The Sunday Mail
Teddie Bepete
A country that honours falsehoods will itself fall victim to the same falsehoods. A nation that forgets its founding past will definitely lose its way. Colonialism should never be forgotten.
A few weeks ago, a certain critic approached me with the accusation that I was too truthful for a political writer. I was shocked.
‘’This is a game of lies,’’ he challenged. I instantly begged to differ.
I told him, “No matter how many lies you amass, they can never change the world. Although lies may give a false sense of victory to the liar, truth shall always prevail over a Pyrrhic victory.”
Colonialism tried as much to justify its existence in Africa by institutionalising certain myths and stereotypes to disparage Africans into believing in its eventuality.
But when time for truth came, all those falsehoods came to naught. Truth is the cornerstone of all successful, ideal revolutions.
Zimbabwe won its freedom from slavery after a bloody war, an uprising strictly guided by virtues of uprightness and good morals — values whose observance guaranteed the revolutionaries victory.
Apart from his vast intellectual weight, President Mugabe won the people’s hearts because of his wisdom and integrity.
He has always stood for truth. He has never been proud; that is why he achieved leadership of the struggle. To achieve, one has to be wise. Knowledge without wisdom is like water in sand. And the proud have no room for wisdom.
He imprinted this legacy in his landmark speech on April 17, 1980: ‘‘Democracy is . . . 3and should remain disciplined rule requiring compliance with the law and social rules. Our independence must thus not be construed as an instrument vesting individuals or groups with the right to harass and intimidate others into acting against their will. It is not the right to negate the freedom of others to think and act as they desire.’’
All those who fought during the liberation war armed with an arm’s length of real grievances did so on the foundations of virtue.
A country that honours falsehoods will itself fall victim to the same falsehoods. A nation that forgets its founding past will definitely lose its way.
Colonialism should never be forgotten. We can only determine our beautiful tomorrow out of the bitter prejudices of our past.
Recriminations can only lead us to another Libya and another Iraq. We are an infant nation bidding to survive in a hostile world. We can only survive if we are harmoniously united.
Our freedom can only be guaranteed if we achieve — in a generation — what the developed world achieved in 300 years.
Remember, when brothers fight to death, a stranger inherits their father’s estate. It is a pity that some circles in the private media are already anticipating instability in Zimbabwe.
We cannot slide back to another war for selfish economic, material reasons. Nothing apart from truth can iron out the criss-crosses of this conundrum.
Those who gave their lives for no material gain would not permit calamity to befall their hard-won Zimbabwe. Their memories prepare us to add our souls to that pedestal of truth. It was the founding aspiration of our struggle to gain an utopia.
Dr Edison Zvobgo once remarked during the struggle, ‘‘We do not want a socio-legal order in the country in which people are petrified; in which people go to bed having barricaded their doors and their windows because someone belonging to the Special Branch of the police will break into their houses. This is what we have been fighting against. This is why we are in this revolution for as long as it is necessary to abolish this system.’’
What our heroic guerrillas fought for was a land bereft of despair, a land pregnant with hope. A land where peace, progress, love, respect, justice and equality; not the opposite. We must measure our liberation journey in accordance with the fulfilment of these aspirations.
In 1986, Dr Joshua Nkomo bemoaned corruption: ‘‘And one of the worst evils we see today is corruption. The country bleeds today because of corruption.’’
We can only get together if we observe love and humility. And we should pick a nugget from Cuban revolutionary Che Guevara who said, ‘‘The true revolutionary is guided by a great feeling of love.’’
The people of Zimbabwe need to be respected for without them, the revolution could not have succeeded. Our revolutionaries succeeded because they had taken heed of Chairman Mao’s teaching that guerilla fighters were the fish and the people the water.
Historian Maxwell Chirimuhanzu commented, ‘‘Revolutions are founded by the people, not by individuals.’’
Therefore, revolutions such as ours are a product of the whole spectrum of the people; involving their culture, religion, economic activities and environment. This natural aspect of our journey has to be respected.
The journey of the martyred heroes should render an unfading badge of honour to our country.
Herbert Hoover once remarked, ‘‘When there is lack of honour in government, the morals of the whole people are poisoned.’’
How far, as a people, have we treasured and sustained this honour for posterity? Are we treading the original path beset by the blood-written ethos of the liberation struggle? Issues pertaining to the rigmarole of succession should never take this nation to limbo.
President Mugabe made it categorically clear in the past when he said, ‘‘Grooming a successor, is it an inheritance? In a democratic party, you don’t want leaders appointed that way. They have to be appointed properly by the people.’’
Unite and stand as a people with an already defined course of life, and let love flourish in a time of hate as a paramount revolutionary bearing.
