Those voices

It's 03h00. The cocks are crowing. The smell of the morning is in the air. Soon the east will turn grey and then golden with the sun's rays.

I have been sitting here. Trying not to think. Shutting my mind down. But memories are like dark waves. They push. And press hard. The mental doors give in. They crash. Flinging open with a loud clanging sound.

For me that loud clanging sound triggers headaches. These heavy thuds on the roof of my head. Like there a thousand wild horses racing across a desolate valley.

With a weakened mind, one cannot fight back. So in the middle of the night, I shrink as the hooves trample over me. Squashing me into a bloodied gob.

I am pummeled from all directions. And the voices come. Whispers at first. Like a million insects moving in one motion. Then as the whispers thicken, they become one voice. Hoarse. Agonised. Pleading.

Why, the voice asks. Why?

I shrink further.

We were friends. We walked the same path from the same school. We agreed that you would cover my back. And I your back.

Closing my eyes, I shout back.

“Shut up! Shut up!”

Had it been in the early days, the voice would have shut down. Disappeared. But over the years, it has grown determined. Brave. Antagonistic even.

So it answers back: It should not have been you? You my friend. You knew what happened. You were there. Yet, you did not tell the truth.

“It had to be one of us. Either you. Or me. There were only two choices. You. Or me. I chose you. I saved myself.”

Silence. But again the horses return. Thundering and tearing away across the desolate, empty valley. The whispers withdrew. Take a distance. Become indistinct. But still threatening to meld into one angry voice.

I fought hard to survive the horses. Stilling myself. Telling myself that the horses can run over me but never flatten me.

The fight is repeated until dawn breaks. And I stagger out of bed to take a shower. The bags under my eyes seem to be growing heavier and bigger. My eyes are bloodshot.

Be Still and Know I Am God

Be still, and know that I am God. I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth.

Is this not the verse that kept us strong during the war? Yes, be still. Before you fight back, be still and watch your enemy's moves.

When you survive and bodies are lying everywhere, be still among the dead. Do not move. Just watch the heavy boots as they stomp over the bodies.

Today, I am also saying Be Still. Listen to what they say. Watch their moves. Be Quiet. Let them talk. Then have the last say.

That is how politics is played. So as all these things start happening in my country – the country I died and killed for – I Am Still. I Am The Leader. I Will Be Exalted. I Will Overcome.

For that reason, I will just read what that silly editor boy writes. For that reason, I will follow behind those stupid professors. Stealthily. Quietly.

Even when I lie alone in the night, listening to my thoughts, I will be still. Nod along to the cicadas' songs once in a while. Feel age creeping on me from the edges of the darkness. Flow with the tide even.

What is the use of fighting life? There is no need because whatever you do, however you fight, life will defeat you.

I have not yet met a person who has defeated life. It gets us in the end. We may run. Jump. Hide. Do anything. Everything. But in the end, life reaches out to us. For us. Pulls us down. And shoves us deep in the earth. Six feet under.

And that is every man's fear. The day life says to him: Dude, I have come for you. Follow me.

At that hour, we all lie still. No complaints. No tears. But resignation. We leave everything behind.

But some of us, this has come and possibly gone. Living death is worse than the act of dying. Taking away a life is also worse than being taken away.

Long after the person whose life you take away has gone quiet, still, you will hear the pleas for mercy. The gurgling sounds when life is forced to leave the body. Then the eyes stare at you, meaningless. Vacant. Emotionless.

Long after those eyes have been eaten by worms, they will stare at you during the night. The pleas for mercy will disrupt your sleep.

With time, you learn to live with death. You become still. Dead. Cadaverous. It is the reason why the living cannot understand you. Why relationships die like your heart. Your children become afraid of you.

But Be Still.

There is no formulae of running an African country

I have just received a briefing from my head of security. I cannot believe what he tells me. Some university professors are planning to launch a party.

They make me laugh. The professors I employed. The ones I pay. Now think they can do better than me. Etse. What is it with people of this country?

Running a country is not like cramming law. There is no formulae to running an African country. I never went to school to run this country. I went to war. I am tested by war. Tried by war.

In any case, is that not what Americans ask for – a president who has been to Vietnam. Or Afghanistan. Or Iraq? What more commitment does a country want from a leader apart from dying and killing for the people?

I am told the professors are not happy. Jesus. What makes them unhappy now and not when they were teachers under the white regime? I mean they never were unhappy then. They taught. Made love to their women. Made kids. Now they are old and unhappy.

Fuck them. If they are unhappy it's not about me. Or my government. It must be their marriages and women and children. They should not try to vent out on me and my government.

