Bye, Bye Mugabe and other Stories

I am very glad and grateful to the Almighty God, the author, creator and maker of my life and my genius for the publication of my new book, "Bye, Bye Mugabe" in Nigeria.
This calls for a celebration, because of the importance of this book in my literary career.

Contents
DEDICATION
BYE, BYE MUGABE
WINDS OF FIRE, WINDS OF CHANGE
A TWIST OF FATE
SHE CAME IN THE RAIN
THE GHOSTS OF AUSCHWITZ
BEYOND THE SEA
MEMORIES OF A REFUGEE CHILD
AFTER THE COUP
LOVE CHILD
THE SHOCKING NEWS
TSUNAMIPHOBIA
MY EARTH, MY CITY AND MY HEARTTHROB
DAUGHTER OF A BEGGAR
LOVE SONG

ISBN 978-978-085-345-9

Copyright © 2008 by Ekenyerengozi Michael Chima


Packaged & Printed in Nigeria by Mareshah Publishing
+234 (0)805 691 8182.


All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or part without
Permission from the publisher is prohibited.


"Bye, Bye Mugabe" is my third major book. My first major book "Children of Heaven" was published by Krystal Publications in 1987 in Nigeria, the second book "Scarlet Tears of London" was published by my King of Kings Books International and distributed by Lulu.com, Amazon, Barnes & Noble and many others outside Nigeria, and the third one "Bye, Bye, Mugabe" is published by Mareshah.

I always say let your works speak for you, because your works will prove your worth.

"Bye, Bye Mugabe" is the first book of my prose fiction in short stories on the existential realities of life on earth. There are love stories based on true life experiences, the nightmares of the victims of President Robert Mugabe in Zimbabwe, the Niger Delta crisis, The Holocaust of World War Two, the Nigerian civil war, Tsunami Disaster and other incidents in Nigeria and other parts of the world.

I lost seven of my unpublished novels in Lagos, and I want to rewrite the most important ones.

I have two more books to be published before the end of this year and each one means a lot to me and the rest of the world.

I have two editors who are higly recommended. Josephine Dee in Nigeria and Pamela Guerrieri, who has judged the Christy Awards, the RWA Awards, and the ECPA Book of the Year Awards in America.

A Decade of Suffering in Zimbabwe

President Robert Mugabe

March 24, 2008
Development Policy Analysis no. 5

A Decade of Suffering in Zimbabwe: Economic Collapse and Political Repression under Robert Mugabe

by David Coltart

On March 29, 2008, Zimbabwe will hold presidential and parliamentary elections. Few people believe that they will be free and fair or that Robert Mugabe and his Zimbabwe African National Union– Patriotic Front party will fail to return to office.

That is a tragedy, because Mugabe and his cronies are chiefly responsible for an economic meltdown that has turned one of Africa's most prosperous countries into a country with one of the lowest life expectancies in the world. Since 1994, the average life expectancy in Zimbabwe has fallen from 57 years to 34 years for women and from 54 years to 37 years for men. Some 3,500 Zimbabweans die every week from the combined effects of HIV/AIDS, poverty, and malnutrition. Half a million Zimbabweans may have died already. There is no freedom of speech or assembly in Zimbabwe, and the state has used violence to intimidate and murder its opponents.

At the root of Zimbabwe's problems is a corrupt political elite that has, with considerable international support, behaved with utter impunity for some two decades. This elite is determined to hang on to power no matter what the consequences, lest it be held to account for the genocide in Matabeleland in the early 1980s and the wholesale looting of Zimbabwe that followed the mismanaged land reform in 2000.

When change comes to Zimbabwe, the nation will have to rediscover the rule of law and the sanctity of persons and property. The public discourse and the economy will have to be reopened. The new government will have to embrace a more limited idea of government and rescind legislation that makes the operation of the private sector next to impossible. Moreover, the new government will have to find a way for the people of Zimbabwe to heal the wounds caused by decades of political violence.

Read the full report in Pdf.

~ David Coltart is a member of the Parliament of Zimbabwe. Affiliated with the Movement for Democratic Change, he represents the Bulawayo South Constituency and serves as the shadow justice minister.

