It’s now or never
Now seems to be the word of the moment. Kubatana subscriber, Sophie Zvapera, wrote to Kubatana sharing a short story about her sister and a new year resolution . . .
I phoned my sister’s seventeen-year-old daughter to wish her a merry christmas and a prosperous new year since they were visiting the rural areas and I was not going to be able to talk to her till after new year. She was excited to go and see her nana and I asked her whether she had already made her new year resolution. I wish I had not asked! She said all she wanted was to study hard and pass her A levels this year and find herself a place in some university somewhere outside Zimbabwe where she can do her studies.
Then I cried!
I cried because my sister’s daughter was going to this mission boarding school and at the end of last year she was sent back home before schools closed because there were no teachers, no food, the school fees that we were paying in zim dollars were not even enough to buy a loaf of bread. Therefore there was nothing that the school could do except to send all the students back. I started thinking of all the other children who have the same resolution as my sister’s daughter and who cannot go to school as the term starts because they cannot afford to pay private college fees in foreign currency. Here is a whole generation whose hopes and aspirations have been shattered by a group of Mugabe’s thugs. They are thugs because they have stolen our children’s future yet they claim to be governing or whatever they call it because the people voted them into office. Which people I ask? How many of all these school and tertiary going students’ future have these politicians quashed, trampled upon and thrown into the dust bin all for the sake of political power? What happened to the concept of investing in the youth for they are tomorrow’s future leaders? What legacy are we leaving for our children?
So while I am still wiping my tears I will put my request to the political leaders for the new year. This political bickering, grandstanding and media statements will not bring back the lost years for our children neither will it arrest or correct all the things that are wrong in this country. So for the sake of Zimbabwe please put people’s interests first and foremost and rescue the global political agreement from wherever it is and come up with a government that will take the country forward. This does not require Monthlante, SADC, AU, UN, Britain or America just us Zimbabweans can do it if there is the political will to do so. How long can we continue to have all these abductions, murders, cholera, starvation, HIV/AIDS and all the deaths before all you politicians say the people have suffered enough?
It is now or never.