Why do I blog and blog?
We are fast approaching Zimbabwe’s 26th “celebration” of independence and I cringe at the extent to which this country has slid into a quagmire of decay. Just this morning as I drove through town I shook my head in disbelief at the filth that now characterizes our once pristine home – this putrefication a perfect metaphor for the iniquity that rules our lives in our sad nation. Dustbins overflowing, beggars abounding, their only food source the muck they can filch from the rubbish of others. Rust bucket cars, petrol gauges always poised on the red for fuel about to run out, ignore basic safety rules, traffic out of control with non-functional robots, rutted, pot-holed streets a constant threat to life as drivers swerve around the ever deepening pits in the tarmac. The faces of the people on the street tense, angry, disappointed, hopeless and, for the vast majority, HUNGRY.
Recently I gave vent to frustration in a blog When is the time right for revolution and I was not surprised at some of the comments which included one anonymous author who wrote, “Quit moaning about it and get it done, it is your country take it back from that evil man. The time for revolution is now, who will lead?”
Looking back over a year of blogging for This is Zimbabwe, six years of commitment to toppling the regime and twenty six years of wasted opportunity I ask the same question: who the hell is going to lead? Heaven knows, I have done my best to galvanise resistance in a variety of ways, often putting myself and my family at risk and I am sick of the wasted opportunities that have flitted by through the ineptitude of our so-called leaders.
I blog and blog while the self-involved, schizophrenic opposition ranted and raved at the second episode of the Movement for Dithering Change congress held in sunny, but filthy, Harare.
Why do I stay? Why do I continue to fight the good fight? Why do I blog and blog? I don’t know, but I think it is because I could never, ever do the ostrich routine – bury my head and pretend all is well in the rotten state of Zimbabwe.
March 22nd, 2006 15:15
In the diaspora of four million Zimbabweans who have abandoned the country rather than continue to live under the impoverishment caused by repressive socialist policies of Mr. Mugabe and the ZANU-PF, one will find the ‘leaders’ who are missing in Zimbabwe today. Simply put, the leadership has already left; all four millions of them.
To risk life and limb, family and fortune, in order to emigrate to a strange country and become part of a strange people takes a strong, pro-active optimism, which is why immigrant nations are sociologically so robust. What is left behind by the many millions of optimistic emigrants who have left Zimbabwe are the more passive pessimists who now dominate the culture.
Rallying negative, passive pessimists is practically a non-sequitor, as Mr. Mugabe knows well. Since the most courageous four million Zimbabweans have already left, his rule is even more secure.
The key here is the psychology of improvability versus the psychology of fallibility. The remaining Zimbabweans who want change HAVE to realize that the few positive, pro-active improvabilists left in the country are the key to that change, and nothing I’ve ever read about Zimbabwe during the past five years reveals any understanding of the importance of rallying this psychological factor.
In short, with the most intrepid four million gone, any positive change in Zimbabwe rests upon rallying the uniformed serviecs on behalf of the people. Without them, the passive negative psychology of fallibilists will accomplish nothng more than what they do now…whine.
March 22nd, 2006 21:34
Thank you Don Kirk, your comments are spot on. However, theory is easy, practical implementation the real challenge. Rallying the armed forces, student groups and the scattering of brave activists takes money, exposure, access to information and, of course, leaders who are not afraid to lead, rather than push from behind. POSA and AIPPA are laws that muzzle freedom of speech, association and movement. Young Zimbabweans have spent the past whopping six years in a regime that has mastered the art of brutal intimidation and their propoganda has effectively brain washed the masses into believing that zanu and its demonic leader are invincible.
Any practical suggestions on how to rally them would be much appreciated.
March 23rd, 2006 18:00
To inculcate the psychology of improvability into Zimbabweans, there is a host of possibilities which cost no money at all, with high vsibility, already having an established method of communicating outside of government-controlled electronic media, and which would not require ‘bravery’ from a long-intimidated people.
While writing such a formulation of “practical suggestions” is possible on a single piece of paper, such an effort should more properly come from Zimbabweans, not from outsiders…and as a free man in a free land, I am an outsider.
However, I would be happy to share some ‘practical suggestions’ with anyone who writes in to the Duoism website, in lieu of writing them in a public forum in Zimbabwe, such as this Zokanele site.
However, for public consumption, the easiest place to start is to study other under-funded, seemingly hopeless efforts at regime change that were successful: Poland jumps out as an example of incredible success at regime change with no money, staged by a beaten, repressed population, and against a totalitarian Marxist government in control over all media; sounds much like Zimbabwe today, frankly.
Yet despite impossible odds, the Poles prevailed. Study how they did this, and a few of their tactics will become ‘practical suggestions’ for Zimbabwe. Also, study how the Berlin Wall fell, ‘without firing a shot.’ And how did Gandhi, in an impoverished largely-illiterate nation, successfully eject the greatest and richest imperial power of the time?
Study the foreign successes. Note what worked. Adapt foreign successes for a Zimabwean populace. Stop whining about ‘change,’ if by change one is simply arguing for more socialism, which seems to be the MDC’s principal method. WHY in the world would a destitute people want a philosophy which results in more destitution?
Adopt the high moral ground…and STAY there! Be positive and pro-active, two psychological elements which socialism utterly lacks. And by all means, realize that EVERY successful revolution in human history was mounted by a small minority of the population. The key to regime change is not numbers of suporters; it is dedication, will, and an idea–grounded upon a distinct philosophy–which is so attractive that it overwhelms the negative reactionary philosophy of the existing repressive government.
Got a positive, anabolic philosophy, Zimbabwe, one that puts you on the high moral ground? Do you, after four millions of your best people have left? There is a philosophy of anabolic change (ancient Heraclitus not withstanding), but it is not called, ‘change.’
I’d welcome any Zimbabweans to write back.
‘Be free.’
March 26th, 2006 07:23
To: Still Here and Don
I spent two years in the early 1990’s teaching at UZ. I now live in New York. How can I help?
Sincerely,
Martin
April 3rd, 2006 23:51
This is Outrageous
Zimbabwe has a thoroughly corrupt government that has brought the once prosperous nation to ruin by systematically destroying the economy while engaging in fraudulent elections, encouraging campaigns of intimidation and murder, eliminating the free pre…