For 42 years, I was a primary school teacher. I died a miserable, poor, sick and frustrated woman. My late father was also a teacher, so are my other three younger sisters. Two of them ‘escaped’ to England at the height of Zimbabwe’s catastrophic economic decline – a decade pervaded with brutality, selective justice, impunity and systemic collapse of governance.
This was the self-inflicted crisis presided over by the ideologically derelict, plutocratic regime of the predatory Zimbabwe National African Union Patriotic Front. Like thousands of other post-Rhodesia teachers, my life was hostage to the curse of poverty. When Zanu (PF) succeeded the Rhodesia Front, the dignity and integrity of teaching was incrementally eroded, permanently shredded. Funny enough, President Robert Mugabe’s cronies boast how their nationalist policies ‘quadrupled enrolment’ and made ours a country with ‘one of the highest literacy rates in Africa.’ What an aberration!
Ian Smith was oppressive alright, yet his teachers were community gems, prized assets of star status; pioneers of quality life-style and fashion trends! Ironically, Mugabe and three quarters of his cabinet are former teachers. Shouldn’t they know better? They afforded houses, cars, groceries and new clothes. My father’s ‘colonial salary’ catered for his own family of eight and several other relatives.
There is something sinister about a politburo and Cabinet full of people with PhDs – whose policies impoverish teachers. For the past 30 years, Zanu (PF) has focused on quenching its insatiable desire for largesse and militarising unproductive state institutions. Much to the detriment of teachers’ welfare, they have only succeeded in heightening acrimony between the state and its employees. Millions of dollars are poured into bottomless canyons of dysfunctional parastatals while more are squandered on senseless oversees presidential, ministerial frolics and obscene patronage.
I never taught or encountered a child of a Zanu (PF) Minister in a poor primary school! Co-existing with leaking roofs, crowded classrooms, dusty floors, broken windows, and no textbooks is normal for most of our children and teachers – while Zanu (PF) glorifies legitimised pilfering, diamond looting and property plunder. Quality healthcare, a resort holiday or small car were beyond my wildest dreams. In short, to remain a school teacher was a sure way of accelerating my fate to this cold, dark, wet, airless tomb.
Colleagues in rural areas are perennially hounded by political rogues. Teachers’ work stations are turned into militia camps. They are routinely and systematically tortured for being ‘opposition’. A piece of advice: as you now enter a season of electoral anxiety, uncertainty and turbulence – vote only for a party that respects humanity, gives real hope for the future and adores teachers.
Be on the side of truth, fairness, integrity, honesty, justice and love. To my fellow teachers, if you decide to vote – which you should no matter how much you are intimidated or harassed – do not vote for Zanu (PF). ‘Soiling’ your ballot paper with a vote for Mugabe means eternally condemning yourselves to yet another era of poverty, destitution, hatred, greed and revenge. That’s my opinion, at least from where I stand, or more appropriately, from where I rest.
Post published in: Opinions & Analysis