Tag: Southern Africa

Dear Zanu-PF, here’s my application for one of those 2.2 million jobs you promised

Dear post-election Zanu-PF (aka Government of Zimbabwe)

RE: APPLICATION FOR ONE OF 2.2 MILLION JOBS

With reference to your election manifesto, which excited even the MDC-T to splitting point and made me put a cross next to your name on the ballot paper, I hereby apply, publicly, for any one of the 2.2 million jobs you promised in Zim Asset. In case you have forgotten, this is that economic blueprint you came up with in October 2013, which is meant to “to provide an enabling environment for sustainable economic empowerment and social transformation to the people of Zimbabwe”.

July 31 marked exactly one year since I cast my first official ballot in the country’s elections, ending previous attempts at maintaining my political virginity. Now, there is some background I should give you. I do not bet or play the lotto because everything I put my bet on seems to lose. Even when I want my football team to win, I don’t watch the match. That is why I have not been voting all these years. I hated to see what I love losing. But last year, for the first time, I took the risk – and the jinx was broken! You won the election. However, looking back on my country, I’m concerned about whether the jinx was really broken. Could it be that in you winning massively, Zimbabwe actually lost quite a lot?

Forgive my rambling. With so many of my job applications gone unanswered, I do not know if it was my cover letter that failed me, or the comma that was missing from my CV, or if it’s just that none of the 2.2 million jobs you promised are on the market yet. But the issue at stake here is that I am looking for a job, and urgently so, because I am 31 and unmarried and cannot afford to be unemployed. One may ask why I am applying to you. Most of the companies I approached are either already closing down or downsizing staff, and employing me is an unrealistic dream for them. But I know you have 2.2 million jobs that you promised me in 2013, and I have come to claim at least one.

I am one of those “resources that gives Zimbabwe a comparative advantage over regional and other international countries is its economic complexity that includes the strong human resource base, which is an outcome of a deliberate educational policy instituted by the ZANU-PF Government at Independence in 1980.” Unfortunately, I have been trying to make myself a useful resource with little success, hence I’m approaching you so that you can employ me.

I hold a qualification in tourism and hospitality, among other numerous qualifications, and should be glad that tourism is one of your key target economic areas with huge potential. It’s just that I have not seen what you referred to in Zim Asset as “Quick Wins” or “rapid results yielded “in the shortest possible time frame (October 2013 – December 2015)”. Obviously I blame this on the fact that no initiatives have been implemented or “blitz interventions” made since I voted for you. Damn the sanctions, of course. Oh, I had forgotten that there are also sanctions-busting strategies. So damn the inaction. What have you been doing this whole past year?

Secondly, survival has taught me all these other vital skills and given me a great deal of experience, which will account for any gap periods in my CV. Like most others, I am now a serial entrepreneur, sometimes vendor, marketer, social media enthusiast, administrator, occasional job-hunter and writer. So, do not get me into the unemployed-experience-unemployed conundrum. I don’t deserve it, neither do millions other Zimbabweans who have faced desperate situations, including this economy, and lived through it.

And if there are any other things that you deem important which I do not have, such as a driver’s licence and a passport, please remember that I might not have been able to afford the $200+ required to bribe driving inspectors, or had the time to wait in unending queues at the Registrar General’s offices.

And lastly, if it turns out that all the other vacancies have already been filled by the numerous educated but unemployed youths roaming the streets – most of whom are thinking of leaving the country – I would like to become one of the officials in the Office of the President and Cabinet who will “play a leading and co-ordinating role as overseer of the implementation process to ensure attainment of set targets of the Plan.”

At least I know that vacancies still exist in this section of Zim Asset because, with nothing happening, my only guess is that no one is co-ordinating the implementation process of this brilliant document. My claim to employment in this section is backed by my qualification in monitoring and evaluation, and validated testimonies that I am discreet, patriotic and intelligent enough to meet your requirements.

Please note:

  1. Do not take this a joke; I really need a job and so do millions others. And the earlier you make those “blitz interventions” for “Quick Wins”, the better it is for all of us. December 2015 is not far away.
  2. At this point don’t refer me to non-working youth funds. I have tried those before. All I need is a job. A piece of land would be a welcome alternative though.
  3. Please ensure that I get a job in haste before South Africa and its post-election ANC deport the more than 3 million jobless Zimbabweans there back home.
  4. I can attend interviews as fast as the kombi you want to banish without an alternative can take me to the venue.

