In the Dark

In the Dark

Yesterday afternoon I was at the Downtown Shopping Mall with Kupela, who was looking for a car at Japan.Salaula.Com. ‘I’ll find you back here,’ I said, ‘I need a drink.’

Going down the corridor, I came to a row of windows all painted over in gothic letters saying In the Dark. I pushed on an elaborate chromium handle, and in I went. Sure enough, I was completely in the dark.

I stood there, waiting for my eyes to adjust, I finally made out the shape of a chair, and sat down. I could just see that I was sitting at a black table in a large black room. A row of white teeth suddenly appeared in front of me.

He put out his hand to shake mine, and then spoke authoritatively into the darkness, ‘Bring a double brandy for Spectator Kalaki!’

‘You know my name?’ I asked, more than a little surprised.

‘You may be in the dark,’ he laughed gruffly. ‘But I’m not.’

Suddenly the darkness was pierced by a few pencil beams of green laser light, just enough to reveal a thin bony man with black suit and black shirt and black tie. He had a thin face, shaped like a hatchet.

‘I seem to recognize the face,’ I said.

‘Whiplash Bandit,’ he replied, ‘I’m the Protector General.’

‘Sounds interesting,’ I said hopefully. ‘What do you protect?’

‘I thought you knew these things, Kalaki. I protect the rich from the poor, the powerful from the weak, and leaders from the led.’

‘Ah ha,’ I said, ‘Now I recognize you. You work for the MMD!’

‘Not the Movement for Marketing Dictatorship,’ he replied. ‘The Militia for Modifying Dissidents.’

Just then the drinks arrived, as if from nowhere, and an invisible voice announced ‘A lemon juice for Mr Bandit and a double brandy for Mr Kalaki.’ Then a swinging laser beams briefly illuminated the owner of the voice, an angel carved out of pure black ebony with black hair and wearing a black apron. ‘Thanks,’ I said, then watched transfixed as her beautiful blackness swayed rhythmically away into the blackness.

‘As far as I can make out,’ I said, as I gulped down the entire brandy, ‘she’s not wearing anything except that little black velvet apron.’

‘She’s one of the Nude Nubile Nubians from Nubia,’ he smiled, revealing a gold tooth. ‘They fetch a good price down in Hillbrow. Here in Lusaka, we’re on the main trade route.’

‘What about human rights?’

‘Exactly,’ he snarled. ‘We don’t want human rights interfering with good business. That’s why we must vote for the MMD.’

‘Half a minute,’ I said, ‘I thought you said your MMD is not anything to do with the MMD?’

‘Quite right,’ he said. ‘The Militia for Modifying Dissidents is a business organization, set up by the Godfather of the Nation, to protect big business from any unnecessary change in the political system.’

‘So you are working for the Movement for Marketing Dictatorship!’

‘Big business is non-political,’ explained Bandit. ‘We’re not interested in one party or the other. We work at modifying dissidents because we want stability. We’re naturally conservative. Big business just doesn’t like change.’

‘Why not?’

‘Take the present system of corruption. If the government changes, how shall a businessman know which one to bribe? How much to pay? He could easily get arrested for bribing the wrong person! His business could collapse!’

‘Better not to bribe!’

‘Bribery is only part of it. We have a system for avoiding tax. Half the copper on the black market. All the emeralds under the radar. Pay ten percent and you can do anything. That’s why the economy is developing, because we business people are accumulating capital rapidly!’

‘And it could all change?’

‘Exactly. We could get some nutter voted in by promising to collect all the surplus money as taxes and using it to pay the poor and starving! Or putting up wages so we can’t employ anybody! Or wasting money on the dying! The whole nation could be destitute within ninety days!’

‘You have to save the nation!’

‘Exactly. These dissidents are obviously trying to use this election to undermine the government! Treason! They even admit that they oppose the legitimate government of the day! We must stop them!’

‘Kill them?’

‘Oh no, we’re opposed to violence. We just buy their voters cards, give them sugar and mealie-meal. Bicycles and chitenges. Beer and roast beef! We’re a benevolent organization, just like the Rotary Club.’

‘No violence at all?’

‘Never. Not unless they insult our Godfather, then we shall come down on them heavily. If they talk too much, we shall cut out their tongues. And of course if they raise their fists in the air, we shall have no option but to shoot!’

‘Protect the government from being overthrown!’

‘Exactly! Protect the nation! Instill discipline! Maintain the rule of law! The police will help us! They’re on our side!’

‘Thanks for the chat,’ I said, as I made for the door. ‘I’ve got enough for this week’s article!’

‘Feel free,’ he sneered. ‘Nobody believes a word you say!’

