Independence Day Celebrations in Zimbabwe: The Contrasts.
By Tongai Phillip Mukarati
We live in a country with more than the familiar two faces. A Tale of Two Countries.
There is the one country that ideally has all the wealth any country would be proud to have. A country with a great human resource base, both in terms of the emotional and intellectual quotient. This is evidenced by how on demand our brains and skills are on demand the world over – and, probably paradoxically, how ‘peace loving’ Zimbabweans are – or maybe how well conditioned we have shown with regards to aversion or fear of violent upheavals.
We are also a resilient people. We have had to endure some very gruesome times and up to today, most Zimbabweans are living in abject poverty.
……so that is the other country. The other Zimbabwe which only a very small minority wants. A country whose metrics are shameful for a country so endowed in resources. A country whose corruption index is of Himalayan proportions. A country led by a ruthless ruling elite whose hands are dirty and one where the corruption trail has led to the doorstep of the First Citizen. It’s is sad.
The recent death and viral video of Tatenda Pinjisi pleading for painkillers has indeed cast a dark cloud over our Independence Day Celebrations – if celebrating the day is really the relevant operational word in such a shambolic state of affairs between Zambezi and Limpopo.
How one can truly claim to be celebrating when there are no painkillers in the hospitals is beyond logical comprehension……And to make things worse we have Zvigananda gifting the already rich with expensive luxurious cars whilst people are dying literally and figuratively because there is no medication in our hospitals, no ambulances, no production in industry because there is no electricity. All this whilst some idiots in suits claim that we have in place sanction bursting mechanisms.
Is the ever present call for Zvigananda to step in and rescue our health system not a subtle sanitisation of the very rot we do not want to fester in Zimbabwe?
We live in a country where falling sick and merely being on the potholed roads are deathtraps. Zimbabwe is a minefield 45 years after independence – we have a government that has presided over a country that has fallen exponentially since 18 April 1980 to 18 April 2025 and there are no signs of the downfall abetting anytime soon as long as the mindset that got us here remains the dominant paradigm going forward.
Zimbabwe is a tale of two countries and the sad reality is that the darker one is choking, engulfing and obliterating the dying embers of the fire that once was Zimbabwe.
Celebrate we might want, but the question that begs the answer is…..Celebrating what!?
