case against the MIC because it failed to comply with the law simply because they disagreed with it. The wise move was to first comply then later challenge whatever they disagreed with. The lawyer suggested the same for PVOs in the current situation.

So if this was a death sentence, first die then appeal?

I am a surgeon with a scalpel for false values.
- Lenny Bruce (1926 – 1966)

I have this great little book called 50 American Revolutions You’re Not Supposed To Know by Mickey Z. What I like about it is that it investigates a variety of actions and people that have contributed, one way or another, to our collective liberation.

As Mickey Z says in his introduction, “from taking up arms against one’s oppressor to using art and words as weapons of mass instruction, these 50 episodes celebrate a different form of patriotism . . . one based on challenging tradition and taking action.”

So, here’s a bit on Lenny Bruce:

“Lenny Bruce was a revolutionary comedy figure because he brought honesty into a form which previously had been little more than an empty crowd-pleasing truth,” says George Carlin.

To say Bruce revolutionized comedy is putting it rather mildly. His impact extended beyond mere entertainment to alter American culture. Perhaps the single greatest indicator of his uniqueness lies in the fact that many of his classic stand-up bits are no longer funny. His primary topics – religion, politics, sex – are hardly taboo anymore (thanks, in part, to Bruce) and thus his scathing attacks seem tame by today’s standards.

Not so in the early 1960s when Bruce faced the repressive wrath of state power. As a former assistant district attorney admitted some 30 years after Bruce’s death, “He was prosecuted because of his words. He didn’t harm anybody; he didn’t commit an assault; he didn’t steal; he didn’t engage in any conduct, which directly harmed someone else. So, therefore, he was punished, first and foremost, because of the words he used . . . We drove him into poverty and used the law to kill him.”

On June 13, 1964, a petition made the rounds denouncing the legal assault on Lenny Bruce. Signed by a veritable who’s who of the time (e.g. Woody Allen, Richard Burton, Bob Dylan, Dick Gregory, Paul Newman, Elizabeth Taylor, James Baldwin, Saul Bellow, Norman Mailer, Arthur Miller, Henry Miller, Susan Sontag, Terry Southern, William Styron, John Updike, Gore Vidal, Leroi Jones (Amiri Baraka), Gregory Corso, Lawrence Ferlinghetti and Allen Ginsberg), the petition read, in part:

Lenny Bruce is a popular controversial performer in the field of social satire in the tradition of Swift, Rabelais, and Twain. Although Bruce makes use of the vernacular in his night-club performances, he does so within the context of his satirical intent and not to arouse the prurient interests of his listeners. It is up to the audience to determine what is offensive to them; it is not a function of the police department of New York or any other city to decide what adult private citizens may or may not hear.

Within two years the battle had claimed Bruce. He was found dead in his apartment . . . never to witness the enduring effect of his efforts. “The greatest gift I derived from knowing him and his work was the importance of honesty, in the words and on the stage,” Carlin states. “Lenny made being full of shit old-fashioned.”

Or, as Lenny himself explained: “Take away the right to say fuck and you take away the right to say fuck the government.”

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Whilst Mugabe fiddles about food in Rome, Zimbabwe is burning. With three weeks till the run off, the election violence continues. The images from a petrol bomb attack in Zaka support with the reports we received below, from an MDC supporter in Masvingo Province.

Zaka

Our Zaka command centre was attacked last night by ZANU PF militia who shot 7 of the MDC supporters there and went on to burn there bodies with the fuel that had been supplied them for campaigning purposes. The Zaka police are trying to down play this incident by saying that only three people have been killed.

Chirezi North

The secretary Nelson Mangwayana’s house at Mkwasine Estate was attacked by people brought there in 2 Mistabushi pick ups last night. He was not there and his wife managed to escape with her children, the militia broke windows and took some goods and radio equipment. The family is now homeless and he is unable to go back to work at Mkwasine Estate. Everyone including management of the Mkwasine estate are being forced to go to ZANU meetings where they have to keep pledging there allegiance.

Chiredzi South

At 2.30am I received a message that the chairman for ward 10 Satan who lives at Chilonga has been abducted with 2 youths. His son who saw the abduction said that 2 white pick ups came to the house and at gun point forced him into a vehicle. As they left he Satan managed to shout his farewells to his family. Suspect who directed this are Matemachani, Edson Chauke (otherwise Right Chimbere), Phillimon Magezani and David Knuka.

For another account of events in Zaka, visit this blog:

Six MDC officials, sleeping in their office, were woken by the arrival of an armed gang at 4am. The armed men forced the officials to lie down and shot three people immediately. (I pray to any available God that they were killed outright). Petrol was poured over them all and they were set alight. The man I am talking to managed to tear off his clothes, beat out the flames burning his body and escape. Two men are dead, their bodies unrecognisably burned, and another suspected dead but his body is missing. Two men have burns over large areas of their bodies. They will be lucky to live.

Yesterday the first flush of crimson appeared on the lucky bean trees
a promise of flowering yet to be

yesterday was a rough day

we have been without cash for a week so I went foraging . . .

As I wait at a traffic light
I see a man and woman make their way slowly across the road in front of me
on the mans back he carries a load
a human reduced to nothing but bones
the shaft of a shin bone hangs down at his side
a human, ageless, of unknown gender
reduced to this

I am consumed by pain, and the need to do something
try to get off the road to offer them a lift
am pushed forwards by impatient traffic
tears running
‘I’m, sorry, I’m sorry’ as I drive on

I go to the ATM (no cash available) to try and establish what money there is in our account
in my disarray, I manage to put in the wrong pin code and my card is taken
(at least something still works!)
I rush into the bank to try and regain my card
it is crammed with about 200 customers queuing to cash the maximum cheque they can
(5 billion – today this translates to US$ 5)

I queue along side 2 men in army uniform as an SMS comes through on my cell
‘the police and army are marching through the crowded streets of Mbare Musika
firing guns into the air.’
and find myself staring at their boots
looking for splatters of blood

Why do none of us say anything?
we are so compelled to behave properly

I am in the wrong queue, but am told that I will have to reapply for a card – it could take 2 weeks (in which time my money will be worth nothing)
into another queue (only 30 minutes) – and I persuade the wonderful, patient woman to try and get my card
20 minutes later it appears –with a big smile

Back to the ATM – I have 28 billion
there is an urgency to spend it before tomorrow
with 28 individual swipes on the cash machine I can buy US$ 28 worth of floor polish and some potatoes
BUT – the cash machines aren’t working today – and no one takes cheques
I go home empty handed

Mel has been out trying to sell onions and convert it to soap, oil, sugar and salt to pay workers
but there is no cash for the onions – only a cheque – a wait of 8 days (at which time it has halved and halved again)
Yesterday he worked out that our 1$ coins that used to be worth 1 US$ would now build a 3 metre high wall around the equator to make an equivalent amount.

The air above the vleis and hillsides are filled with prayers
I wonder if they are praying for deliverance
or for the strength and courage to endure?

We hear of someone who is being pursued by the police
the fear of death hangs over him
a sudden urgency to find a safe place, food to survive

News comes of Morgan being arrested for speaking to his electorate at Lupane

These are the early mornings when the shadows lean long on the earth
and at a slow shifting of the sun an unseen spider web is lit with rainbows
invisible magic hidden in the shadows
waiting for a shift in the light