I walked out from the dark, into the bright light of day, to find Kupela laughing with her friend Lorraine. ‘Everything may seem happy and marvelous to you!’ I exclaimed, ‘but I just found something very dark and dangerous!’

‘Poor old bally,’ laughed Kupela. ‘It’s all in your mind!’

Kiss of Death

Kiss of Death

‘Grandpa,’ pleaded Thoko, ‘Tell us a story before we go to bed.’

‘You’re far too old for fairy stories,’ I replied.

‘Then tell us a horror story,’ said Khoza.

‘Once upon a time,’ I began, ‘in the Land of Zed, the Great Leader died suddenly and there was nobody to replace him.’

‘Why not?’ demanded Thoko.

‘Because in those days,’ I explained, ‘a leader always threw all his competitors in jail, or had them murdered, and instead surrounded himself with complete dunderheads who were too stupid to topple him.’

‘So how did they find a new leader?’ asked Thoko.

‘The elders went to the Leaders Graveyard,’ I said, ‘and started digging, to see if there was any life left in any of their dead leaders.’

‘Uhhgghhh,’ said Thoko with a shudder. ‘How disgusting!’

‘And did they find one?’ asked Khoza.

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘They found a grave marked King Nyamasoya, Born 937, Died 1008, May His Soul Never Rest in Peace. So they thought that sounded hopeful, and dug him up. Sure enough, when they opened the lid of the old stone coffin, out jumped old King Nyamasoya, shouting What took you so long? I’ve been waiting here for nearly a thousand years!

‘But why aren’t you dead? they asked. ‘Ah Ha! He laughed, The foolish fellows forgot to drive a stake through my heart!’

‘So he was a vampire!’ Khoza gasped.

‘Of course,’ I said. ‘But in those days the people hadn’t heard about vampires. And anyway, they were in a hurry to find a new king so they didn’t ask too many questions.’

‘Very foolish,’ said Thoko.

‘So what sort of king did he make?’ Khoza wondered.

‘He started off alright,’ I said. ‘Seemed to be a very jolly fellow. Ate a lot, drank a lot, laughed a lot. Better than the previous fellow who had a nasty temper.

‘Don’t call me Nyamasoya, I never liked the name, declared the new king. Just call me RB! But when he said that, the people began to shake with fear, because there had been previous leaders who had been called RB. There had been Rig the Ballot, and Rob the Bank, and Run from Bullets. Don’t worry, laughed the new king, RB stands for Royal Blood. After all those years of democracy, you now have a king!’

‘He had come to suck their blood,’ said Thoko.

‘Things began to go wrong,’ I admitted, ‘after he appointed his first minister. When the new minister came out from the palace he was looking very pale and thin.’

‘He’d been given the Kiss of Death!’ declared Thoko. ‘The king pretended to kiss him, but instead sucked all the blood out of his jugular vein!’

‘In those days,’ I said, ‘before taxes were invented, kings grew fat and rich by sucking blood from the people. Soon all the king’s ministers were bloodsuckers. Just as the king sucked blood from his ministers, so the ministers sucked blood out of the people. And so the people grew thinner and thinner as the king and his ministers grew fatter and fatter. Soon there was a national surplus of blood, and the king began to export blood to Ching Chang, where all the people were small and thin because of a shortage of blood.’

‘So the Land of Zed soon became rich?’ suggested Khoza.

‘Don’t be silly,’ snorted Thoko. ‘The government became richer as the people became poorer. They had to keep working harder and harder to grow the food to replace the blood that was constantly being sucked out of them.’

‘But I thought a king was supposed to be the servant of the people,’ said Khoza, ‘not just a gigantic blood sucker.’

‘The king did his best to explain how he was really working for everybody’s benefit. Every day the Zed National Blood Corporation was busy telling the people about the new hospital where they could donate their blood, and the new mobile hospitals that would seek them out wherever they went. And new roads to enable the blood to be exported to Ching Chang. Free agricultural inputs to produce more food for increased blood production. More schools for pupils to learn the process of turning mere peasant blood into fine Royal Blood. And billboards everywhere repeating the national slogan Your blood, working for you!’

‘Didn’t the people protest? Rebel? Riot?’ asked Thoko hopefully.

‘The Kiss of Death didn’t just affect ordinary people,’ I explained. ‘The police would round up protesters to suck the blood out of them, to replace the blood that was being sucked out of them. Similarly the courts had to offer up victims to have their blood sucked, or the king would suck the blood out of the judges instead.’

‘No elections?’ asked Thoko.

