"When you are sorrowful look again in your
heart, and you shall see that in truth you are weeping for that which has been
your delight.”
- Kahlil Gibran.
- Kahlil Gibran.
SATURDAY, May 9, 2015
or there about. Lucky Mulusa’s posse drove into Ngabwe district, Central
province. The whole spectacle was reminiscent of John Wayne riding into a new
western country frontier town. I can imagine Mulusa sitting low in his brand
new shining government vehicle, dreaming of the welcome he would get. Healthy
looking school children with flags lining the neat tarmac road into the town;
civil servants in double breasted suits ordered from Oxendales, eagerly waiting at the new district offices;
and, a raised podium where he will deliver his speech. I further imagine Mulusa
going over his speech, how he will walk up the steps to greet the District
Commissioner and what jest he will utter to reduce the tension. There surely
was going to be tension. After all Mulusa is a simile of the inspector general
in that classic satirical
play, Government Inspector, by Nikolai Gogol.
But unlike in the Government Inspector, there
will be no Bobchinsky and Dobchinsky, rushing to inform the District
Commissioner and his officials that they have seen the government inspector
staying at the local inn.
Mulusa will enter the town in grand style! It’s
a new town after all and he has to savour it first. There was no way Mulusa
could not dream all this. After all, Michael Sata had said, let there be a
Ngabwe district. And abracadabra, there was Ngabwe district!
But lo and behold! Mulusa entered Ngabwe and he
wept. There was no new district called Ngabwe. Instead, he stumbled upon a
district and a people living in Shaka Zulu times!
The question then is, why did Lucky Mulusa
weep? Did he weep because of doubt about a truth he observed? That “abracadabra, and
there was Ngabwe district” was a lie? Or did he weep because the reality he
observed was surreal, to the extent that he was ashamed? We may never know the
answer until we ask him, but the latter seems more likely.
Mulusa knew there was no Ngabwe. For him to
have expected the contrary is foolery. And this is why.
On August 24, 2014 in a blog article titled, Be responsible voters, never be cheated
again, Mulusa writes: “It is strange why
the PF in its governance chose to adopt political methods that have been proven
through scientific and social studies, that such methodology of governance
makes development less likely. The PF from inception lied to the people about
its 90 day deliverables…. As if to ensure that development should never be
delivered to the people, the party adopted undemocratic and bad governance
characteristics”[1].
He further observes that: “Both the PF and those that voted for the party are guilty of the
calamity that has befallen our land. May be an appreciation of our challenges,
would make us more responsible voters who in future, should get concerned, be
responsible voters and refuse to be misled again!”
In another article, Mulusa writes: “Future generations will wonder how such an
educated, experienced and exposed generation failed to take advantage of a
wealth of mineral resource endowment, rich soils and great tourism potential.
They will wonder why they were born in a country whose fore fathers left it in
a mess several years after the dawn of civilisation – boy we will be cursed.”[2].
Clearly, Mulusa wept because he was ashamed.
Guilty. He even wrote about it. Sic.
Perhaps, we should thank Mulusa for weeping?
After all, when he shed tears over Ngabwe, we later read that government has
disbursed 24 million kwacha for the construction of a district administration
block and staff houses.
In hindsight, we can’t thank him. We do not
want him to go and weep over Sioma, Nkeyema, Luano, Shiwang’andu, etc. He will
surely run out of tears. I, for one, wouldn’t want that for my good friend.
But let us not deceive ourselves, it is not
only Lucky Mulusa’s shame or guilt, it is our shame and guilt too.
Over fifty years after political independence,
us the privileged - The ones who have never known the hardships of open
defecation, the hardships of walking long miles to a health centre; and indeed,
the hardships of watching our children die of curable diseases, choreograph our
lives like that that is how all Zambians live.
Mulusa carries the shame of our governance
irresponsibility. Like Mulusa wrote in 2014, our political governance choices
are tragically becoming an incarnation of the unthinking. This, we need to free
ourselves from.
Sophocles says, “if it were possible to cure evils by lamentation and to raise the dead
with tears, then gold would be a less valuable thing than weeping”.
So unlike Mulusa, let us not weep. Weeping
won’t help those we always leave behind. We can leave that to Mulusa for now.
We can ease our shame, our guilt by always demanding
of those we choose to govern on our behalf, to honour their promises. If they
don’t, show them the door, as often in their ego trip they sometimes forget
where the door is. Period.
Verbum satis
sapienti - a word to
the wise suffices.
