By Dr Tafataona Mahoso

“Na Jehovha wakati kuna Mosi, ndiunganidzire makumi manomwe evasharuka (elders) vaIsraeri avo vounoziva kuti vari vakuru vevanhu, vane nduna padera pavo; uvaunze kutende romusangano, kuti vamire (to take a stand) newe.
“Neni ndinozodzaka ndirekete apo.
“Ndinozotora mweya uri kwauri, ndiudurure padera pavo.
“Navo vanozotakura mutoro (mutwaro) wevanhu pamwepo newe, kuti usachazotwara wega. – (Zvierengo 11: 16:17)
“Mosi na Aaroni vakaenda vakaunganidza vasharuka vese va Israeri. “Aaroni wakaereketa mazwi eshe akaereketa Jehovha kuna Mosi.
“Navanhu vakatenda.” – (Ekisedusi 4: 29-31)

BY now, 34 years after independence, every institution of higher learning should be a vibrant centre for the grooming and training of African leaders for all sectors of society and the economy.
That this is not yet the case can be demonstrated by the media controversy over the fact that Vice-President Joice Mujuru and First Lady Amai Grace Mugabe recently graduated from the University of Zimbabwe with PhDs.
If anything, this media frenzy proves that as Africans we have not yet developed a national practice and policy deliberately linking education, training and leadership. Every year tens of thousands of Zimbabweans graduate from our institutions of higher learning and each year hundreds of lecturers and professors are appointed and promoted within the same institutions.
If the press and the public had paid the same meticulous attention to them and asked even half the questions about them as they have so far asked about Vice-President Mujuru and First Lady Amai Grace Mugabe, Zimbabwe by now would be a superpower.
Unfortunately they have not done so, and this selective attention reveals serious and disturbing realities about our concept of leadership and our attitudes toward education, training, power, succession and leadership:
What is bizarre about the media frenzy is that it is fuelled by speculation over immediate political succession battles.
The method most familiar to the so-called educated elite is the Eurocentric, linear method of succession which is an adversarial, individualistic, event-based fight for positions, for posts and for a route to the fastest ladder for self-enrichment.
But Madzimbahwe cannot sustain their revolution by borrowing this linear and Eurocentric method of succession.
It exposes the revolution to imperialist onslaught or rigging as happened in Kenya in 2007-2008; and as almost happened in Venezuela in 2013.
What is at stake in Zimbabwe is not so much the ascent of individuals to positions and posts.
The occupation of positions and posts should be secondary and should be the automatic result of the true succession of generations (nhaka yemibariranwa ya Murenga, Chaminuka, Nehanda, Kaguvi, Lobengula, Chingaira, Chitepo, Nkomo, Mugabe.)
For the first time since independence, the majority of Madzimbahwe are under 33 years of age and, at that age they are older than those youths were who volunteered to join the Second Chimurenga and to liberate Zimbabwe from Rhodesia in the 1970s.
Since only a few of those born-frees can occupy positions and posts of top leadership in the Eurocentric sense, it is important to stress the African relational approach to leadership.
Contrary to the Eurocentric horse-race to which non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and counter-revolutionary parties wish to subject us, what is really at stake is the succession of generations which is collective, material, generational, ideological, moral and continual.
The collective means that President Robert Mugabe emerged as a leader only when and because a whole generation had been inaugurated and had succeeded the generation of Nehanda, Kaguvi, Mapondera, Chingaira and Lobengula.
The material part means that the generation of Chitepo and Mugabe succeeded by remaining focused on the objective of Zimbabwe neupfumi hwayo hwose which is also stated so clearly in the Book of Proverbs which says, “Mubereki akangwara anogadzirira vana vevana vake nhaka yakakwana.”
It is not the International Monetary Fund (IMF) or World Bank which is going to prepare and preserve that inheritance of generations.
The ideological and moral aspect is what Kenias Mafukidze referred to as the need for indigenous Zimbabwean software.
This is where Mafukidze said we have a shortfall, a moral deficit.
In the Chronicles verse cited at the start of this instalment God outlined the programme for the succession of the generations of Moses by introducing a multiplier from one to seventy who were already heads of their class or constituencies.
“Ndinozotora mweya uri kwauri
Ndiudurure padera pavo
Navo vanozoutakura mutoro
(mutwaro) wevanhu pamwepo
Newe, kuti usachazotakura wega”
If we transfer this plan to the drama of Zimbabwe which we have witnessed since the beginning of the African land revolution here in the 1990s, we can translate the same passage thus:
“Ndinozowandudza mweya
(weshungu dzekutora
nekuchengetedza nhaka yemadzitateguru vako)
uri kwauri, ndiudurure
pakati pevana vewakazvara murusunumguko. Navo vanozotakura mutoro (mutwaro) wevanhu pamwepo newe, kuita kuti usachazotwara wega.”
This is not just a call for the rise of a new generation of revolutionaries.
This is a call to new generations to be even more revolutionary than those they are succeeding, precisely because there are more of them, multiplied from one to seventy, but also because the enemy has been defeated.
The new generation has to concentrate on reconstruction.
“Na Jehovah unozoita kuti vavengi venyu vamumukire nokumurwisa, vechipinda ngenzira imwe chete;
“Asi Jehovah unoita kuti kana vomutiza vavengi venyu, vachapararira nenzira nomwe.
“Na Jehovah uchamuzarurira pfuma yake; amupe mvura yenyika yenyu ngenguva yayo; nokuropafadza mabasa ose amavoko enyu;
“Imi muchapa marudzi mazhinji zvikwereti, asi imi hamuzotori zvikwereti.
“Jehovah uchakuitai misoro yeutungamiri; hamungaite miswe kwete.” – (Deuteronomy 28: verses 3-13)

This commandment rules out individual ambitions; it also rules out the IMF and World Bank from taking leadership of our affairs and our economy.
But it should also be stressed that the new generations of Moses are being called upon to carry forward the people’s revolution together with Moses.
The generation which is fit to carry forward Zimbabwe’s Third Chimurenga must do so under Mugabe’s apprenticeship and not via illegal regime change.
“Navo vanozotakura mutwaro wevanhu pamwepo newe,
kuita kuti usachazotwara wega.”

(To be continued)