‘Of course not,’ I laughed. ‘The king sucked all the blood out of the Electoral Commission, and their desiccated corpses were put on display in the National Museum.’

‘No constitution?’ asked Khoza.

‘It had so much blood sucked out of it,’ I replied, ‘that it was reduced to only five words: The King’s Word is Law!’

‘So the Kiss of Death destroyed even the state itself,’ said Khoza glumly.

‘Completely,’ I said.

‘What I can’t understand,’ said Thoko, ‘is why Nyamasoya hadn’t had that stake driven into his heart in the first place, to prevent him ever coming back.’

‘That was the problem,’ I said. ‘He didn’t have a heart.’

______________________

Just then Sara put her head round the door. ‘Time for bed! Give Grandpa a goodnight kiss!’

‘Aarrghhh!’ they both screamed, and ran helter-skelter out of the room.

‘You’ve been telling them another of your horror stories!’ said Sara. ‘What a horrible frightening Grandpa!’

‘It’s a frightening world,’ I replied.

_______________________

[Story based partly on suggestions from my Facebook friends, especially Francis Mwelwa Bwalya]

The Divorce Court

The Divorce Court

The judge leant towards the beautiful woman sitting in front of him. ‘Zambiana,’ he said in a kindly voice, ‘please explain to the court why you are seeking a divorce from this man.’

Tears welled into her eyes as she tried to explain. ‘Your honour, this man has ruined me. When my first husband died, his last wish was that I should marry the farm manager. He said that Nyamasoya was the right man to look after me and the family farm. So I respected my husband’s dying wish, even though my relatives warned me that he was not to be trusted. But they were right. He has stolen everything and left me destitute.’

The judge now turned to Nyamasoya. ‘Is this true?’

‘Your honour, it is the exact opposite of the truth. The late Muwelewele would be proud of the way I have developed the farm. I have gone into production of jhathropa for export, installed an irrigation system, invested in planting and harvesting machinery, and the annual turnover is now ten million dollars a year. When I took over it was just a subsistence operation, they were just scratching around with chickens, vegetables and a few pigs.’

The puzzled judge now turned to Zambiana. ‘There seem to be two very different sides to this story. Is the farm prosperous or ruined?’

‘Both, your honour,’ said Zambian sadly. ‘All this development was done with borrowed money. He has borrowed more than the value of the farm, which is now run by the Ching Chang people from whom he borrowed the money. All the money from sales goes straight to the Ching Chang for repayment of the loan. In the meantime all my relatives and workers on the farm are starving and dying. We are destitute.’

The baffled judge now turned back to Nyamasoya. ‘Is this true?’

Nyamasoya now treated the judge to a broad and genial smile. ‘Of course it is true, your honour. It is entirely normal to borrow money against the value of the land in order to invest in development...’

‘Yes yes,’ interrupted the judge irritably, ‘but is it true that all Zambiana’s workers and relatives are now destitute?’

‘I am in the awkward position having to contradict my dear wife,’ smiled Nyamasoya, ‘but she has little understanding of business. That’s why the late asked me to take charge. As a matter of fact, when I first took over, everybody on the farm was unemployed. But I have now given them all jobs.’

The judge now turned to Zambiana with a weary smile. ‘It seems that all your workers and relatives are fully employed. From what your husband has told us, we imagine that people on neighbouring farms must be jealous of your prosperity!’

Now Zambiana stood up shaking with rage, pointing at Nyamasoya. ‘This man has stolen our farm. They were once all self-employed farmers, growing their own food in a mixed farming operation and selling the surplus to the late. Now Nyamasoya has rented the land to the Ching Chang and all the farmers have now become wage labourers on what was once their own farm. They are paid only five pins a day, and they cannot eat jhathropa. We are all destitute.’

‘I notice,’ said the judge, ‘that your husband is dressed in a very smart suit, and arrived at this court in a new Mercedes. This appearance doesn’t seem to tally with your story of poverty and destititution.’

‘Him!’ shouted Zambiana, ‘the Ching Chang allow him to keep 10% of everything, so that they can externalize all of the remainder to Hung Hong. Nyamasoya is busy buying a farm in the Bahamas while the rest of us are starving.’

‘I also notice,’ said the judge, smiling at the beautiful Zambiana, ‘that you are wearing a very nice new blue chitenge, which I must say suits you very well.’

‘It’s the first time in years that my husband has bought me anything,’ sobbed Zambiana. ‘But he saw the danger of my appearing here in my usual worn out rags.’

‘I wonder if there is not more to this dispute than meets the eye,’ said the judge. ‘How are the marital relations between the two of you?’