Latest News From Zimbabwe: Bush Blasts Mugabe

Bush: Mugabe Has Ruined Zimbabwe



Zimbabwe Opposition Faction In Alliance With ZANU-PF Rebel Makoni



Zimbabwean Annual Inflation Surges To Official 66,000% In December


Makoni Promises Reconciliation As One Cure for Zimbabwe's Problems
Zimbabwe Election Authorities Again Extend Voter Registration Deadline
Economic Hard Times Makes for a Frugal Valentines Day in Zimbabwe
Zimbabwe's Gunners Football Club Prepares For Premier League Debut
Zimbabwe Presidential Candidates Makoni And Tsvangirai Square Off
Zimbabwe Presidential Challenger Outlines Platform
Some Zimbabwean Voters Find Their Names Missing From Voter Rolls
Zimbabwe NGO Warns Political Violence Rising As Elections Approach
Zimbabwean Women's Activist Group Charges Police Beatings In Protest
Zimbabwe's Dynamos Reinforced By Marere In African Champions League
Britain Joins Chorus Of Concern Over Approaching Zimbabwe Elections
Human Rights Body Says Zimbabwe Not Ready For Elections
Maize Meal, Zimbabwean Staple Food, Hard To Find And Expensive
Women Activists Demonstrate For Child Rights In Bulawayo, Zimbabwe
Zimbabwe's Ruling ZANU-PF Party Perplexed By Makoni Upstart Candidacy
Voter Registration & Verification Extended In Zimbabwe - But Until When?
Zimbabwe’s Opposition Sure of Victory in General Elections
Power Outages And Water Shortages In Zimbabwe Becoming Chronic
Zimbabwe Presidential Hopeful Makoni Urged To Seek Opposition Allies
US Expresses 'Very Serious Concern' About Zimbabwe March Elections
Mugabe Challenger From Zimbabwe Ruling Party Denies Western Backing
Zimbabwe Ruling Party Riven By Divisions, Distrust With Elections Looming
Zimbabwe Opposition Members Criticize Candidate Selection Process

"Bye Bye Mugabe" is Out!

My historical fiction of the agonies in Zimbabwe under the draconian rule of President Robert Mugabe, "Bye Bye Mugabe" is live on Amazon.

Domboramwari, a young Zimbabwean blogger and proofreader for the Zimbabwean Times was sympathetic to President Robert Mugabe. But Domboramwari had to go on exile to escape from political persecution when he refused to join the notorious Green Bombers after collecting the financial payment to do so. He fled with his South African girlfriend Nkosi to Johannesburg after telling his old uncle. And he had to help in digging a grave to bury the dead grandson of his mother's neighbor. This is the story of the millions of the traumatized Zimbabweans suffering under the draconian rule of one of the worst dictators in Africa.

"When you give someone a book, you don't give him just paper, ink, and glue. You give him the possibility of a whole new life."
– Christopher Morley, 1890-1957, Novelist, Journalist and Poet

I Saw Mugabe in Another Dream

I saw President Robert Mugabe visitng Nigeria and he came with his family.

This time, he was looking older than the last dream and he was saying something to me that I forgot when I woke up.

I wonder why Mugabe is showing up in my dreams.

Piling on Mugabe: A Better Metaphor

Piling on Mugabe: A Better Metaphor

~ By Rudolph Lewis
The Publisher/Editor of Chickenbones



Ablorh, you're probably right. I don't know. You're probably much more informed about the African situation than I, and more specifically the Zimbabwe dilemma. I'm being rather intuitive about the whole situation. My tendency is to grant Mugabe the utmost respect and dignity for his past sacrifices, regardless of his errors. I have heard arguments on both sides from both black and white. Those arguments opposed to Mugabe have been mostly absurd and mostly racist (coming from the USA and the UK). One Zimbabwean detractor said that they were better off under Ian Smith! That's how far his detractors have gone.

I am not opposed to criticism of Mugabe. Read the short story by Zimbabwe: In The House of Stone by Ekenyerengozi Michael Chima, which deals with the out-migration to South Africa. I cannot/will not deny any of the problems of Zimbabwe, though many of them are common to other African nations. But Mugabe detractors try to make them peculiar to Zimbabwe. I have heard them on BBC, radio, TV, online.

For me the worst mismanagement of an African nation occurs in Sudan. I have yet to hear the kind of vilification of Bashir from Washington and London that I hear about Mugabe on media outlets from those countries, especially the BBC. For me there is something wrong with that picture, sadly wrong. And as long as Bashir remains sitting pretty in eyes from those capitols, there will be no shaming of Mugabe coming from me.