Look, we were angry. Us who went to war against the seemingly invincible white regime. We gave up everything to free this country. And them lazy bones of professors. Yes, us who were angry freed them professors who now say they are unhappy.

This is idiocy of the tallest order. Where were they with their professorship when we were dying and killing for the country? Most of them were old enough to join the struggle.

Back then when we needed them at the front, none of them was unhappy. Back then when they were treated like children, none of them was unhappy. None thought of forming a party.

Now that we have died and killed for them, they are suddenly unhappy with the government. Africans are idiots. Who is the musician who said there is no good African. Even the one sleeping can still dream horror about you. Those that are dead can still haunt you.

So I ask my security chief what the professors want? Apparently, they want a better Constitution! Imagine that silly demand. A Better Constitution? Yet this is the same Constitution they were born under. They went to school under this Constitution. Married under this Constitution. Had children under the same Constitution.

Suddenly, the Constitution that saw them becoming professors is not good enough. Honestly, if this Constitution was not good enough for them, how did they become teachers? Fathers. Husbands. And now professors?

But my security chief says they are serious. Really now. Do they have guns? What will they do if they do not have guns?

I doubt they have brains too. If they had, they could not be messing up with a tried and tested cadre like me. They are playing with their fathers' manhoods.

But wait, could they have been behind the students riots? Could they be working with the finance minister? Is there a link with the stupid editor boy?

Could be. Maybe.

How can a country have no money?

Imagine that this so-called Harvard trained economist whom I made finance minister tells me that our coffers are running low.

Honestly, this chap is talking about a country. And its money. How can a country's coffers run dry? A country that owns everything? Is that possible?

Why, even my grandmother knew how to save and balance her books with money earned from selling groundnuts. Now what about a whole country that owns the land. The people. Companies. Everything? How can it have no money?

This is what I do not understand with the so-called educated chaps. They go by the book. Everything has to be according to a chapter in a book written by some dead guy from America or Britain.

This is not America. This is not Britain. We are an independent country. A sovereign state. That is what we died and killed for.

And look now, this American educated chap wants to drag us back to the very people whom we fought. The same system we refused.

There is no way this country will have no money. That cannot happen even when some of my ministers take here and there. They cannot take everything. How can they drain an ocean dry?

During the war, we managed to run our finances. It was not much but we managed. We survived. But to say that a country's coffers are running dry is absurd.

Do I sense some sabotage here? What is wrong with these young people? This finance minister is like the editor. That boy who run stories which are shaming us. I see a thread. Where was this editor boy educated again? Could be England if am not mistaken.

I see it now. First, the stories that my gallant police officers are butchering students. Even showing those pictures of my police force tear-gassing the misbehaving students. Who does that?

And that silly editorial: The government should do more! Nxaaa. For Christ's Sake! That in my paper. And then we pay that bastard who embarrasses us like that.

If the finance minister and that editor boy thinks I am an idiot, they have it coming. They can't destroy the party from within.

Even during the war, we dealt effectively with such dangerous people. I am watching them. If they keep pushing me into the corner, the comrade in me will fight back.

I need a new finance minister. One who understands the sacrifice of war. The losses caused by war. One who saw the blood. The death. Not one who counts money while taking notes from an old book written stupid people.

This smile is my mask

If there is something we politicians can do and do very well is having no scruples. We know how to wear those masks and smile.

My personal assistant taught me that I should paste a smile on my face even when I am being bombarded with unkind words. He told me to smile when I face television cameras. Laugh even at the questions.

I do it. I have done it. It has helped me cross bridges. Throughout my divorces, I made it appear that my ex-wives had problems not me.

Apart from having no scruples, us politicians do not feel guilty. That sets us apart from the ordinary people. Why should I feel guilty when a person dies? Even if it is of my doing? People die. People must die. Who lives forever? Even Jesus died. Not a natural death but on the hands of some people.

Killing is part of the game. Once you kill once, then you can kill again and again. These days I don't do it physically. Others do it for me. An accident here. Another accident there. And then I am asked to speak at the burial.

Most often, we declare the dead national heroes. Guarantee a lifetime of state support to the orphans and the widows.

I also smiled when I almost lost my leadership. It was a tight race between my late friend and secretary general of the party. It was so close. But I know the game. He is gone. I am still here.

He is a hero. Buried there at the Heroes Acre. But dead still. I spoke at his graveside. Told the people how he was a great man. Fearless. And a dedicated cadre. I said the party's democracy would never be the same again. That he believed in the ideals of humanity.

I did not tell the mourners that one of my people – a beautiful lady – had treated his drink. I did not tell the mourners that it was not a heart attack. In any case, my personal doctor carried out the post mortem.