‘There you’ve put your finger on it!’ shouted Nyamasoya. ‘She never wanted me, she was just following instructions from the late departed. But now she has fallen for some smoothy from the big city, a dubious character called Cycle Mata!’

‘Is there any truth in this story?’ asked the judge, as he turned towards Zambiana.

She blushed and cast her eyes down. ‘Yes, your honour. He doesn’t shout at me or insult me. He listens to me. He loves me. He doesn’t steal from me. He’s the one I want.’

‘I have come to a decision,’ declared the judge. ‘You, Nyamasoya, should not attempt to cling on where you’re not wanted. I grant Zambiana a divorce, and further order that the farm must be returned to her as the rightful owner. I further declare that Nyamasoya should be investigated for attempting to steal the farm when he was only given the job of looking after it.’

As Nyamasoya strode angrily from the court, the judge turned to smile at Zambiana. ‘Well, there you are my dear. What are you going to do now?’

‘I’m going to marry Cycle Mata,’ she replied. ‘He’s going to manage my farm properly!’

The judge put his head in his hands. Then he looked up, and there were tears in his eyes. ‘My dear Zambiana,’ he said softly, ‘I hope you’re making the right decision.’

Rationality

Rationality

It took me days to track him down. Finally I was directed to a crumbling house in Garden Compound, right next to the sewage pond. I knocked on the door and walked in.

Suddenly, it was as if nothing had changed. There behind a large mahogany desk sat diminutive figure of the former Minister of Lies and Misinformation, the formerly Honourable Mouth Mulufyanya. In front of him on the otherwise empty desk were the usual six flashy cell phones and a little national flag. Behind him, hanging on the wall, was a picture of himself, looking like a crafty little rat.

‘Good morning Kalaki,’ he said cheerily, shaking my hand and directing me to a large armchair. ‘Make yourself comfortable. What brings you here?’

‘I just wanted to hear your side of the story on this precipitous fall from power.’

‘Well,’ he said, stroking his little pointed chin, ‘I certainly do find it sad that poor old Nyamasoya is facing such a precipitous fall. After all, I was the one who put him up there, got him elected and showed him how to do the job. Now that he’s thrown me overboard, all the other rats are abandoning the sinking ship.’

‘So you admit to being a little rat?’ I laughed.

‘Certainly not!’ he immediately objected. ‘Maybe by human standards I’m very small, but by rat standards I’m very large. In the company of politicians, nobody even realized I was a rat.’

‘Ha!’ I cackled, ‘I suppose politicians are humans who behave more like rats, and by comparison rats behaves more like a humans. But I didn’t expect you to admit all this to me!’

‘Nobody believes your stories, Kalaki. That’s why we can tell you the truth.’

‘So tell me the true story of you and Nyamasoya. How did it all begin?’

‘It began when Muwelewele sent me to fetch the old dinosaur from Mfuwe. He wanted to offer him the job of Number Two.’

‘I often wondered why he chose him.’

‘I was the one who advised him to follow the basic strategy: Choose somebody who’s so useless that he can never challenge the Big Man for the Top Job.’

‘But how did you, a mere rat, become so influential at the Palace?’

‘Don’t be silly, Kalaki, we rats have been advisers at the Palace since colonial days. Of course it’s not generally known because we come in and out through the tunnels.’

‘Rats as advisers? Why should government need rats as advisers?’

‘How little you know about politics, Kalaki. These politicians face one major problem. They talk fine words about democracy and serving the people, but what they actually do is help themselves.’

‘We know that. But where do you rats come in?’

‘Humans can’t understand themselves. They often genuinely believe their own fine words and get genuinely perplexed by their own opposite actions. And they suffer terrible agony when this causes them to become a public laughing stock. But we rats can observe humans from an objective point of view, and come to a scientific understanding of the strange gap between their words and their deeds. So we are in a position to propose more rational behaviour.’

‘Rats are more rational?’

‘Exactly, that’s where the word comes from.’

‘So was government rational under Muwelewele?’

‘We rats really helped him. We kept the words very beautiful, and the dirty deeds almost impossible to see. The only problem we had was the dreaded Red-Lipped Snake, who kept saying nolle prosequi when he was supposed to say justice, and saying corruption when he was supposed to say constitution.’

‘He was conducting the Fight Against the Constitution instead of the Fight Against Corruption.’

‘The poor man couldn’t quite grasp the contradiction between fine words and dirty deeds. But apart from him, everybody kept our dirty deeds very secret.’

‘But then Muwelewele departed without saying goodbye.’

‘Very sad. It was myself who proposed Nyamasoya as the new Great Leader.’

‘Where was the rationality in that?’

