By Tinomudaishe Chinyoka
Once, when l was still in school, someone told me and my classmates a profound thing. That if you take a frog and put it in hot water, it will jump straight out. But, if you took that frog and put it cold water, then slowly increase the temperature, said frog will remain in the water until it is cooked.
I do not believe that the teacher that told me this actually cooked frogs, because l do not believe that he originated the saying. He must have heard it from somewhere.
But notice how l said ‘cooked’. That was deliberate. Because what he cooked then might not necessarily be what he cooks now. He may well be involved in the cooking and consumption of frogs.
Because you see, the irony is that while he was busy imparting this wisdom to his starry-eyed students, what he and those students did not realise was that we and our entire country were the frogs, and that the temperature was being ramped up. It was a slow burn, in a slow cooker, and the time to vault out of there came and passed, and the country remained. Stewing.
We were a proud people mhani, once upon a time. Remember when our beef got all those certifications and it was headline news that we were supplying the European Economic Community with our Samson (nyama inonaka inotaura yega!)? Who would have known that instead of CSC real beef, tisu tava kuteya makudo tichivhiya honestly. Makudo.
It was an insult to say to someone “muchaseva namapete”, and now tave kuananika seharugwa dzeBikita toita vusavi. To adapt what the great poet Paul Matavire says in his celebrated MaU: ndisu here ava tave kuseva nomunyu setisakaziva nyama? Across SADC we were known for Food Security, the bread basket of Africa. We were the envy of all, murungu dunhu wakadhla sadza nokukara. Now, we would be a basket case, except that we cannot even afford baskets.
Do you remember staggered hours? Some silly idea thought up by some myopic civil servant about people starting work at different hours, which spectacularly backfired because some people were getting to where they wanted to go for business early and finding that those who worked there only started two hours later. There was such a furore that the idea was scrapped ex post haste, like Tigger from Winnie the Pooh would say. Pronto.
That was the frog in hot water scenario.
Now? We have been so suitably stewed that we do not even make a whimper when salaries come after 45 days. Instead, we go get payday loans at zvimbadzo type interest, then sign forms for SSB to deduct the money from our pay. Some deductions are so high the salary that comes is so tiny it will not even cover the extortionate bank charges they levy without regulation.
And do we jump out of the water? Oh no. We create lists of who to borrow from next.
Ndisu vaya taiseka vataiti ma Moscan. Now, Mozambique is a go to place, buying their things so that we can sell at home. Who still knows dzoramombe rekuMozambique? We can no longer afford them. Because we would make more working for him in his country.
Ah, and my teacher? Him of the frog boiling formula? Well, he is no longer a teacher. He works as a clerk on a Tollbooth on the Harare-Bulawayo road. That, it turns out, pays more than teaching. Imagine that!
Remember when Frederick Shava resigned and Maurice Nyagumbo committed suicide following involvement in the Willowgate scandal. That was the one where Ministers used their influence to actually buy cars from Willowvale Motor Industries, then sold them for a higher price to third parties.
Yes, you read that right. They actually bought the cars. The scandal was merely because we were producing so few cars that the waiting list was so long, and Ministers could skip it.
That was the scandal. Buying and selling cars at a profit. Like typical capitalist philosophy, supply and demand. And when Geoff Nyarota and The Chronicle exposed the scandal, it was all over the place. You could not get a copy of The Chronicle, it was selling like Downings Bread.
Now? We have been so stewed in the sewer that is Robert Ebagum’s cesspit that when a Minister is accused of theft, he pleads first that he stole less than others and then suggests that he was playing Robin Hood. And, here is the tragedy: we look, we make jokes, and do nothing.
Absolutely nothing.
How many jokes have we made about Kasukuwere’s 50 bedroom mansion? How many very funny videos have we all seen and exchanged about Bond paper and Bond notes? “Chingwarire ichi chichiri kupisa“, we tell each other with a generous dollop of emojis.
Uku nyika ichitsva.
We are the country that now has accepted that we will allow our government to introduce phantom money, and instead of taking said Bond money to the loo, we are forming three day long queues at the bank, to rescue at least $30 from what we legitimately put in there before it gets replaced with the insulting tissue paper money.
Queuing patiently. Not demanding to take what is ours: you gave the Bank US dollars and you are content kuti ingondipaivo hangu 30 imwe mozondipa yave maBond. Honestly?
At what point will it be time to jump out of the water? At what point is it okay to start a revolution? When are we going to attend to the anthem? What is the point of raising Zimbabwe’s flag when we are being stewed to death?
Are we really, really content to just wait for another election which we know they are going to rig? Is that it? Do we honestly think that they will just wake up one day and suddenly have a clue how to run a state? Or that they will forget how to rig elections?
The bible tells us of what happened when the Israelites heard Rehoboam’s answer after he vowed to oppress them harder than his father had: “And when all Israel saw that the king did not listen to them, the people answered the king, “What portion do we have in David? We have no inheritance in the son of Jesse. To your tents, O Israel! Look now to your own house, David.” So Israel went to their tents.
When, O people of Zimbabwe, are we going to our tents? When do we say enough is enough? What portion do we have in Ebagum? We have no inheritance in the son of Matibiri.
Is it not time to get angry?
Tinomudaishe Chinyoka is a UK based Zimbabwean lawyer and prominent former University of Zimbabwe student leader.