Regards (because we are compatriots and I deserve better from you),
Lawrence Hoba

 

Lawrence Hoba is an entrepreneur, author and passive politician.  His short stories and poetry have appeared in The Gonjon Pin and Other Stories, Writing Lives, Laughing Now, Warwick Review and Writing Now.  His anthology, The Trek and Other Stories (2009), was nominated for the NAMA in 2010 and went on to win the ZBPA award for Best Literature in English. It tackles the highs and lows of Zimbabwe’s land reform. Connect with him on Twitter: @lawhoba

Malawi’s prized chambo fish faces extinction

In the decade that fisherman Edward Njeleza has been trawling the deep, clear waters of Lake Malawi in Africa’s Great Rift Valley, he has seen his once abundant catch shrink by 90 percent.

Now he spends most days on the shore searching for pods and a special type of grass he uses to make necklaces, key rings and bracelets to supplement his income.

In the past, he and his nine fishing mates would on average catch roughly 300 kilograms (650 pounds) of fish a day, but that haul has dropped to no more than 25 kilograms, he told AFP.

“We go fishing but never come back with much,” said Njeleza, waiting by the lake with a bag full of homemade jewellery slung over his shoulder.

“And we don’t catch big fish.”

Malawian fishermen pulling up fish in their nets on the shores of Lake Malawi. (Pic: AFP)
Malawian fishermen pulling up fish in their nets on the shores of Lake Malawi. (Pic: AFP)

Lake Malawi, one of the deepest in the world, is estimated to have the largest concentration of freshwater fish species – up to 1 000, according to the UN Scientific and Cultural Organisation (Unesco).

And a local favourite, the Oreochromis lidole or “chambo” as it is known in this landlocked southeast Africa state where it is a vital source of protein for millions of poor, is among the hardest hit.

In its last study on chambo, the International Union for the Conservation of Nature estimated in 2004 that the population had declined 70 percent over the previous 10 years, William Darwall, head of the IUCN’s freshwater biodiversity unit, told AFP.

Overfishing is the main cause, and scientists blame both a lack of government muscle to enforce seasonal fishing bans as well as environmental degradation.

“The primary reasons why the fish stocks, specifically chambo, are going down is overfishing, (and) degradation issues because of factors related to the effects of climate change,” said William Chadza, director of the Centre for Environmental Policy and Advocacy in Blantyre, the country’s finance and commerce hub.

Climate change is said to have affected rainfall patterns and caused a drop in the lake’s water levels, also hit by the effects of deforestation on tributaries feeding the lake.

‘Going towards a disaster’
In Makawa fishing village near Mangochi town in the country’s southeast, Njeleza has no choice but to diversify.

Apart from making jewellery, he hopes to bait the odd tourist visiting the lake into a ride in his blue and white boat, which he has named Wanangachi, meaning “What is the problem with us?”

At night he returns to fishing, but stays much longer than in previous years.

“We used to spend just about two hours out on the lake and come back with a boatload of fish – now we need about 12 hours, and bring back less than before,” Njeleza said.

Some officials fear chambo could face extinction in Lake Malawi.

“It’s a very big issue, and I think if we don’t do something … we could be in a dire state shortly,” Chadza told AFP.

But rangers say the fight to save the fish is a losing battle.

“We are not winning,” said Gervaz Thamala, chief of the Wildlife and Environmental Society of Malawi.

Laws to protect the chambo exist, but “the major problem which we have is governance,” Thamala said.

“It seems we are going towards a disaster, which is quite critical,” he warned. “Extinction is also a possibility because we have not fully developed the aquaculture sector, which could act as a buffer.”

Back at the lake, Dogo Morris leads a team of 10 fishermen pulling in their nets, cast six hours earlier, but their haul is only about 10 kilograms of fingerlings.

“I have nothing to sell today,” he tells more than a dozen would-be customers, who walk away dejectedly clutching their empty bowls.

Fishmonger Raymond Johnson, who supplies hotels and restaurants in Blantyre, Malawi’s largest city, has waited three days to purchase chambo, which he buys in bulk – hundreds of kilograms per trip to the lake.

“My business is not doing well. It has gone down by 40 to 45 percent,” said Johnson.

Back in Blantyre, restaurant owners share his despair, saying diners complain that the fish on their plates are getting smaller all the time.

Susan Njanji for AFP

Dear President Zuma

An open letter to South African President Jacob Zuma from a young citizen.

Jacob Zuma (Pic: Gallo)

Dear Mr President

I hope you are well today and thank you for taking the time to read my letter (just practising). I can only imagine how busy you are. It’s the big day, election day. I have been waiting for this day for so long. You see, I love politics and I cannot express enough in words or actions how honoured I feel to cast my vote. It is my second time voting, but it feels like my first.

