Dying – for want of cough syrup

e same leader. At that time, in March 2005, inflation in Zimbabwe was 123% and we thought life was hard. We didn’t realise that we were about to enter the worst of times when you only bought petrol or diesel on the black market, when clean water from the tap would become a luxury and when electricity supplies would be interrupted every single day. It is hard to believe that just a year since those elections inflation has become unstoppable and is now officially quoted at 782%.

It is still incomprehensible that just a year ago there were many thousands of ordinary Zimbabweans surviving by making and selling goods on our road sides, pavements and flea markets. The vast majority of those people, cleared away in the government’s Operation Murambatsvina last winter, have not been seen again in our local neighbourhoods. The trauma of that cleansing remains with all of us, whether we were victims or eye witnesses: the sound of the bulldozers, the smell of dust and smoke and the sight of smashed homes and piles of rubble.
After a quarter of a century in power this is the legacy of our ruling party and now every single Zimbabwean asks just one question : how much longer? Week after week I have delayed writing about or commenting on the opposition MDC. I don’t want to have to write about sides and factions; about each insisting they are the official party, each saying they own the name, the slogan and the assets. Sadly though, it is still going on – the squabbles, bickering and accusations, and while it does, Zimbabweans, just ordinary men, women and children, are simply not coping anymore and are falling by the wayside.

This week I met a man I know who begged me to help him with money so that he could buy cough mixture for his two-month-old baby. Day and night this tiny baby coughs and coughs. The baby is weak and failing, the parents are exhausted and desperate but neither government clinic nor hospital can help – they have no cough medicine to dispense. 25- year-old promises of free health for all are mirages on a receding horizon. The man dragged a shaking hand over his face to wipe away exhaustion and tears as we talked about how to help his baby and the huge cost of a simple bottle of infant cough syrup. I do not have a direct line to Zanu (PF) or either of the two MDC’s but if I did I would say that what they are all doing is not in our name. While Zanu (PF) leaders warn and threaten and MDC leaders argue and accuse, people are barely alive out here, on the point of death for a spoon of cough syrup. Until next week, Ndini shamwari yenyu.