With him, we thought of not removing him by a road accident. It would have been too obvious. Of course, the heart attack, I told the mourners, was caused by pressure of democracy.

I remember it too well: Good people don't live long, I said. God wants all his angels to join him in Heaven. We are poorer without people like this man we are bidding goodbye today.

The mourners roared in agreement. By the look of things, the nation believes me. My people still love me. That is why I love this country. Why we fought for this country. And why we will never let it become a colony again. Not in our lifetime.

My people believe whatever I tell them. I may not be sleeping – anyway, I know it's not only me – but as long as I can stagger out of bed everyday, this country will never be a colony again.

Until today, nobody suspects anything. Of course, the girl and one other spy boss know what happened. They carried out the operation. I was not there. If anything, I will say I did not know anything.

My heart does not skip even. But sleep never comes.

That state paper 'boy' must be dealt with

If there is anything that dries up my sleep is the media. God, those leeches. Everywhere like cockroaches. 

If I had my way, I would just shut down the whole damn industry.  

I sometimes do not know what to do whenever they run stories about corruption. 

It's about corruption this and corruption that. One would think that life is not corrupt. Hell, man. Where have they ever seen an honest life?

Life is just life. Man is just man. And corruption is part of life. Man is only the actor here. 

And read about them writing about corruption. You would be mistaken that some of these guys know who their mothers are. They are products of corruption themselves. Their mothers lied about who the fathers are. Nxaaa. Idiots.

As if they do not know that even Adam and Eve's unsanctioned act in the Garden of Eden was an act of corruption. What kind of life would it be without corruption? Dull. Uninspiring even.

At least the media should be very grateful to us. We give them so much to write about. What would they write if we were not corrupt?

Just reading about these spoilt university students demanding for more money and better food. Honestly now, do their fathers give them the food our universities give them?

We never got education for free. Most of us had to walk long distances to school. With no shoes upon our feet. On empty stomachs. We did not complain. Yet, all what these kids do is run the streets making demands. Nxaaa.

They want us to give them a salary as if they are working. This is crazy. And when they get that money, they go partying and picking up AIDS and other diseases. Who does that?

What I want to know is why the state paper has run this story on the front page. That stupid boy is being used against us. Why did he use this picture where the police are working? Sometimes, I don't understand people. We give them jobs. Money. Cars. And houses. Then they try to destroy us from within.

I will ask the minister to deal with that boy. What kind of an editor is he who does not understand the aspirations of the party? Do they know that we died and killed for this country? And whose child is that boy?

The party has been infiltrated. I will ask the chairman to vet all the people who are given strategic positions like being an editor of our paper. Such positions should be held by tried and tested cadres. Otherwise the dark secrets we are carrying from the war will be splashed on the front page.

Now that has scuttled my hopes for sleep.

How Can I tell Nhamo's Son

I knew that after the visit by Nhamo Junior son, my nights would be long and unbearable. 

They say one does not have to feel guilty over what happened during the war. 

The war is another time. Another country. One where one should never go back to. A time which a person should never live twice.

In most cases, the war will live forever in those involved. It becomes a scent. A smell that lingers after one has passed by.

It is there in the mind. All the voices. The images. The despair. The uncertainty. The fears. The insecurity.

Most who walked ahead of the pack did not return home. They fell. Today they are the unknown soldier. Real soldiers died. Most of us who returned leading the pack after the war were never at the front. 

We survived not because we were heroes but cowards.

Maybe what they say about heroes being the dead ones is true. I did not ask what Nhamo Junior wanted. But well, he said he was just passing by. Checking on me. He did not stay even.

I am tempted to tell him how his father died. But how will he feel? How will he look at me? I was there. I saw it.

When we buried the earth scooped from the mass grave behind the family's homestead, I thought I saw Nhamo's face floating before my eyes. 

I saw the blood spurting from the gap between his teeth. His eyes rolled back as his legs kicked. Then the eyes held still. And the body stiffened.

Yet what we buried that cold wintry day was a goat's head, some shrubs, a flag and then an elder planted a tree on the head of the grave.

I broke down in tears. My body shook. Nhamo's father referred to me as a hero. One who has helped the family to find closure. He said the family also viewed me as a son. And that I was free to visit any time and demand anything.

Nhamo's mother said while she was sad that Nhamo did not walk back home, she was consoled by the fact I had brought his spirit home.

I was touched. For a moment I almost told them the truth just like I want to tell Nhamo Junior the truth. But how would I be in their eyes? How would they take it. And what would the whole country say?

I was not the only one who returned from the war guilty. The only cowards who acted hero.

Even today, how can I tell them that I killed Nhamo? Oh God, bring back my sleep.