I enjoyed reading The Standard editor’s latest instalment about Mudenge. I also took notice of the paper’s “Quote of the week” where Saviour Kasukuwere spoke about the black man’s right not to remain poop when the spoils of war resemble Aladdin’s cave. Kasukuwere speaks the language of Supa Mandiwanzira – or vice versa who a few weeks ago told us the indigenisation crusade will not be around forever and exhorted exiled patriots not to wait until “things are okay.” Yet Mudenge takes the cake as he reminds us about his love for game meat, meat which war veterans enjoyed in unforgettable barbecues during the height of farm invasions that claimed Martin Olds and other nameless black farm workers. Then we heard the same government complaining about the falling numbers of the national herd. Now when Mudenge speaks about wantonly killing and eating game meat, what does it say about Francis Nhema on the other hand crusading about the conservation of wild life? And  it goes further, Patrick Zhuwawo leading the takeover of tourist resorts and Walter Muzembi selling the country as a safe tourist destination. These are people supposedly working together! And we are expected to take them seriously?

“The best time to listen to a politician is when he is on a street corner, in the rain, late at night, when he is exhausted. Then he doesn’t lie.” Theodore H. White, US journalist (1969)

But I figure Mudenge, Zvuwawo and all still well-heeled as they are and protected from the elements are not lying. As the Carlifornia guv would say back in the day as a celluloid thespian, Zwuwawo said, they will back at Kuimbashiri. Are cops listening? You bet!

They have become real dare devils, and you begin to ask if these are the sort of people who would be on the frontline of street protests. They are so far the only members of an “organised union” who have stood up – rightly or wrongly – to assert their right to “fight the power.”

With their daring demeanor – perhaps psychedelic based as the stereotype goes – they have become a pain in the arse for law enforcement, and one has to imagine that determination being transfered into the broader public psyche as an ingredient for street protests. All over the country they have been tagged a lawless lot, and that’s exactly what street protestors pushing for democratic reform have been called.

Sometimes you just have to marvel at the valour of the kombi drivers and touts as they take on the cops – all else notwithstanding!

How many factions does the MDC as we thought we knew it now have, that is adding from the mudslinging that has followed the elevation of Welshman Ncube who elbowed out Mutambara?

Is this not yet another tragedy of African politics that pretenders to the throne turn against each other and take their eyes off the prize, that is unseat an unpopular democracy? Small wonder then that frustrated analysts and kosher opposition politicians are always quick to say Zanu PF has mastered the game and creates these spoilers to enfeeble what would have been the party that forms the next government. So, when elections are eventually called be sure to see 20 or even 50 parties emerging from the woodwork to claim their place in the ballot as has been seen elsewhere in Africa. They are quick to call it democracy but it is rather more of multiparty elections than multiparty politics because, outside election season they hibernate and are known only to their spouses. But still that’s a big MAYBE.

Now with the numerous MDCs who will fight it out with other unknown political outfits, who can write Zanu PF’s epitaph?

Duze massages his backside. He is not the autoerotic type, neither is he scratching burning buttocks trapped in tight denims under the cruel scorching African under. This is summer, a very hot Zimbabwean summer, and many look up to the heavens to open and weep as their only consolation that they will perhaps not only cool off and escape the heat, but also be able to grow their own food. With a smug look on his face, it is obvious that here is one young man with money in his pocket. Duze again massages his backside. He is happy feeling the bulge on his back pocket. His wallet is stacked with crisp hundred 100 Rand bills. Many of his peers are struggling to get five Rand yet here he is strutting about in the city centre without a care in the world feeling like a million bucks.

Duze has just arrived from South Africa where he has been working in the past year, and it feels great being back home with the kind of money he has and he can’t wait to spoil himself silly. He stops at a city pub, one of many that have sprouted in virtually every corner after the citizens of this land began using currencies of other countries. He has on his mind a few choice beers that he saw and sipped with gusto in South Africa, only to be told by lads who know the hard times back home he was wasting his hard earned cash on bourgeoisie intoxicants. No one would ask or bother him in Bulawayo where boys coming back from Jozi are expected to be loaded. He makes himself comfortable at the sports bar as he watches English soccer from a giant television screen. He takes in the ambience and notices this is the place to be: young men speak at the top of their voices with unbridled confidence as they take into their system what many here consider expensive beer. Already, Duze feels he belongs. He has one, then another, then another. Damn the ice cold frothing Heineken is just what Bacchus ordered. In a while Duze feels his head getting woozy: he is glad he is not wasting his money drinking beer that would not get him drunk. He feels he could do with some fresh air and decides to have a walkabout checking out the places he had not visited in a long time. He walks down town where he sees gigantic men speaking with funny accents and he guesses they must be Nigerian as he has seen many speaking like them in down town Jo’burg. He sees Chinese shops at every turn and women clad in flowing all-white robes flocking into the shops to make bulk purchases. The women sell these wares just around the corner at inflated prices, and unknowing cash-strapped customers jostle for the “bargains.”

“Zhing zhong!” Duze curses as he walks past the Chinese shop.

Three men are lazily standing by the side of the shop’s door. They apparently have nothing to do but watch these women go in and out of the shop and watch cars wheeze by and chat idly about what they would do with the money if a Nigerian or Chinese businessman offered them part time jobs. As what? This is the state of things where grown men leave their homes and spend time in the CBD watching other people spend money. Some scratch their heads for answers while others scratch lotto tickets, but still none of them win.

But not these men it turns out.

“What did you say?” one of the men says, and the question is directed at Duze.

“Zhing zhong,” Duze repeats as he continues walking. The man’s feelings are injured.

