Two million feet salute Pan-Africanist President Mugabe
President Mugabe

President Mugabe

Stephen Mpofu
The earth shudders beneath two million feet – plus or minus – when the Million-Man March organised by Zanu-PF Youth League hits Harare today.

The faint-hearted political creatures will scamper to safety away from the route, or steal glances perched on trees or on buildings abutting the route of the march.

First, the march by delegates from all of Zimbabwe’s provinces suggests that the event goes beyond a fitting tribute to President Mugabe for the sterling and resolute dedication to nurturing the revolution that in 1980 brought the freedom that has somehow constipated some inverted patriots to the extent that they sup with those who rode on the backs of blacks in this country as though we were hobby horses.

In the circumstances, the darlings of the enemies of a free sovereign Zimbabwean state have switched off their consciences and in that way nullified any remembrance of the sacrifice that young men and young women paid with their lives to free our country.

These self-anointed nationalists will stop at nothing in furthering the agenda of the proponents of regime change because, it would appear, the sellouts believe they can maneuver their way into power riding on the back of regime change with which the West desired and still desires to achieve through their imposition of economic sanctions as a reprisal against land reform by the Zanu-PF government.

Secondly, the million-man march is a challenge to the youth taking part in it to model the selfless leadership of the man they are honouring as well as the love he has demonstrated for the motherland with his unflinching intrepidity in calling a spade a spade whenever imperialism has reared its ugly head.

The marchers should therefore see themselves as if cat walking on the ramp in a political pageantry from which the judges, in this case the public, will choose the political king from among them when the time is ripe.

The march will certainly have been in vain if none of those taking part in it eventually stands out as a leader credited with the same qualities that President Mugabe displays and of which the march is a celebration.

Of course, the net is cast over and beyond young men and women in the ruling party to catch those who belong to other political persuasions, or are still too young to participate in the march, to demonstrate the political mettle of Zimbabwe’s first President to become true stewards of the freedom and independence that did not come to this country on a platter but through the barrel of the AK rifle whose echoes across the country still reverberate musically as a reminder of the hard won independence so that no one goes to sleep over saturated with the warmth of freedom and then re-awaken under re-colonisation with all its dysfunctional repercussions.

The third and similarly significant dimension is that the two million or so feet march celebrates President Mugabe’s just ended remarkable terms as chairman of both the Southern African Development Committee and the African Union, respectively.

The AU succeeded the Organisation of African Unity and that the march this week takes place on Africa (Freedom) Day is not mere coincidence. On the contrary, the event should make contemporary Africans enter memory lane back to 1963 when founding fathers of independence sat around a table to found an organisation that would spearhead the freedom struggle and dismantle colonialism and its oppressive alien regimes on the African continent.

These leaders include Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana; Haile Selassie (Ethiopia); Jomo Kenyatta – Kenya; Ahmed Ben Bella of Algeria; Gamal Abdel Nasser of Egypt; Sekou Toure of Guinea; Modiba Kieta of Mali; King Hassan of Morocco, and Leopold Sedar Senghor and Julius Nyerere of Senegal and Tanzania respectively.

The OAU’s founding fathers set out goals that included:
·    The achievement of Africa’s total liberation;
·    To work for the unity of Africa;
·    To use this unity to entrench the rights of Africans and practice to self determination without foreign interference;
·    To use the unity to transform all of liberated Africa to work together to end poverty and under development and to achieve the continent’s renaissance or new beginning.

It is therefore no exaggeration for this pen to claim that President Mugabe’s iconic leadership of both the AU as well as SADC should be seen as furthering the spirit of freedom and total independence and sovereignty of Africa as envisaged by those selfless leaders who put their heads together in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia on 25 May 1963 to chart the way forward for Africa’s liberation and self determination in spearheading the continent to a brave new future.

Therefore any African leader who digresses from the ethos that the founders of the OAU sought to inculcate both among themselves and among future generations deserve to be branded sellouts of the African cause.

To this end Zimbabweans who aspire now and in the future to have their names immortalized in the archives of Africa’s political history alongside the architects of the freedom struggle on the continent should have the people coming first before their own interests so that they may stay the arduous political journey on the freedom road which is without end.

Which challenges the one million man marchers and other young men and women especially in Southern Africa to link their arms and stand together as impenetrable shields against religious terrorism which threatens to scuttle the freedom, peace and stability in our region.

Islamic terrorist organisation, Boko Haram which is causing mayhem in Nigeria and that country’s neighbours – killing thousands of innocent people, abducting many others and displacing still countless numbers of people from their homes to refuge in neighbouring states remains a threat to Zimbabwe and other states in this region as it is not beyond the terror organisation’s ability to extent its tentacles here.

As a matter of fact, fears are already quietly being expressed in religious circles that sections or a section the Church in Zimbabwe might predispose itself to being used as a Trojan horse to smuggle terrorists into this country.

Skeptics might dismiss those fears out of hand – a fatalistic act in this pen’s view, as the saying there is no smoke without fire is valid to a very large extent.

Schools are often chosen as fertile grounds to sow the seeds of terrorism as pupils are not so discerning as to differentiate between dysfunctional and destructive ideals of what they are taught and those that are meant to groom them into future responsible citizens.

Therefore the youth taking part in the one million man march and others belonging to different political parties in the country should act as guardians of peace and stability as none of them would surely wish to inherit leadership positions in future in a country torn apart by terrorists of whatever stripe.

It is to be hoped, however, that the powers that be in Zimbabwe and elsewhere in SADC will take such measures as they deem necessary to ensure that religious terrorism remains an unwanted import commodity to Southern Africa so that there is no disruption to efforts to industrialize our economies under a stable environment of peace and stability for the good of all the people of this region.

You Might Also Like

Comments