The Hard Way for Africans

I had to write this letter so that I can also contribute in shaping democracy in the SADC region. It is an opportunity for most of SADC community to communicate in matters relating to the Zimbabwe issue, the SA attitude towards the Africans, and the role that the youth should be playing in politics. The level of understanding of politics by some South Africans is not impressing at all. I say this because we will be going for elections next year, but I foresee that some people might not be taking part on them because that some are disgruntled.

My contribution to the SADC region is that it is some opportunity for us to unite and form one block that might be able to fight the Western domination over us. Our economy is being controlled by some elite group (the western power) that is making decisions on our behalf –by means of controlling food prices as it is the case today. We can only unit on this if we stop trading with countries of the West who keeps on dictating terms on us. We should just request that we go for a state of isolation in the whole SADC region, and that we can have some time to debate differences that we might be having. For example, as South Africans, we are still far from being united - the Tswanas have their own understanding of matters, the Xhosas on the other hand have the same attitude towards other groups. When listening to some radio talk shows, you can notice that this country is divided - the blacks will have their own understanding of matters in discussion, and the whites on the other hand will also have a different opinion on the matter at hand. The ANCYL should have tried to organize youth in all spectrums of society and should have led public debates on this, but it did not stick to what OR would have envisaged on the youth of today. The west will continue using these gaps and influence what happens in our society, if you look at some Africans coming from other countries, they come with only one mission of developing themselves under sever conditions and they are able to make it in our markets. Do you blame them? Do you blame the apartheid? These are some of the challenges that we are still facing in shaping our democracy in this region.

If we can just sit and think, we can use the current situation as an opportunity that might develop our way of living. We can just go for a state of isolation and trade amongst ourselves, anyone willing to trade with us should go via the SADC. During this time, we will be discussing issues that we should have discussed sometime ago -how will we have one currency? What education system should we follow? Which language can we use when we communicate amongst ourselves -should we adopt Swahili or continue using the language of the Holly King and Queen English? What agenda should we follow -who are we serving? do South Africans able to have "ubuntu" to other SADC community members e.g., someone coming from Angola? These are some of the few issues that can be placed in the table for discussions to the SADC agenda. Let us put the notice for this on the UN table and the deadline is 2012. When looking at the Zimbabwe elections and results, I have an understanding that our leaders who are leading the SADC on the Zimbabwe issue are still on the right path. This is because most people in the world are for the view that Mr. Mugabe has lost the elections and that he should just go and leave the office, but this can be a problem for the incoming president. Most soldiers, police, civil servants are still loyal to the ZANU' s politburo and will not serve either Tswangarayi or Makoni at this stage. Yes, the MDC has won the parliamentary elections and can only use this opportunity in infiltrating the ranks of decision making for Zimbabwe during the first five years. They can either negotiate that the position of a Prime Minister be introduced and be filled with one of the above mentioned leaders, with constitutional amendments that should go the parliament that will be shaping the government of national unity. The main aim to be in power in any democracy is to serve the nation and thus I call upon both camps to sit down and follow what the Kenya has done in the few recent weeks.

Our (as South Africans) attitude should change towards people coming from the northern parts of Africa and have some tolerance towards them. We will not be able to say that the SADC leadership is wrong on the decisions that it has taken till far, because a lot of havoc has been avoided and that there was no crisis during the elections in Zimbabwe. People should understand that the fight for neo-colonialisation is not yet over, so 'aluta continua' as Cde Samora would say, our economic system has been infiltrated by opportunistic individuals who would only want to gain as much as they can on our gold, platinum or any mineral that we produce. The question is are we all for the idea of African development or that people should serve their masters and have dual citizenship and /or double agenda in our parliaments? When you look at some political parties in this country, you would wonder who is it that they want for ensuring that we have patriotism in this county at least by 2012. The challenge we face not only as Africans, but the whole global village is, if leaders are serving people why do they develop a notion of becoming greedy? Why a group of people would want to form some elite class and forget about the humanness while the brother next door will be sleeping without some bread on the table?

I have only raised these concerns so that we can promote the culture of talking amongst ourselves, responding to challenges like: - Who should lead us? If you are tasked, then why do we loose confidence in you? Did you serve the people well in that they would keep you in their minds? Are we fit to take control of our lives from western domination? You end with more questions than answers, but one thing that most of us will agree upon is that at this time we should be moving towards maintaining peace in the global politics and stop the double agenda. Why will it be wrong for Mugabe and not for Bush or Blair because they have also attacked Iraq despite marches that were conducted around the world calling 'NO TO WAR', 'NO OIL FOR FOOD', etc and look at what they have done. A lot of people are still dying in those parts of the world and no one has called for justice for both of these leaders at the International Court for crimes that are still going in Iraq and Palestine.

Zolisa

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