The Sunday Mail
EXACTLY seven days ago, young Genius Kadungure, who hogged social media traffic for the best part of last week, went out the way he had lived his life — with a bang, literally!
Well, a very big bang.
His flying US$500 000 road machine — a bespoke Rolls Royce Wraith — apparently careened into an unassuming Honda Fit before ferociously ramming into roadside trees along Liberation Legacy Way (former Borrowdale Road) in the wee hours of Sunday morning.
The incredibly expensive big boys’ toy resultantly exploded into a hellish cauldron, but not before fatally spitting out the 36-year-old playboy.
Three of his acquaintances were not so lucky as they were consumed by the mercilessly raging inferno.
It was like a train wreck.
Well, the white man would say Genius died with his boots on, doing what he knew best — partying.
However, by the time he breathed his last, the young lad, who was given to ostentatiously displaying his fabulous wealth, had primitively amassed a scandalous amount of possessions that set off Harare’s ever-busy rumour mill.
Tongues were still waging by yesterday on how such a young man had acquired such obscene wealth.
For sure, he was rich.
Bishop Lazi would say he had more high-value cars than an ordinary chief executive officer of some of our local companies would have decent shoes. Kikikiki.
But with no one offering anything remotely coherent or convincing enough about his source of wealth, naturally speculation is ranging from the reasonable, doubtful, fanciful, bizarre and outrightly outlandish.
Hocus-Pocus
The Bishop was particularly piqued by chatter that suggested the secret to Genius’ riches was a mystical snake living in his palatial home that had the uncanny ability to vomit wads of US dollar notes. Kikikiki.
It would have been funny were it not so tragic.
People believe in the strangest of things.
It reminds the Bishop of this chap who was called Alexander the Great, a Greek prince who turned king at the age of 20, who lived eons ago — in fact from 356 BC-323BC.
He is a figure who looms large in history mainly because of his conquests, part of which saw him build the port city of Alexandria (named after him) in Egypt in 331BC, among many of his notable and indelible achievements.
Alexandria is still the second-largest city in the North African country.
At one time, he was believed to be the richest man on the planet.
But for the greater part of his 32 years on earth, Alexander actually believed that he was a god sired by Zeus — considered at the time by the Greeks as the father of all gods and humans.
By some accounts, his mother, Olympias, had told him he was the product of an “immaculate conception”.
These words were to create an intrepid war machine that would go on to conquer Greece, Egypt, Afghanistan and Persia, which by the time covered swatches of Iran, Iraq, Armenia, Turkey, Bulgaria, Jordan, Israel, Lebanon, the West Bank, Libya, etcetera. Because of his “divine” superiority complex, he, like the French emperor Napoleon Bonaparte did in the 19th century, led his troops from the front.
As legend would have it, we are told that during his imperial odyssey somewhere in what is now modern-day Turkey, he passed through a city where an ox-cart had been tied for ages to a tree using an intricate knot that was known as the Gordian knot.
It is believed that an oracle had earlier declared that whoever managed to unravel the intricately entangled knot would be destined to rule Asia, which fit in neatly into Alexander’s ambitious designs and enterprise.
It was the ultimate test of his divinity.
Well, unlike many before him who had grappled and failed to untie the knot, the astute military general surmised that it didn’t actually matter how it was untied as long it as unravelled.
He just removed his sword from the sheath and gave it a mighty swing.
By one hefty swish, the knot was untied.
Believe me, it is one of the most anticlimactic stories one would ever hear.
While not exactly being a god, Alexander the Great’s almost superhuman achievements were driven by an indomitable will and courage borne out of a belief that he was half-man, half god.
It is all about faith and belief.
President Mnangagwa commissioned Marovanyati Dam in Buhera on Thursday
Hebrew 11: 1 reminds us that: “Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see”, while James 1: 2-4 adds: “Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.”
The Gordian knot has, however, since been repackaged into an English expression that describes an incredibly difficult or intractable problem.
Traction
And Zimbabwe has had so many seemingly intractable and difficult problems over the years — a rotting economy, decaying infrastructure and general disillusionment.
It all began to change on this day three years ago when the army decided to step in to stem the tide, which set in motion a chain of epochal events that resulted in the political transition that birthed the Second Republic led by President ED.
Five months into his new job, he made a strategic State visit to China between April 2 and April 6 in 2018 from where he managed to iron out creases that were developing in the relations between Harare and Beijing over debts on previous projects.
