Back to Index

A promise for the future
The Independent (Zimbabwe)
October 11, 2008

http://www.thezimbabweindependent.com/opinion/21372-we-need-a-promise-for-our-future.html

Most Zimbabweans feel speechless at the moment. We feel powerless and demoralized. We do not know what to do, to whom to turn or how to make the powers that have reduced us to our misery take heed of our plight. We feel there is no action we can take. Prolonged and dreadful misery has this effect on people. It intimidates us, and saps our life force so that we become lethargic and narrow in our outlook, content on avoiding trouble and getting through each day with our loved ones. Yet even in this bleak scenario, when are powers are low and there is no mercy in sight from those whom we expect to be merciful towards us, there is action we can take. We can analyse calmly and logically, with the common good at the centre of our deliberations, what has taken place.

What has taken place since the last statement from Zimwatch that looked at those who do and those who co not desire change amongst us, is that a promise was made. President Robert Mugabe promised Zimbabweans that each child, woman and man in this country would have a government to protect her or him and regulate the affairs of our country by Friday October 3. This promised was backed up by Prime Minster Designate Mr Tsvangirayi. Analysis requires information. There has been a dearth of this since the promise was made, and in the time following the making of the promise up until now. We, as Africans, have a history of being denied information. We were denied information by enslaver and slave owners during the time of slavery. We were denied information during colonial times. To our horror, we see we are being denied information now, in an independent sovereign state. In the cases of slavery and colonization, information was denied us to keep us ignorant thus make it easier to enslave and colonise us. Time will tell why we are denied information now. However, even in the absence of more information, there are things we know that can be analysed.

What we know is that since Zimwatch's last statement on the need for change, that analyzed who wants change and who does not want change amongst us, a promise was made. What is a promie? One dictionary defines 'promise" as "an engagement to do or keep from doing something: expectation, or that which raises expectation: a ground for hope of future excellence." The promise to the nation has been broken. No person in Zimbabwe has a government yet. Therefore those who have broken the promise have broken and dashed the expectations of every child, woman, man and unborn in Zimbabwe. The promise-breakers have washed away any ground there might have been for future excellence for millions of people in this country.

What kind of people would do this to other people who are their kith and kin? What kind of people would consign their own kind to unending misery through failure to keep a promise that was made? Promises are broken for many reasons. These reasons include sheer incompetence right through to sheer skullduggery. This statement serves to tell those who are engaged in the breakage of the lives of all Zimbabweans by breaking promises that we expect more from them, and we also believe they are capable of better leadership than they have shown. This statement tells those who are party to the power-sharing deal to keep their promise to form a government of national unity in which power is shared, within the week in the interests of the common Zimbabwean good. Otherwise it will become sadly clear that the common Zimbabwean good is of absolutely no consequence to these promise breakers.

Please credit www.kubatana.net if you make use of material from this website. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License unless stated otherwise.

TOP