‘Any other candidate would have split the party. But Nyamasoya was not wanted by anybody, so therefore he was equally acceptable to everybody. A perfect compromise.’

‘And he was so grateful to you that he made you an MP and Minister. Despite being a rat you became honourable on the spot, by royal decree.’

‘I had done everything to make him look like a Great Leader. I dressed him in a nice suit and fitted him with contact lenses. Taught him the basic principles of rationality, and made him practice public speaking in front of a big mirror. I led his campaign, wrote his speeches and got him elected.’

You were on top of the world! What went wrong?’

‘After we had installed him, a strange thing happened. He suddenly imagined himself to be a Great Leader and a genius. He began to look up from the carefully prepared speeches, and to say what he actually thought!’

‘What a disaster!’

‘Exactly. Instead of using words to justify deeds and to conceal misdeeds, he started boasting of all his misdeeds, and justifying them on the basis that he was the Great Leader who could do as he liked! Complete irrationality!’

‘So now all the rats have deserted the sinking ship.’

‘Not exactly. The ship is sinking because rationality has deserted it. But the rats are still there, waiting in the tunnels for the next ship to come along.’

‘So soon you’ll be honourable again!’

‘I must bring back rationality,’ he said. ‘It is my duty to serve the nation.’

The Saviour

The Saviour

I was sitting on the veranda trying to make sense of a Post Editorial when I heard footsteps behind me. I turned round to find the rather ample figure of a man. ‘Hullo Kalaki,’ he said, ‘how’s it going?’

‘Who are you?’ I replied, as I stood up to shake his hand.

‘I’m fine,’ he said.

‘I didn’t say how are you, I said who are you?’

‘I’m Alex,’ he said. ‘I’ve been your good friend for the past year, we chat almost every week on Facebook.’

‘Alex!’ I exclaimed, ‘I thought you lived in cyberspace! Sit down! Have a brandy! Make yourself at home! What brings you here?’

‘I was looking at the question you posted on Facebook this morning,’ he said, ‘asking why these senile old leaders insist on hanging on when the entire country is screaming for them to go.’

‘Then I’m glad you dropped in,’ I said. ‘What’s the answer? I’m supposed to be writing my story tomorrow.’

‘What’s your answer?’ he countered.

‘Nothing very original,’ I admitted. ‘Usual sort of thing. He’s so busy stealing and can’t stop. Got his hand stuck in the till. Wants to completely fill his Swiss bank account before he leaves. Just another fifty million and then he’ll quit!’

‘You mean he has to complete his programme,’ laughed Alex.

‘Exactly,’ I agreed. ‘Also he hasn’t yet identified a country which will provide him with a comfortable exile and protect him from extradition for theft. So far he has visited only 75 countries, and still has to check the other 87 to see if there might be just one that would have him.’

‘Your only problem,’ said Alex, as I refreshed his glass, ‘is that these are not the sort of explanations he can give to the voters.’

‘Well of course not,’ I cackled. ‘He can’t tell them the truth. He has to say he is bringing development, even though the people are getting poorer. He says that he has to continue the fight against corruption, when he’s actually fighting the fight against corruption. He promises a free and fair election, while at the same time training his private militia and subverting the election commission.’

‘Poor old Kalaki,’ sighed Alex. ‘You’re huffing and puffing like an Old Testament Prophet, or like Jesus on a bad day. You’ve been reading too many Post editorials. You view all problems as good versus evil, truth versus lies and God versus the Devil. The world is not that simple!’

‘Is it not? Are we not ruled by crooks who know very well they are crooks, and knowingly lie to us. They say one thing but do another. They are nothing but thieving hypocrites, who claim to be working for our benefit when they are working only for the enrichment of themselves! Is this not the simple truth?’

‘A couple of days ago,’ said Alex, ‘I was watching Mubarak on TV. It was rather sad. He had reduced the entire country to complete chaos, but he announced that he had to stay on to ensure stability. He said he had to do his duty, and that he intended to die in Egypt.’

‘Hah!’ I cackled. ‘There’s a few people who might grant him his wish on that one! And possibly within the next week!’

‘But contrary to your theory, he doesn’t seem to see himself as a crook, but rather as the Saviour of his people.’

‘He can see himself as Count Dracula for all I care!’ I shouted. ‘He’s got to bugger off!’

‘He may be a corrupt liar,’ said Alex calmly, ‘but I think he sees himself as working for the interests of his people.’

‘Poof,’ I said, as I refilled his glass. ‘You’ll need another brandy to argue your way out of that one!’