I have no problem with your baseball metaphor. You use it however inappropriately. Mugabe is not a pitcher to be yanked out of a game; he is the manager, more, the CEO of the team, responsible to his corporate investors, in this case the Zimbabwe people. Your metaphor, for me, indicates to me how the man as head of state has been diminished in the popular press.

My metaphor comes from football. The player stumbles and falls and his opponents though he is down piles on. Maybe I am being perverse here and argumentative to no end. But I am being sincere, and possibly excessively sentimental. I'm willing to allow the Zimbabweans to work out their problems. It is within reach. But certainly I will not be adding to Western anti-Mugabe propaganda, even if means I lose every friend and associate I have.

Mugabe is fighting back, admirably. Read his UN Speech (President Robert G. Mugabe's UN Speech), possibly he is headed toward martyrdom. If it must be, let it be. But I know such hatred. It reminds me very much of that which was leveled on MLK while he lived. His detractors from all quarters were just as unfair and envious as those we have today with Mugabe. They wanted him to step down. They offered him a college presidency, all kinds of goodies. And when he continued to resist, they assassinated him.

That looks to me what some Western nations desire, are prompting, and some of their black stooges will love it too and when he is dead they will cry their crocodile tears and build a monument in his name. Such too was the case with Nkrumah.



Jane Musoke-Nteyafas on Professor Rudolp Lewis:
First published: April 18, 2006

For those with an interest and involvement in the writing and publishing industry, especially when it comes to black culture, his name would be familiar. Rudolph Lewis is one of the hardest working, dedicated and respected men in the online publishing world. Yet very little is known about his personal life. He is the editor and founder of Chickenbones: A Journal for Literary and Artistic African-American Themes (www.nathanielturner.com). This is an educational web site which explores black culture with the aims of uplifting and educating black people as well as non black people about black culture.

Initiated in the fall of 2001, Chickenbones: A Journal has accumulated a faithful following of readers as well as a wide range of literary contributors from all over the world. In 2005, Chickenbones attracted about 5,000 visitors on a daily basis and is already exceeding 1 million visitors for the year 2006. This is a meteoric rise from 2003 when traffic included about 500,000 visitors. Chickenbones has produced and featured the works of several celebrated and new writers including Kalamu Ya Salaam, Amiri Baraka, Zora Neale Hurston, Askia Touré, Niyi Osundare, Latorial Faison, Lasana Sekou, Ras Baraka, DB Cox, Stacey Tolbert, Nicholas Berdyaev, Kiini Ibura Salaam, Kola Boof,Danyel Smith, Yambo Ouologuem, Claire Carew and Drisana Deborah Jack to mention a few. Chickenbones is in short, a national treasure.

Behind all that work is Rudolph Lewis. Lewis is a prolific writer of the Black Arts Movement generation. He is the author of numerous essays, poems, interviews and articles for various journals. He has also done editorial jobs with positions such as the editor of I Am New Orleans & Other Poems by Marcus Bruce Christian. New Orleans: Xavier Review Press, 1999, Editorial Assistant Labor's Heritage, Spring 1997. Contributing Editor The New Laurel Review, Spring/Fall 1984; Spring/Fall 1987 Editor (& Founder) CRICKET: Poems and Other Jazz. New Orleans, 1985.

Literature has always been a part of his life. Lewis was also an English and Literature instructor at the following institutions: Coppin State College, University of New Orleans, Northeast Louisiana University, and the University of District of Columbia. He has in addition reviewed several books and performed interviews with notable writers such as Yusef Komunyakaa. Yet despite all this, he has never been interviewed in any literary magazine. So it was a great pleasure to be able to pay homage to this illustrious writer/poet/editor/publisher and instructor by interviewing him and getting his readers and supporters to know more about the amazing presence behind Chickenbones. He shared several things with me; among them, his love for New Orleans, the origins of Chickenbones, his relationship with several historic icons and his beautiful poetry on women.

President Robert G. Mugabe's UN Speech on September 26, 2007

I lost eleven precious years of my life in the jail of a white man whose freedom and well-being

I have assured from the first day of Zimbabwe's Independence.

I lost a further fifteen years fighting white injustice in my country.