As a country, we need to just breathe and be grateful. Twenty years of democracy is an achievement, don’t you think? Yes, we have a long way to go but let’s think about what we have now that we didn’t have 20 years ago. I know some people give you a hard time and say that nothing has changed, but I want to believe that deep down in their hearts they are telling a different story.

But Mr President, I write this letter with a broken heart and a deep frustration. I look around and see young people graduating, but the minute they get off that stage they become a statistic that contributes to the unemployment figure in this country. Luckily South Africa’s unemployment rate eased to 24.1% in the fourth quarter of last year from a revised 24.5% in the third. According to Stats SA, the number of jobs had increased by 141 000 in the quarter, largely because of an increase of 123 000 jobs in the informal sector and 64 000 jobs in the formal sector. Quite an achievement, Mr President. But I must say things feel like they are becoming unbearable.

The cost of living has become too high. I recently discovered that there are people out there who earn a salary of R2 500. I am not referring to internships here, I am talking about people who have worked for years in a particular company. I was once that person but I had the advantage of living at home, therefore I did struggle much to survive.

The second thing that breaks my heart is the allegation of you spending more than R200-million on your private property. Really? R200-million, Mr President? No disrespect towards you or your family, but if this is true, did you really need that much to build and upgrade your own property? Whatever your reasons were, in the process of planning did you think about those who don’t live life but are forced to survive because of extenuating circumstances? I don’t want to believe that you upgraded Nkandla without considering the service delivery that still needs to be attended to more than ever. RDP houses still have to be built and the education system is shocking, from textbooks to children still being taught under trees. Yes, things have changed, but there is still more to be done.

This country is angry, Sir. Young people have a growing anger in them and I fear for the future. I feel as though one day our people will release their anger and it won’t be pleasant. The Egyptian people in 2012 came together, walked down the streets and voiced their concerns. Violence erupted and suddenly it was the people who were fighting back. They overthrew the government, living by the rule that says the people shall govern. I don’t want that to happen to us, I don’t want my people to resort to violence to be taken seriously by those we thought could rule this country better. If that happens, innocent people will be hurt and we won’t be moving forward as a country.

Mr President, you talk a lot but let’s try something new for a change. Listen to your people, we did put you in the position that you are in. We listened to you when you were campaigning for our votes and you became the president of South Africa. Take a minute of every day of your life and listen to the cries of the people. We don’t feel politically cheated by your actions, but I for one feel socially and emotionally cheated. I trusted you but I feel as though you have broken my trust. People are painting you as a selfish leader and no matter how hard I try to defend you and convince myself that’s not true, my heart breaks.

I hope these allegations about you are wrong because if they are true, I fear voting for the ANC because you will win and be the president again. Will you spend R200-million for your personal use again? Can you promise me that? I don’t want to vote for another political party other than the ANC but I fear, I fear that you will remain as the president and you will continue not to listen to my people.

My only plea to you is that if the ANC wins the election, please step down and give someone else the opportunity to rule this country. You have done well, Mr President, but I feel your time is up.

Kind regards,

Sindiswa Nene

This article is published in partnership with inkulufreeheid.org – a non-partisan, youth-led organisation that innovates engagement and ignites action on democratic, social and economic issues in South Africa with the aim of advancing the implementation of solutions to those issues.

Zimbabwe learns to laugh at itself – but just how much?

Zimbabwe’s largest arts event, the Harare International Festival of the Arts (Hifa), came to a controversial end last night when popular South African Afro-fusion band, Freshlyground, was prevented from performing its closing show. With the highest priced ticket – US$25 – of all the performances at this year’s Hifa, the band was set to bring to an end the 15th edition of the festival, held under the theme ‘Switch On’.

Fielding questions from Zimbabweans via Twitter late last night, the band stated that upon arrival at Harare International Airport yesterday, they were immediately ordered to leave the country with no explanation offered.

The only plausible reason for this, and their inability to gain accreditation to perform, is the 2010 release of their song Chicken To Change. The music video features President Robert Mugabe as a latex puppet in a re-enactment of his 1980 Independence speech. The video incorporates political characters derived from the satirical South African show, ZA News, including Jacob Zuma, Helen Zille, Zwelinzima Vavi, Desmond Tutu and Nelson Mandela. Towards the end of the video, Mugabe’s caricature turns into a chicken, underscoring the song’s message that the leader has lost his standing and respectability due to an inability to change with the times.