‘Take our man Nyamasoya,’ said Alex. ‘I think he probably means well. He sees himself and his clique as clinging onto power in order to protect the rest of us from the stink of corruption. If the ruling elite can keep corruption amongst themselves, then they can prevent the rest of us from indulging in bribery, rigging elections, illegal allocation of land, shooting of unarmed protesters, and so on.’

‘Isn’t this what I said! They’re just crooks and thieves!’

‘But I’m suggesting they really have our interests at heart. They know that we Zedians are honest people who can enjoy the simple life. They want to protect us from the stink and corruption of power and wealth. Nyamasoya sees us as our Saviour. By taking all power and wealth to himself, he has also lifted the burden of corruption from the rest of us, and carries it on our behalf, so that we may live in purity and peace!’

‘So he’s not just a simple crook?’

‘Not at all,’ replied Alex. ‘Like all true dictators, he is both imaginative and intelligent, and really believes that he is working for our benefit. He believes God has authorized him to carry all the evils of corruption on his broad shoulders. Believing himself appointed by God, he therefore also believes that he will be judged only by God. It is this theocratic ideology which explains his contempt for any mere Earthly judge or judgement.’

‘So he has God and ideology on his side!’

‘Exactly.’

‘If that’s the case,’ I declared, ‘the problem is more deep rooted than I thought.’

‘Exactly,’ said Alex.

[Special thanks to Alexander Mwalula for his contribution to this story]

The Last Dinosaur

The Last Dinosaur

MMD is on its deathbed – Inonge Wina.

(The Post, 31 January, 2011)

‘Grandpa,’ said Nawiti, ‘it’s time for my bedtime story.’

‘One upon a time, a long time ago,’ I began, ‘the faraway country of Zed was ruled by an enormous old dinosaur, called MMD.’

‘What did MMD stand for?’ asked Nawiti.

‘Monstrous Malignant Dinosaur,’ I explained, ‘but he liked to be called His Excellency the Emperor, the Most Magnificent Dinosaur.’

‘And was he really the Most Magnificent Dinosaur?’

‘Oh yes,’ I said. ‘The Most Magnificent and also the Most Ugly, because he was the last dinosaur left alive. All the others had died off many years before.’

‘But why,’ wondered Nawiti, ‘did the people choose an old leftover dinosaur as their emperor?’

‘They had had a couple of bad experiences with previous emperors,’ I said, ‘and had come to the opinion that the job was too much for mere mortals, who tended to become too pompous and arrogant. So they thought that the old dinosaur, having survived for millions of years, must have achieved wisdom, and must have been humbled by the ups and downs of such a long life.’

‘And did the Dinosaur make a good emperor?’

‘It all began to go wrong at the first press conference, which the Dinosaur held under a huge tree in the grounds of his huge palace. A naughty monkey sitting at the top of the tree could not resist the temptation, and pissed on the Dinosaur.’

‘What a terrible humiliation for the MMD,’ said Nawiti.

‘Most people just thought it was a good joke.’ I said. ‘But perhaps the Dinosaur knew that this was the beginning of the end for him, for as the monkey’s urine hit him square in the eye he shouted Kanitundila!’

‘Meaning what?’ asked Nawiti.

‘Kanitundila,’ I explained, ‘is the dreaded disease which can cross the species barrier from monkeys to other animals, and cause a long lingering death.’

‘Is it a bacteria or a virus?’

‘It’s not a biological disease,’ I explained, ‘It’s a social disease. Just as monkeys are very naughty and delinquent, so those who catch Kanitundila become socially delinquent.’

‘Once a monkey has pissed on you,’ suggested Nawiti, ‘so you now start to piss on other people!’

‘It’s not as simple as that,’ I said. ‘The symptoms vary from one person to another. It’s actually an immune deficiency disease, which gradually destroys the victims’ resistance to other social diseases.’

‘So what social disease did the Dinosaur develop?’

‘He gradually began to do things that were socially unacceptable.’

‘Such as what?’

‘Well, the first thing people noticed was that he was eating and drinking too much.’

‘Rather like you, Grandpa, you drink too much brandy.’

‘Well, er, perhaps. But I’m not swallowing public money. And I don’t have to stay sober, because I’m not running the country.’

‘Even so,’ said Nawiti. ‘If Kanitundila just caused the Dinosaur to get pissed now and again, was that a national disaster? Some of these leaders are less dangerous when they’re plastered.’

‘That was only the beginning. Gradually the social diseases got worse. He became deaf to what other people were telling him, and just wouldn’t listen to complaints. Soon after that he developed Kamwendo Munjila, causing him to fly from one country to another for no apparent reason. Then he developed Amnesia, and couldn’t remember any of his promises. As things got worse he developed Kleptomania, and began to swallow anything and everything.’