Statement by His Excellency the President of the Republic of Zimbabwe

Comrade R. G. Mugabe,

on the occasion of the 62nd Session of the United Nations General Assembly,

New York, 26 September, 2007

Your Excellency, President of the 62nd Session of the United Nations General Assembly, Mr. Srgjan Kerim

Your Majesties

Your Excellencies, Heads of State and Government

Your Excellency the Secretary-General of the United Nations, Mr. Ban Ki-Moon

Distinguished Delegates

Ladies and Gentlemen.


Mr. President,

Allow me to congratulate you on your election to preside over this august assembly. We are confident that through your stewardship, issues on this 62nd Session agenda be dealt with in a balanced manner and to the satisfaction of all.

Let me also pay tribute to your predecessor, Madame Sheikha Haya Rashed Al Khalifa, who steered the work of the 61st Session in a very competent and impartial manner.

Her ability to identify the crucial issues facing the world today will be remembered as the hallmark of her presidency.

Mr. President,

We extend our hearty welcome to the new Secretary-General, Mr. Ban Ki-Moon, who has taken up this challenging job requiting dynamism in confronting the global challenges of the 21st Century. Balancing global interests and steering the United Nations in a direction that gives hope to the multitudes of the poor, the sick, the hungry and the marginalized, is indeed a mammoth task. We would like to assure him that Zimbabwe will continue to support an open, transparent and all-inclusive multilateral approach in dealing with these global challenges.

Mr. President,

Climate change is one of the most pressing global issues of our time. Its negative impact is greatest in developing countries, particularly those on the African continent. We believe that if the international community is going to seriously address the challenges of climate change, then we need to get our priorities right. In Zimbabwe, the effects of climate change have become more evident in the past decade as we have witnessed increased and recurrent droughts as well as occasional floods, leading to enormous humanitarian challenges.

Mr. President,

We are for a United Nations that recognises the equality of sovereign nations and peoples whether big or small. We are averse to a body in which the economically and militarily powerful behave like bullies, trampling on the rights of weak and smaller states as sadly happened in Iraq. In the light of these inauspicious developments, this Organisation must surely examine the essence of its authority and the extent of its power when challenged in this manner.

Such challenges to the authority of the UN and its Charter underpin our repeated call for the revitalisation of the United Nations General Assembly, itself the most representative organ of the UN. The General Assembly should be more active in all areas including those of peace and security. The encroachment of some U.N. organs upon the work of the General Assembly is of great concern to us. Thus any process of revitalizing or strengthening of the General Assembly should necessarily avoid eroding the principle of the accountability of all principal and subsidiary organs to the General Assembly.

Mr. President,

Once again we reiterate our position that the Security Council as presently constituted is not democratic. In its present configuration, the Council has shown that it is not in a position to protect the weaker states who find themselves at loggerheads with a marauding super-power. Most importantly, justice demands that any Security Council reform redresses the fact that Africa is the only continent without a permanent seat and veto power in the Security Council. Africa's demands are known and enunciated in the Ezulwini consensus.

Mr. President,

We further call for the U.N. system to refrain from interfering in matters that are clearly the domain of member states and are not a threat to international peace and security. Development at country level should continue to be country-led, and not subject to the whims of powerful donor states.

Mr President,

Zimbabwe won its independence on 18th April, 1980, after a protracted war against British colonial imperialism which denied us human rights and democracy. That colonial system which suppressed and oppressed us enjoyed the support of many countries of the West who were signatories to the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Even after 1945, it would appear that the Berlin Conference of 1884, through which Africa was parcelled to colonial European powers, remained stronger than the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. It is therefore clear that for the West, vested economic interests, racial and ethnocentric considerations proved stronger than their adherence to principles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

The West still negates our sovereignties by way of control of our resources, in the process making us mere chattels in out own lands, mere minders of its trans-national interests. In my own country and other sister states in Southern Africa, the most visible form of this control has been over land despoiled from us at the onset of British colonialism.

That control largely persists, although it stands firmly challenged in Zimbabwe, thereby triggering the current stand-off between us and Britain, supported by her cousin states, most notably the United States and Australia. Mr Bush, Mr. Blair and now Mr Brown's sense of human rights precludes our people's right to their God-given resources, which in their view must be controlled by their kith and kin. I am termed dictator because I have rejected this supremacist view and frustrated the neo-colonialists.