In the same year as the song’s release, Freshlyground had their working visas to Zimbabwe revoked just before a scheduled performance in Harare. Before the release of Radio Africa, the album which features Chicken To Change, the band had previously played in Zimbabwe at the 2009 National Arts Merit Awards (NAMA) ceremony and at Hifa in 2004.

Mixed emotions have been expressed by Zimbabweans via social media about the cancellation with some feeling that state censors have acted irrationally to curtail freedom of artistic expression, while others feel that the festival organisers should not have publicised the band’s appearance if accreditation for the performance was not guaranteed. Some feel that the group should not have expected entry into the country again after releasing their controversial 2010 song.

Not the only controversy at this year’s festival, the play Lovers in Time came under intense scrutiny – from both the state and the public –  for its reworking of the historical narrative of the 1800s anti-colonial figures, Mbuya Nehanda and Sekuru Kaguvi, who are transported into contemporary post-colonial Zimbabwe wherein they switch sex and race and experience Zimbabwe in different bodies.  Its last showing yesterday was delayed by almost 30 minutes and featured police presence and audience protest.

Stand-up comedy
Amid the web of controversy, stand-up comedians seems to somehow have managed to get away with it at this year’s festival.

Two of the comedy shows on offer, 75% (comprising three local comedians, Comrade Fatso, Michael Kudakwashe and Clive Chigubu) and Carl Joshua Ncube’s one-man act held audiences in braces of laughter with jokes about the adventures and misadventures of Zimbabwean life.

Attracting a racially mixed audience at the Reps Theatre auditorium – a venue of historical privilege which is still patronised by a largely white audience in between Hifa performances – the performers showed a consciousness and ease about discussing race. In one of his skits, Kudakwashe joked that while the black people in the audience may have had reservations about coming to the show, they couldn’t resist it when they heard it was comedy (as opposed to high art). Also, Comrade Fatso took to unpacking the different colloquialisms used among Zimbabweans – black, white, Indian and coloured – to show their concurrent hilarity and inaccessibility to those outside each racial grouping.

While it might seem risqué for a white performer in Comrade Fatso (real name Samm Monro) to make fun of race, he is of the long tradition of satire and political commentary in Zimbabwe. Starting out about a decade ago as a dreadlocked spoken word artist, his moniker is a deliberate play on the socialist tradition of comradeship among Zanu-PF’s leadership, while Fatso is a common corruption of the Shona name, Farai, which Monro has adopted. Monro is also co-anchor of Zimbabwe’s satirical comedic news show, Zambezi News, which provides commentary on politics and the state in Zimbabwe.

Nevertheless, it was Carl Joshua Ncube who raised the stakes higher in his one-man act. Everything came under humorous attack including the weakened MDC party, the state broadcaster’s idolisation of Mugabe and tribal differences among Zimbabweans, which all elicited howling laughter.

Carl Joshua Ncube. (Pic: Fungai Machirori)
Carl Joshua Ncube. (Pic: Fungai Machirori)

“Initially, political comedy had to be ambiguous because people always felt that if you made fun of Mugabe you were MDC, and if you made fun of Tsvangirai, you were Zanu-PF,” he states.

Joking about religion
When Ncube turns his humour to religion, however, the contrast is striking. Stifled audience response is offered as he makes a sexual joke veiled as a prayer and when he references the popular Pentecostal prophet, Emmanuel Makandiwa, who has promised to walk on water.

“My biggest challenge right now is religious leaders,” says Ncube adding that he has received death threats from church leaders and congregants of different churches and denominations he makes jokes about.

Ncube identifies as a Christian.

“Right now, I am deliberately holding back a lot of content because I need to get to a point where I am not seen as the anti-Christ,” he adds.

Ncube, who has steadily become a household name in Zimbabwean comedy, sees increasing acceptance of his more political content as a natural progression of political discourse in Zimbabwe; something which is not apparent in religious discussions.

Zimbabwe-born Takunda Bimha, founding director of the South-Africa based comedy agency, Podium The Comedy Merchants, concurs.

“Compared to South Africa, it’s been a lot more difficult to get a comedy industry going in Zimbabwe given the many issues the country is going through and the obvious sensitivities around politics and religion,” he observes.

Bimha’s agency has managed big South African names in comedy including Trevor Noah and currently boasts names like Kagiso Lediga and Loyiso Gola.

“Comedy comes from pain and a place where you need to say something,” Bimha adds. “And given Zimbabwe’s circumstance, this makes for great content.”

While this year’s local Hifa comedy performances have shown an increasing ease among Zimbabweans to laugh at themselves, they also underscore that with the return to one-party rule and the seeming demise of the MDC, religion is increasingly gaining purchase as the new and untouchable political paradigm in Zimbabwe.