‘His belly must have become very large.’

‘Far too large, even for a dinosaur,’ I agreed. ‘Then he began swallowing things which belonged to other people. Before long the extreme Kleptomania caused Acute Constipation, and he had to be admitted to the ICU.’

‘The Intensive Care Unit?’

‘No, the Intensive Corruption Unit.’

‘And did he recover?’

‘Things got worse. The massive constipation was now causing internal corruption. Foul gas began to escape from the ICU, and to corrupt entire social institutions. Nothing could escape the foul stink of corruption. It wafted into Mulungushi Hall, and corrupted the constitution. It crept into the law courts, causing the guilty go free and the innocent to be convicted. Then into the National Arsembly, which immediately declared corruption to be legal. And finally into the Election Commission, where all the Election Commissioners were turned into Election Corrupters. Now the entire social system was corrupted.’

‘So all the people now caught Kanitundila? Did they all start pissing on each other?’

‘A strange thing happened. The ordinary people, all choking with the stink of corruption, developed an allergic reaction, called Mubarakitis. A mass allergic reaction caused a massive shift to a new political climate, from Dinosaucracy to Democracy.’

‘So it’s true!’ declared Nawiti. ‘Climate change killed the Dinosaur! Where did they bury him?’

‘His body keeps flying round the world,’ I said, ‘Nobody will have him.’

‘Because of the stink?’

‘Exactly,’ I replied.

______________________________

[In cooking up this story Kalaki was assisted by several Facebook friends, especially Joanne Ng’andu, Humphrey Milimo, Patrick Pani and Mayani Changala]

HYENA

Hyena

‘Grandpa,’ said Nawiti, ‘before I go to bed, tell me a story with a happy ending.'

‘Once upon a time,’ I began, ‘in the land of Zed, there was a farmer called Mrs Zedia Bantubonse…’

‘I thought farmers were men,’ Nawiti objected.

‘Then you thought wrong,’ I replied. ‘In Zed the farmers were all women. Their husbands’ job was to drink beer and look for more wives, so that the farm could have more farmers.’

‘And what was the name of the farm?’

‘It was called Carrotseland, because Mrs Bantubonse was very good at growing carrots. But she also grew maize and groundnuts and kept cattle and goats. It was a very large farm, with thousands of workers living in the many villages of Carrotseland.’

‘So what was the problem?’ asked Nawiti.

‘As with all farms in Zed,’ I explained, ‘the problem was theft. The crops were being stolen by monkeys, eaten by rats and trampled by elephants and hippos. What with all the thieving animals and the lazy husbands, the farm just couldn’t make a profit.’

‘They just needed a big guard dog,’ declared Nawiti.

‘Several guard dogs had been trampled by the elephants, and one had been eaten by a crocodile. But one day a large hyena came knocking at her door. ‘Excuse me, Mrs Bantubonse,’ said the hyena politely, ‘but I have heard of your problem. Me and my friends can help. We can stay on your farm and protect everything.’

‘How much would I have to pay you?’ asked Mrs Bantubonse suspiciously.

‘No, you wouldn’t have to pay anything,’ the hyena assured her. ‘It’s all in the general interest. It will be a win-win situation. We shall eat the naughty monkeys, and your crops will be protected, and we shall all be happy.’

‘And what is your name?’ asked Mrs Bantubonse.

‘Call me Ragbo,’ he answered. ‘Or RB for short.’

‘So did Ragbo do a good job?’ asked Nawiti.

‘Everything went very well for about a year,’ I replied. ‘Then one day Ragbo again knocked on Mrs Bantubonse’s door. ‘Madam,’ he said politely, ‘your farm is now selling lots of produce and all you humans are now fat and rich, but we hyenas are poor and starving!’

‘How’s that?’ asked Mrs Bantubonse.

‘We have done our job so well that there are no monkeys left to eat,’ said Ragbo. ‘You just let us eat the goats, and you can have the rest, and we can all live happily together. It will be a win-win situation.’

‘So they signed the Carrotseland Agreement,’ suggested Nawiti.

‘Exactly,’ I replied. ‘But a year later Ragbo knocked on her door again. ‘We have eaten all the goats, so now we need the cows. You can have the carrots and maize. It will be a win-win situation.’

‘Certainly not!’ said Mrs Bantubonse. ‘You’ve eaten too much already! You and all your friends can now leave my farm!’

‘Your order has no force,’ sneered Ragbo, ‘According to the Carrotseland Agreement, we hyenas are now in charge!’

‘Then we’ll have an election,’ declared Mrs Bantubonse, ‘to see who’s in charge!’

