For some annoying reason, Africans always wonder why Zimbabweans think that they have problems in their country when they have a brilliant leader like Robert Mugabe.
Many people on high rungs of social, political and economic strata ask me the very same stupid questions that can only be answered by Zimbabwe itself.
I have always warned people not to listen to Mugabe but to pay attention to Zimbabwe because the answers are there everywhere.
Read Zimbabwe and take a discerning eye at our country because from there, one would get the answers they need, free from political or personal embellishment.
What I do not understand is how Africa views and judges Zimbabwe because the same standards are not being used against other countries.
We have become famous more for what we were than what we are as we continuously hear ourselves being referred to as “once the bread-basket of Africa”.
In our schools, colleges and university, we hosted students from all over Africa and beyond. Even today, so many from Botswana and other SADC countries are in our schools.
Rightfully, Africa and the world pin us down to an era when we had inherited what departing colonial governments had left for us.
While the Portuguese in Mozambique took everything with them (including toilet chambers, seats and cisterns) when the country became independent, colonialists left Zimbabwe with almost everything intact.
From schools and education, hospitals, agriculture, transport, industry, communications and all else, all was in place.
All we needed to do was to maintain what we had inherited from the colonial government, not necessarily improve them but just maintain the systems left in place.
We failed to do that. We are still failing.
Robert Mugabe, a master at deflecting important issues away from himself, was in South Africa earlier this week. It was sad to see the press, along with some cabinet ministers, including President Jacob Zuma himself, joining in laughter over sad issues of importance.
Mugabe tried to take Trevor Noah’s mantle, joking and making people laugh about issues of serious importance to Zimbabweans.
As the South Africans were laughing, did they ever wonder about the abuse of Mugabe’s political opponents in Zimbabwe?
Why did they not bother to find out about a still missing fellow journalist in Zimbabwe?
Did they care about the millions of Zimbabweans facing hardships in South Africa or they were satisfied by Mugabe thanking South Africa?
How far did the South African media go in finding out what the so-called “strengthening of bi-lateral relations” means when South African business is camped in Zimbabwe?
Two weeks ago, Mugabe was worrying about how to fund a SADC Summit that is due and it was hinted that Zimbabwe would approach South Africa for financial assistance.
Both South Africa and Botswana have given Mugabe millions before and the situation is still hopeless and getting worse.
Just two weeks ago, Mugabe visited Ethiopia, among other countries, and Zimbabweans resident in Ethiopia were asked to contribute at least US$50 each to host Mugabe who then went on to appeal to Zimbabweans in the wider Diaspora to send money home to relatives. But we know who really needs money from those remittances.
Mugabe is still talking about Tony Blair, for goodness sake.
Was this kind of idiocy apparent to fellow news people that they were being led away from important issues?
He talks and insults other people and reporters are diverted from major issues because this man has major questions to answer.
But they gobbled it all up.
They all laughed when Mugabe talked about Cecil John Rhodes being buried in Zimbabwe while South Africans are demanding the removal of his statue.
Mugabe was even taunting them, the South Africans did not notice; they were all in thrall of this man.
The importance of history is that it belongs to no one but the nation. Heroes are heroes because they conquered someone under the most acute of circumstances. The conquered are always worthy opponents who made our heroes by being defeated by them.
Who is Mugabe without Ian Smith and his predecessors?
Who is Nelson Mandela without the apartheid presidents? They are all part of our history and deserve prominence to remind us of our past.
History is not politics and cannot be negotiated.
Zimbabwean heroes, South African heroes or Botswana heroes are no heroes unless we show the people and the forces they conquered against all odds.
We must not repeat history but we must learn from it.
The giggling media in South Africa, its cabinet ministers, Jacob Zuma, rebel-rouser Julius Malema must all understand that destroying historical reminders is much more dangerous than the nonsense they spout tirelessly every day.
A statue of Nelson Mandela is worthless unless we know the more powerful people he defeated. People like Julius Malema should not be expected to understand this because their depth of knowledge is finger-deep; they are one-issue rebel rousers.
Back to my President and his effort “to strengthen bilateral relations with South Africa”.
It is not funny that Mugabe finds humour in the closure of many companies and in the daily laying off of workers due to his moronic economic policies, greed, thievery and mismanagement.
It is sad to see the man and his family shamelessly behaving as if a failed nation like Zimbabwe is their personal property.
But worst of all, it is tragic that fellow African presidents do not find it necessary to isolate this political demon and make him answerable for his actions.
I wonder what it takes to end the fascination with this man because there are times when I feel that, for some reason, the world really enjoys to see people being abused, people being made to disappear, people losing their jobs and property, people being treated in deplorable ways in the full glare of television lights.
The world is becoming more and more complicit in the ongoing tragedy in Zimbabwe and it is my hope that we all see no humour in this man’s behavior.
Zimbabwe is not a scene from a stage act; Zimbabwe is a nation that is crying for help and we are mistaking wails of pain for demands of an encore.
It might help if we all treated Mugabe as a murderous manipulative dictator that he is and stop applauding him or laugh at his jokes while he snatches young people from among us, never to see them again.
The African Union gave him the chairmanship of their organization and some Zimbabweans were asked to contribute money for his trip to Ethiopia on AU business.
SADC gave him the chairmanship of its organization now, SADC must cough up the money to stage its Summit where they will, once again, give Mugabe a standing ovation.
Now, that is comedy that even Trevor Noah cannot write. Yes, now you may laugh, please.