Elevating relations to a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership — representing one of the highest levels of diplomatic relations — did the trick by deepening co-operation.
Through this diplomatic manoeuvre, Harare managed to unlock resources for expansion works at Robert Gabriel Mugabe International Airport (US$153 million); Hwange Thermal Power Station Units 7 & 8 (US$1,3 billion), which will be feeding 600 megawatts (MW) to the grid soon; and the construction of the new Parliament Building (US$100 million), among the key infrastructural projects.
As the Bishop has been telling you over the past couple of years, you need to listen intently to what this President says because it always comes to pass.
Many would know the child’s play that had characterised efforts to rehabilitate the Harare-Beitbridge road over the years.
Journalists who started writing about this story back in the day are probably grandfathers by now.
It was first linked to South Africans, then a consortium of local contractors called Zimborders, before being handed over to a shadowy company called Geiger International.
However, after taking over in November 2017, in May the following year, ED moved in to disentangle the mess and cut Geiger loose.
Two years down the line, the first 100 kilometres of the spruced-up road have since been commissioned and opened to traffic after local contractors were roped in.
This is what cutting the Gordian knot really entails.
By the way, the multiplier effect that this is creating on the local economy is massive and its impact might yet be fully realised in years to come, if it has not begun to be felt already.
Silent progress
To extricate itself from the rut it found itself in hasn’t been easy for Zimbabwe, which is considered a leper in the international community because it has been isolated for the bold decision it took to reclaim its land from white minority farmers at the turn of the millennium.
Where others ordinarily receive support, the country has been left to fend for itself.
Neighbouring South Africa, for example, has been given US$4,5 billion by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and a further US$1 billion from the BRICS New Development Bank to insulate it against the fallout from the coronavirus.
Even Mozambique got a US$309 million kitty from the IMF to get by.
And Zimbabwe, which is affected by the pandemic like any other country, has received zilch.
Yet Harare still stands, and is plodding ahead with major infrastructure projects at a pace never seen before in recent times.
Just last week, ED commissioned Marovanyati Dam, which he had promised the people of Buhera in Manicaland on May 19, 2018 during that year’s campaign trail.
Get this: construction of the dam had stalled for more than a decade since works were suspended in 2007 — yes, 2007.
Next up will be Causeway Dam in Marondera, which will be commissioned soon — well, actually very soon.
The same can be said for dams in Chivhu, Bindura and, most importantly, Gwayi-Shangani Dam, whose major contribution to Bulawayo — the former key industrial hub — would be immense.
The economic spin-offs through agriculture and other concomitant economic activities tied to these projects will undoubtedly be limitless.
But all this cannot match the silent progress taking place in mining, where major miracles are taking place.
Last week, there was a largely unremarked story on Bravura, which has committed US$1 billion to its platinum project along the Great Dyke.
Also, largely unremarked are milestones on the US$4,5 billion Karo project(s), the US$400 million Great Dyke Investment platinum venture that is being carried out in partnership with Russian investors, or the US$1 billion steel plant by Tsingshan that is slowly taking shape.
Need the Bishop also mention the seven Chinese mining companies in Hwange, some of which are setting up power plants?
Only that mining projects have a longer gestation period than other ventures.
It is important to mention that some, if not most, of these projects were previously bogged down by unnecessary bureaucracy, inexplicable inertia, corruption and downright sloth.
It only took boldness and decisiveness to move them forward.
Stabilising the economy, which the Second Republic has managed to achieve within the set timeframes, will naturally add impetus and fillip to economic growth efforts.
One of the major strategies by incorrigible critics and cynics has been to cast the new administration as worse than the old.
Taking advantage of the upheaval that was caused by the economic reforms last year, one cynic wrote on microblogging site Twitter on October 18 last year: “Mugabe akasiya chingwa chiri pa US$(1) and masanctions aingoveko. Kana uchiri kufunga kuti ED can turn around this economy imbodya zondo.” (Robert Mugabe left the price of bread at US$1 even though sanctions were still in place. If you think President ED will turnaround the economy, go suck on a cow’s hoof).
Well, so how much is the price of bread now in US dollar terms? Kikikiki.
Do not believe blind keyboard warriors who are far removed from development taking place in the country hinterland, from where votes will come in three years’ time.
If you think this train is slowing down anytime soon, you need to read the National Development Strategy that will be out this week.
Despite extraordinary odds, Zimbabwe is moving!
Bishop out!
