Blogging for Sky News - our Thursday entry
Sokwanele was invited to blog for Sky News this week on The Insider Blog. The Sky audience is much wider and far more diverse than ours, so we encourage you to visit The Insider Blog and please participate in the comments and discussion being generated there.
Our Thursday entry for ‘The Insider Blog’
Zimbabweans are in the dark and powerless, and I mean that literally: we often have no power and the lights are often out.
Last year we’d have a power cut about once a week depending where you lived, and we had a vague idea when they’d be coming.
‘Load shedding’ as it is called, was staggered across different areas on a more or less regular basis. If Tuesday was the night the lights went out for two or three hours, you could plan ahead and cook in advance.
This year the power cuts come with no warning and several times a week.
I rent a two-roomed cottage on a larger property. I have candleholders and matches in all the rooms, including the toilet. When the cut comes I walk around lighting candles.
The quality of the candles we get in Zimbabwe is appalling. Cheap Chinese imports that foam and froth rather than smoothly melt down like our Zimbabwe-made candles used to do.
The matches are just as bad; they break off and spit out a spark rather than strike and burn. It can take ten matches to light one candle.
As well as lighting the candles, I also (and this is very important) go around switching off all the lights at the wall, and I disconnect my TV from the wall. There is nothing worse than being woken up in the middle of the night by a sudden blaze of light when the power comes back on!
The only thing worse is when you find your TV no longer works because a power surge blew out its delicate electrics.
My mother has stopped going to her Bible Studies group because the power cuts are unpredictable. The church cannot afford to pay for candles.
She said that at her last meeting, when they were forced to stop reading their Bibles, her group sat and talked in the dark, mostly about how much we needed our government to be changed so solutions could be found.
When I heard that, I thought to myself that that was a true sign that God was on the side of the people! I have started to pray for more power cuts at meetings so people sit and talk together about the need for change.
When the electricity goes off during the night there is a sense of stillness and total silence that is hard to explain.
I am not a brave person during power cuts, so rather than enjoying the silence my ears strain for the sounds of burglars who I am convinced like to use the blackout to creep about undetected!
Last year my ears would be trying to hear thuds and clinks of burglar tools in between the loud clatter of someone’s petrol generator a few blocks down. But I’ve not been hearing as much of the generator recently - I suspect the price and scarcity of petrol has put an end to that solution.
Power cuts are a supermarkets’ worst nightmare. The shop where I buy my groceries stopped stocking certain kinds of groceries a long time ago. Ice cream - a luxury I couldn’t afford anyway - was the first to go. Essentials like milk are a bit risky. Sometimes the shop leaves them in the fridge and just waits for it to re-chill when the fridge comes on.
I buy it and often don’t know that it’s sour until I get home. Forget about refunds in this economy; besides, how do you prove it was the power cut in the shop fridge that made it go sour rather than a power cut affecting your fridge?
We have had three power cuts so far this week. My aunt’s son works at ZESA (Zimbabwe Electricity Supply Authority) and he told me yesterday that South Africa have not supplied electricity to Zimbabwe for three weeks now.
He said we used to get about 40% of our electricity from them, but because Zimbabwe can no longer pay its bills and we owe them a lot of money, they have started to switch us off. Is this about money or is it maybe ‘quiet diplomacy’ in action?
My ‘freezer’ is a tiny compartment over my very old fridge that has managed to keep going through it all. If the power cut is longer than a few hours, and it often is, I’m mopping water off the floor. Any longer than that and the meat defrosts and starts to smell funny, especially during the hot months. So I don’t store meat and perishables anymore; I can’t afford to throw things away.
I was moaning about this at the butchery where I occasionally buy meat. The person serving me just laughed and pointed to their large freezers: only one out of the three they had was working. Two had ‘blown out’ due to power surges and they can’t get spare parts to repair them. The third stocked frozen chickens and cuts of meat packed in plastic. “How do you think we feel when all that goes off?” he said. He has a point.
March 30th, 2007 12:35
Amen Hope mhlobo wami - God works in mysterious ways and you are right to thank the power failure as it enables your mama’s bible reading group to talk about change. I used to love bible classes - I moved on from them and implimented what the lessons in the bible teach me - i.e. Prayer - Faith - Love. Loving your enemy just as you love your friends. Its true what you say as well about talking - Jesus was sent to preach the good news to the poor - how the kingdom of God is near us - in us - with us. Its also true that where two or more are gathered in His name - God is there.
Keep the good work going - I am praying with you. UNkulunkulu wami akehlulwa lutho - Victory is His just as the war against Mugabe is His. He just needs soldiers like you. In God we are one.