‘THE ‘ WOKE’ FOOTBALL CLUB’ ( Part 1)
By Aaron Gono
The recently passed Patriotic Bill has been received by many Zimbabweans, as just another piece of stuff, employed to thwart criticism of the current ruling Zanu PF party.
Some few Pan- Africanists hail it as good for the country. Zimbabweans are currently deeply polarised along political lines, ideologies of the current ruling Zanu PF are now commonly called ‘ thieves or looters.’ Labeling and some form of McCarthyism is now propagating its seeds, as Zimbabweans are now heading for the harmonised elections in August 2023. Followers of the popular opposition party are also labeled Western stooges by Zanu PF stalwarts.
I always wonder why, this type of hate speech in social media platforms amongst Zimbabweans is allowed to proliferate? Should politics define who l am and who to hate? Should politics allow one, to have the power to beat or kill somebody?
Why can’t the voices of reason prevail, where Zimbabwean citizens are allowed to commodify their party manifestos, so that individuals can freely choose, who to vote for.
Isn’t development by the legislators the benchmark of being voted in again by the electorate? I remember the former War Veteran leader Jabulani Sibanda, decrying non- performing legislators as culprits for inciting violence, as they would like to be voted in once again, but they have nothing to show for their terms in power.
As Zimbabweans, we boast of being one of the most literate countries in Africa, what do we have to offer to fellow Africans as a sign of a highly educated society, unfortunately we are always found wanting and catastrophizing.
And some of our best minds are tucked in far away distant lands, where they can critique anything Zimbabwean as a relic of antiquity, inane and inept lot. Many Zimbabweans go abroad when they feel like doing something for their country, mostly they attack the Zimbabwean government on its handling of the economy which remains in a mess for two decades.
Some Pan Africanists do not blame the leadership of Zimbabwe as responsible for the economic meltdown but look further at the primary rather than the secondary issues of the Zimbabwean economic moribund.
Some clever blacks in the country and abroad always take a dig at Zanu PF, for bringing in the mess. They accuse it of corruption, poor governance and wasteful expenditure. If it purchases, for example the current shipment of helicopters, they will start by giving Zimbabweans back home the actual cost of each, and accusing the procurement guys of tampering with invoices.
Some will further ask, why didn’t they buy automobile ambulances, which suit our local environment? Their accusations might be correct if you look at it from a layman’ s view. But the complexities involving the whole deal will be unknown to them.
By trying to justify their allegations, only anxiety among the audience receiving this information will simply tell them that they are doomed to be Zimbabweans.
Clever blacks now constitute anyone who owns a smartphone as they are all citizen journalists, feeding garbage in and garbage out (producers and consumers). As democracy is the word commonly applied to remind the meek that they have the right to express themselves as it is guaranteed in our Constitution.
The media provide checks and balances on public figures not to abuse the power of their offices. It also helps the citizenry to contribute to public debates which help boost the country’ s democracy. Now the ‘ Woke Football Club’ which represents fighters for social justice, are now very difficult to handle as they politicize anything they touch as suspicious.
The ‘ Woke players’ quickly want to adopt anything foreign as a sign of modernity and some quick grasp of world modern trends. Recently Sweden declared sex as sport. The woke players instead of saying no, this is anathema to our culture, they will advocate for their governments in Africa to follow suit. This laissez- faire approach is what the players always want Africans institutions to adopt as it is promoted in the Western culture.
At the end of the day the African culture will be diluted and disjointed that calling them Africans will not tally, as they will have lost anything that identifies them as so. This what is called cultural imperialism, in pursuit of something alien , your culture risk extinction.
America has threatened Uganda with punitive actions for passing a law banning LGBTQL + in the country. Still we find some clever blacks condemning the Ugandan leader for such a stance against the intrusion of foreign culture in his country. This simply expose the American hypocrisy, Middle East countries have banned all these nuisances in their countries but the Western world never sanctioned one, instead they awarded them the hosting of the world football cup tournament last year in Qatar.
Workers who died of heat stroke and some work related accidents building the stadia, were never mentioned as most of them were from third World countries. I am not inciting hatred towards the Westerners but only highlighting their shortcomings. To the suprise of some African scholars, neither did our African countries force-feed them with our ‘ Gule waMkulu, Mbakumba, lmbaqanga dances, or any pagan African rites.
We keep this to ourselves, and why do Western countries want to penalize Africa in disbelieving their norms and values, to us it’s un- African. Is that a sign of love of promoting pornographic and gay/ lesbian relationships on us?
We did accept their Hollywood movies, pop, funk, rock and country music but accepting more of this will be sleeping on duty on African leaders.
Agenda setting (selective representation of stories) is something the Western media apply to third world countries on which stories to include and exclude.
If it is war, conflict and pestilence like the AIDS pandemic, you might think Africa created those diseases to punish its children. These stories can be repeated till one understands every tiny detail of the stereotyped presentations of events and starts self doubting him/herself and the ‘ Stockholm Syndrome ‘ will creep in. The Woke team will start blaming African governments of not paying attention to detail, neglecting their populations to the vagaries of the modern world.
The late President of Zimbabwe, Robert Mugabe was given names for denying the growing of genetically modified products in the country. He knew the effects of those products as not good for the health of Zimbabweans. But was castigated as myopic and a leader without people at heart. This earned him the moniker ‘ dictator’.
But he wasn’t diktating, he was safeguarding his flock, something that that earns you the wrath of the Western community till to the third generation.