At the same time, it is also clear that Zimbabwe’s political history remains off limits to humorous representation and artistic re-interpretation.

Zimbabwe can laugh … just not at everything.

Fungai Machirori is a blogger, editor, poet and researcher. She runs Zimbabwe’s first web-based platform for womenHer Zimbabweand is an advocate for using social media for consciousness-building among Zimbabweans. Connect with her on Twitter

Angola’s hidden crisis

What exactly constitutes development for a post-conflict African country? Is it the built environment or investment in human capital?

That’s a question I think about daily here in Luanda, Angola’s rapidly changing capital. On paper, Angola is a success story and a frequently cited example in the ‘Africa Rising’ narrative. It has enjoyed double-digit economic growth during the last decade, fueled by its plentiful crude oil deposits, and is experiencing a construction boom. It’s even attracting big-name luxury brands, such as Porsche, Gucci, Prada and Armani.

Luanda’s skyline is dotted with construction cranes and our nascent middle class is expanding. But it isn’t just (some) Angolans benefiting from the boom. Perhaps most striking of all, Angola has become a sort of El Dorado for the Portuguese, Angola’s old colonial power. In Angola, the Portuguese are finding much better livelihoods here than in Europe, where they’re one of the most prominent victims of the continent’s financial slowdown.

Luanda cityscape at dusk. (Reuters)
Luanda’s cityscape at dusk. (Reuters)

But for all the investment in the built environment, investment in human capital is severely lacking. I’d even venture to say it’s Angola’s hidden crisis. Speak to anyone in any industry and they’ll tell you about the great difficulty they have in hiring competent Angolans, let alone highly skilled ones. And the skills we’re talking about are as basic as properly reading and writing in Portuguese. A friend of mine who works for a television studio put it bluntly: “We’ll need expats here for the next 40 years. I have staff that can’t write a simple email without glaring spelling mistakes.”

Angola’s lack of investment in education isn’t exactly news. Portugal’s colonial system rigorously discouraged education among its African subjects, with its missionary schools the only exception to this rule. The long, brutal civil war that wrecked the country immediately after independence further hampered education efforts. But now, 12 years after peace has been achieved, investment in education remains depressingly low. And it shows.

In the many multinationals and large national firms that operate in Angola, Portuguese workers have a strong presence in middle management and senior roles. It’s true that Angola’s lack of skilled workers was exacerbated by the war years and foreign help is not only warranted but acutely needed. Yet, I see no evidence of any effort being done on a governmental level to change this reality. In fact, we are one of Africa’s worst investors in education, regularly spending less than 10% of our national budget on this expenditure. When compared to post-conflict countries such as Burundi and Côte d’Ivoire, who each last year spent over 20% of their budget on education, this is especially startling. Angola, in comparison, dedicated just 6.2% of its budget on education.

So how do these statistics translate to our day-to-day reality? Three of my family members are professors in both public and private universities in Luanda, and all three often complain about just how intellectually poor their students are, to the point where they cannot properly read, write or solve basic mathematical problems. We’re talking about university-level students. But the professors stress that it’s not their fault – rather, they’re the product of a seriously deficient educational system at the primarily level. Professors are required by law to pass 80% of their students onto the next grade, regardless of their skill and intelligence. By the time they get to university, many of these students are lacking even the most basic skills to succeed and learn.

And if you think that the government is addressing this important issue, think again. Just this year, they further slashed public investment in primarily level education by an outrageous 33%. Instead, and despite our 12 years of peace, the government preferred to invest its earnings in military equipment. So much so that Angola is sub-Saharan Africa’s biggest military spender. The wisdom of spending $6.1-billion on military equipment, a lot of it nearly obsolete, during peacetime, to the detriment of proper spending in education, is extremely worrying.

Although it likes to think of itself as a regional leader and enjoys flexing its financial muscle, Angola does not have a single university in Africa’s top 100. Its existing universities, with very few exceptions, are utter shambles.

Continuous and sustainable investment in education is a must if we are to have a properly functioning society and economy run by Angolans. Human development is our most pressing need because human capital is our most valuable commodity. Oil will run out one day, and the financial crisis in Portugal that brings so many Portuguese to our workforce will one day end. Who then, will run Angola, and with what education?

Claudio Silva is Angolan. He has spent time in New York, Washington DC, Lisbon, Reading (UK) and attended university in Boston. In 2009, he started Caipirinha Lounge, a music blog dedicated to Lusophone music. Claudio contributes to several other blogs including Africa is a Country and Central Angola 7311. Connect with him on Twitter.