“Hey stop there,” he says as he fumbles for something in his back pocket, his colleagues are by his side but are yet to pick what the hell their mate is getting all excited about.

“How dare you mock our investors!” the man says as he grabs Duze by the belt.

The tipsy Duze violently shoves the man with his elbow, and the elbow lands right in the nose of the man who turns out to be a cop in plain clothes.

“Did you not hear him say ‘Zhing-zhong’,” the diligent cop says to his colleagues, “now he is resisting arrest and assaulting me,” he continues as he massages his injured nose.

“What?” Duze yells.

In solidarity with their comrade who is now massaging his stinging nose, the other two men who also turn out to be cops wrestle with Duze as they cuff him. Duze is clueless what is happening, and before he knows it a crowd is swelling around him to watch the free show. What humiliation for an injiva who wanted nothing but spend his money on himself!

“What’s going on? I didn’t know saying Zhing-zhong is a crime,” he pleads in a South African accent.

“It is and so is assaulting a police officer. You boys go to South Africa then come here and think you are above the law?” one of the men says, and the crowd appears to enjoy the fact that it is an injiva being arrested but they do not dare ask arrested for what.

Duze is sent to the police station where he is ordered to pay an admission of guilt fine and released after a stern warning that you don’t make fun of the Chinese as they are friends of the president. The assault of a cop is not mentioned, but Duze has already made up his mind that he is returning to Johannesburg that very day. He is however grateful the cops did not go through his pockets as they would have found cash worth more than a year of their salaries! So much for coming home to spend your money, the young patriot curses.

You see those fliers always strewn all over the place by pro-democracy activists be it about the constitution, elections or whatever? They could be dangerous to your health after all, and this not because they are environmentally unfriendly or anything of that sort.

I picked up one the other day under a tree where a friend was having his hair trimmed by those outdoor barbers who have become ubiquitous in Bulawayo. Also there chatting with the barber was a cop I am acquainted with. The guy helpfully says to me, be careful about just picking up these papers in the street and reading them. I give a knowing laugh that he is warning me that someone might have used it as toilet paper, but the guy says, no dude I’m serious. Then he explains, and it is not about hygiene considerations:

A man obviously minding his own business picked up one of these pro-democracy fliers just in front of the Western Commonage courts in Bulawayo – there is also a notorious police station here.  As he was busy going through the flier, two men approached and asked him to tell them what Tsvangirai was saying. The man was bamboozled. “Isn’t you have read this piece of paper, now tell us what it is saying.” The poor man was like “who the fuck are you people?” the two men were like, “we are asking you politely and you are saying such rude things.”

Turns out the two were plain clothes cops, and the cop under the tree tells me, these two wanted to take this poor man in and give him a thorough beating, but they “realised” the person they were dealing with was clueless about what they were talking about – and the gravity of the offence, I might add. So they let him off with a stern warning: don’t go about reading these papers put on the streets by unknown people or else you will die for things you don’t know [that’s a direct translation from the vernacular they spoke].

And to me the cop says, “When you see these papers and want to read one, just pick it up, put it your pocket and read it in the privacy of your home”! Why? But I answered it myself – to avoid being picked up by the spooks for reading “subversive” material. I thanked the cop for the invaluable “tip” but in my mind yelled, “Idiot!” I suspected he was one of the said cops as the chap is already known in the locality as a super patriot and moron.

There you have it folks, careful what you read, you may not exactly die of a misprint, but political zealots may just not like what you read and you may die of that dislike from people with apparent dyslexia!  The mind control could be working overdrive ahead of elections, after all, haven’t some people been beaten up in the not-so-distant past for reading the Daily News and other newspapers critical of Zanu PF? Certainly the Zimbabwe we do not want.

Everyday – and I mean everyday – I read about rape cases and am eerily reminded of South Africa being touted over the years as the “rape capital of the world.” Our courts are no doubt kept busy by this violation, but there is one particular case that got me questioning the wisdom of the courts that perhaps evoked emotions and images of Sharia-like dispensation of justice as some know and prefer it.

In a story headlined “Teacher to do community service for statutory rape” [Chronicle, 11 January 2010], it was reported that a 39-year old Mberengwa teacher “was in a relationship” with a 14-year old Form Two pupil and had sex with her on several occasions. The teacher was sentenced to 105 hours of community service.

Here is how “the relationship” began: The teacher proposed love to the 14-year old, and forced the minor – the court admits this is minor despite the sentence handed out – after he confiscated her blouse while she was doing her laundry at a local borehole. To make mattes worse, the school head discovered “the affair” but took no action against the paedophile!

The teacher pleaded for leniency with the court saying he wanted to continue serving as a teacher and was his family’s breadwinner. Believe it or not, this worked with the magistrate – female for that matter!!  I’m still trying to understand why as this does not hold for mitigation for a crime that serious. Who can challenge the postulation that here is serial schoolgirl rapist in the making? Send him back to class and he is your typical recidivist, what with his daily interactions with the 14-year olds and also knowing from experience that he get nothing but a slap on the wrist for his roving eye? The law is an ass, and it is people like this magistrate who assify it!

The only “consolation” I guess is that the State has appealed against the sentence at the High Court, but it does show there are many things wrong with the application and interpretation of the law in Zimbabwe in dealing not only with rape cases but certainly across the whole criminal justice gamut.

No activists with sandwich boards demonstrating against such sentences? Who will protect these young girls from these randy savages whom they look up to in loco parentis? And obviously one has to ask the position or policy of the Ministry of Education on teachers who rape their students and tell the courts they “deserve the court’s leniency” because they love serving the country as teachers. It stands to reason that it’s not the teaching they love!