HomeOld_PostsGloves off all-round for 2018...we should never be blind to the truth

Gloves off all-round for 2018…we should never be blind to the truth

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A few weeks ago this paper published an article titled ‘Gloves off for 2018’.
This article detailed the activities of regime change sponsors through the arts.
The Patriot was right, but it goes beyond the arts; it is everywhere, it is gloves off all-round.
Soon after reading this article, I was musing about its implications and it all began to come together — the network so carefully knitted together to prove the one big lie that ‘Zimbabwe does not work.’
They say ‘Zimbabwe haiite,’ ‘Zimbabwe inenharo,’ or more commonly, ‘Ndiyo Zimbabwe yacho,’ is associated with failure.
It is said, ‘Zimbabwe is not navigable.’
A man sat next to me. I was travelling from Bulawayo to Harare on one of the luxury coaches.
It was the end of July.
Soon after greeting me politely, things began to fall apart for this gentleman.
The co-driver of the coach came up and started making some announcements; duration of the journey, stop-overs and so on.
He did not use a microphone, neither did he raise his voice, he just mumbled through.
My neighbour was upset: “But how can he just mumble, no-one can hear him?”
I too was not impressed and I said: “Perhaps he does not want anyone to hear him.”
But my neighbour was not appeased and he went on: “These days no-one does anything properly. What would it have cost him to make a proper announcement. There he is, just seated, doing nothing and yet he could not even spare a few moments to make a proper announcement, but he still expects to be paid and he is paid.”
I avoided fuelling the fire.
“You see,” he went on: “I came from Botswana yesterday; we got to the border, we off loaded all our luggage, packages as instructed by the customs official. After we had done so, the customs official just sat there doing nothing, the border post was not busy. She ignored us for about 45 minutes, doing absolutely nothing and then she took the customs declaration forms and just stamped them through, without going through the luggage at all. She did not even glance at the contents of the forms, never read them, just stamped them.”
He could not believe that she had made them off load the luggage for no purpose at all.
The man was so hurt, he could not believe this kind of treatment. “Zvinoshunguradza chaizvo,” he sighed.
I could not say much, I was appalled.
As if it was not enough, our coach overtook another bus, crossing the double-line a few metres before the Gweru Toll Gate. He was speeding, he must have been going at least 100km/h.
“And what are we supposed to be killed for?” my neighbour asked in consternation.
We could have crushed into the toll gate, we could have been injured or killed — and for what?
So it is gloves off I mused, this was no kombi, mushikashika or ‘chicken bus’ but a luxury coach. They can no longer be left out of the race. They too have to deliver their punches on the edifice called Zimbabwe or they are struck off the payroll.
After Kwekwe, we met another coach of the same company, coming from Harare.
They exchanged drivers, but the ‘mumbling’ driver remained.
As the new driver took the steering wheel, our mumbling driver said to him:
“We are behind time so you better speed up, don’t worry about the police, they are my friends”.
This time he was not mumbling we could hear him all across the bus.
The new driver remained cautious, but the ‘old’ one insisted: “Pick up speed, the police are my friends, I have got money to give them.”
At this point my neighbour was too upset to say anything — he just sat dejected.
I was grateful for his silence for I too was not feeling ‘normal’.
To literally announce, so clearly for all of us to hear that he has money for the purpose of bribing the police was an indictment on both the ZRP and the coach company, and he was doing it so brazenly.
He was announcing that there is no law in this country — lawlessness is the norm.
From then on, the new driver threw caution to the winds.
He flew past any vehicle that dared to ‘challenge’ him. He overtook any ‘chicken bus’ that dared cross his path.
We got to Harare on time, 1:30 pm sharp.
His claim was not tested, for there were no roadblocks after Kwekwe that day.
Later, I stopped by the coach company’s offices in Harare and asked them whether they supply their drivers with money to bribe the police.
The manager responded that they don’t and asked me to write them an e-mail on the matter.
This is what happens.
The President does not issue proclamations to ‘harass people wherever you find them’ but in the end everything that does not work is blamed on him.
But in actual fact there is a conspiracy to make life impossible for citizens to prepare fertile ground for regime change machinations.
You are never to feel at peace about anything especially here in Harare.
Wherever you are, whatever service you seek you are never to be made to feel good about yourself or about being Zimbabwean.
You are taunted, harassed, humiliated.
You need to have a strong sense of who you are to retain your sanguinity.
Talking about this bank of mine which is so inhospitable, it is like no-one ever took public relations classes.
Recently I was in Kwekwe and I did not encounter any problems withdrawing my money.
For three days, consecutively in one week I would present my card, get my money, no hassles, no being shouted at, no questions, it was just normal.
Every day, for more than a week, I would pass by this bank and people would be in long peaceful queues, withdrawing their money, it was unbelievable.
It was just normal to wake up to go to the bank and get your money.
But here in Harare, it is a different story.
Here, it is almost certain you will never get any money.
Similarly, I never got the same headaches when I was in Bulawayo, I got my money without being harassed and tormented, the treatment of customers was civilised — unlike in the capital city.
So much peace and tranquility prevailed in this Bulawayo branch of my bank.
Harare is not Zimbabwe, but it makes enough noise to drown every other sane voices across the nation.
We should never be blind to the truth that Harare is not Zimbabwe and it does not represent Zimbabwe.
Perhaps as the hub of regime change machinations, it is being turned into the standard that nothing works in Zimbabwe, that the country has failed.
It is gloves off all-round for 2018!

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