Mr President,

Clearly the history of the struggle for out own national and people's rights is unknown to the president of the United States of America. He thinks the Declaration of Human Rights starts with his last term in office! He thinks she can introduce to us, who bore the brunt of fighting for the freedoms of our peoples, the virtues of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. What rank hypocrisy!

Mr President,

I lost eleven precious years of my life in the jail of a white man whose freedom and well- being I have assured from the first day of Zimbabwe's Independence. I lost a further fifteen years fighting white injustice in my country.

Ian Smith is responsible for the death of well over 50 000 of my people. I bear scars of his tyranny which Britain and America condoned. I meet his victims everyday. Yet he walks free. He farms free. He talks freely, associates freely under a black Government.

We taught him democracy. We gave him back his humanity.

He would have faced a different fate here and in Europe if the 50 000 he killed were Europeans. Africa has not called for a Nuremberg trial against the white world which committed heinous crimes against its own humanity. It has not hunted perpetrators of this genocide, many of whom live to this day, nor has it got reparations from those who offended against it. Instead it is Africa which is in the dock, facing trial from the same world that persecuted it for centuries.

Let Mr. Bush read history correctly. Let him realise that both personally and in his representative capacity as the current President of the United States, he stands for this "civilisation" which occupied, which colonised, which incarcerated, which killed. He has much to atone for and very little to lecture us on the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. His hands drip with innocent blood of many nationalities.

He still kills.

He kills in Iraq. He kills in Afghanistan. And this is supposed to be out master on human rights?

He imprisons.

He imprisons and tortures at Guantanamo. He imprisoned and tortured at Abu Ghraib. He has secret torture chambers in Europe. Yes, he imprisons even here in the United States, with his jails carrying more blacks than his universities can ever enroll. He even suspends the provisions of the Universal Declaration on Human Rights. Take Guantanamo for example; at that concentration camp international law does not apply. The national laws of the people there do not apply. Laws of the United States of America do not apply. Only Bush's law applies. Can the international community accept being lectured by this man on the provisions of the universal declaration of human rights? Definitely not!

Mr President, We are alarmed that under his leadership, basic rights of his own people and those of the rest of the world have summarily been rolled back. America is primarily responsible for rewriting core tenets of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. We seem all guilty for 9/11. Mr. Bush thinks he stands above all structures of governance, whether national or international.

At home, he apparently does not need the Congress. Abroad, he does not need the UN, international law and opinion. This forum did not sanction Blair and Bush's misadventures in Iraq. The two rode roughshod over the UN and international opinion. Almighty Bush is now coming back to the UN for a rescue package because his nose is bloodied! Yet he dares lecture us on tyranny. Indeed, he wants us to praise him! We say No to him and encourage him to get out of Iraq. Indeed he should mend his ways before he clambers up the pulpit to deliver pieties of democracy.

Mr President,

The British and the Americans have gone on a relentless campaign of destabilising and vilifying my country. They have sponsored surrogate forces to challenge lawful authority in my country. They seek regime change, placing themselves in the role of the Zimbabwean people in whose collective will democracy places the right to define and change regimes.

Let these sinister governments be told here and now that Zimbabwe will not allow a regime change authored by outsiders. We do not interfere with their own systems in America and Britain. Mr Bush and Mr Brown have no role to play in our national affairs. They are outsiders and mischievous outsiders and should therefore keep out! The colonial sun set a long time ago; in 1980 in the case of Zimbabwe, and hence Zimbabwe will never be a colony again. Never!

We do not deserve sanctions. We are Zimbabweans and we know how to deal with our problems. We have done so in the past, well before Bush and Brown were known politically. We have our own regional and continental organizations and communities.

In that vein, I wish to express my country's gratitude to President Thabo Mbeki of South Africa who, on behalf of SADC, successfully facilitated the dialogue between the Ruling Party and the Opposition Parties, which yielded the agreement that has now resulted in the constitutional provisions being finally adopted. Consequently, we will be holding multiple democratic elections in March 2008. Indeed we have always had timely general and presidential elections since our independence.

Mr. President,

In conclusion, let me stress once more that the strength of the United Nations lies in its universality and impartiality as it implements its mandate to promote peace and security, economic and social development, human rights and international law as outlined in the Charter. Zimbabwe stands ready to play its part in all efforts and programmes aimed at achieving these noble goals.

I thank you.