‘Very good,’ said Ragbo. ‘And as Chief of Security and Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces, I shall be the one to organize the election and count the votes.’

‘And so the hyenas organized themselves into the Movement of Murderous Dogs, and the humans became the Peoples’ Farm, and the election was held.’

‘Didn’t the cows also form a party?’ wondered Nawiti.

‘No. During the election the hyenas ate all the cows. But the monkeys all voted in favour of the Murderous Dogs.’

‘What!’ shouted Nawiti. ‘You said that the hyenas ate all the monkeys.’

‘I never said that,’ I retorted. ‘What I said was that Ragbo said that. But of course he was a compulsive liar. In fact he did a deal with the monkeys that they could eat the maize while the hyenas were eating the goats. You see, it was the monkeys who taught the hyenas how to steal, and Ragbo became best friends with Kolwe Kafupi, the chief of the thieving monkeys.

‘But surely there were many more humans than hyenas?’

‘Yes there were,’ I admitted. ‘But the humans lost the election because the hyenas did the counting. So they swallowed most of the human votes, and also some of the humans. So Ragbo declared he had won the election, appointed himself President of the new Republic of Chimbwi, and then tore up the Carrotseland Agreement.’

‘Oh dear,’ said Nawiti. ‘Did he turn out to be a good president?’

‘Of course not. He sold off all the land to foreigners from the Republic of Ching Chang, so the former farmers now became wage labourers on their own land. When they were sick and starving, he built them a big hospital.’

‘At least that was good, wasn’t it?’

‘No. The job of the hospital was to squeeze out the last drop of blood, which was being exported to the Republic of Ching Chang for $9,000 a ton.’

‘So the humans voted them out at the next election?’

‘Of course not. The hyenas were still counting the votes.’

‘So they went on strike!’

‘The hyenas had made strikes illegal!’

‘They protested in the street!’

‘That was treason, punishable by death!’

‘So how were they set free?’

‘There is still a legend amongst the people of Carrotseland that one day a young woman called Nawiti will come amongst them and set them free!’

‘Yes!’ shouted Nawiti. ‘When I grow up, I shall save them!’

‘There you are!’ I said gratefully. ‘The story has a happy ending!’

POLITICAL PARASITES

Political Parasites

'Did you hear the cheek of that little pipsqueak, Mouth Mulufyanya?' asked Sara in exasperation, 'saying that Kabolala Bakalamba should keep his job as Scrounger General!'
Just then Amock came in with the bottle and four glasses. 'Sounds as if we need a drop of brandy,' he said, 'to calm us down.'
'It's monstrous!' continued Sara, apparently unaffected by the soothing liquid, 'did you hear what Mulufyanya actually said? Forgive him, he just made a mistake. We all make mistakes. As if he had been found pocketing the office newspaper, rather than looting the national treasury which he had sworn to protect. If he had any moral sense he would have resigned when he was first arrested.'
'Your argument is incoherent,' I observed. 'If he had any moral sense, he would never have looted the national treasury in the first place.'
'So now,' Sara continued, 'the entire National Excretion Committee has to meet to decide whether he should be excreted.'
'I think you've missed the force of Kalaki's earlier point,' said Amock. 'It is not possible for the excreta on the National Excretion Committee to smell their own stink. The smell that we find disgusting is quite normal to them.'
'Look,' said Jennifer firmly, as she drained her glass and reached for the bottle, 'it's no good just dismissing the ruling elite as a pile of excrement. The MMD may have begun as a Mere Mound of Dung, but now it's Much More Dangerous.'
'Dangerous dung,' I laughed.
'That's the problem with current political argument,' sighed Jennifer,
'it has degenerated into crude metaphors amounting to mere insults. We
need a more sophisticated metaphor on which to base a meaningful
analysis of the economic and social role of the MMD in its systematic
destruction of the nation. We have to understand the MMD as the
Movement of Malignant Drones.'
'Drones are just useless creatures, that have to be fed by others,' said Sara. 'I don't see the analytic power of such a flat and boring metaphor, it doesn't even explain the stink. I prefer the dung.'
'A drone is a parasite that lives off the rest of society,' Jennifer
explained. 'But a malignant parasite is much worse. It is so greedy
and foolish that it eats too much of the host off which it feeds,
thereby destroying both host and parasite.'
'You still haven't explained the notorious stink that comes from MMD.'
'An entire country,' explained Jennifer, 'is a complete integrated
system, rather like the human body. Politicians are the parasites that
live in the bowels and live off us, without doing any work
themselves.'
'So the stink comes from the bowels?' Sara wondered.
'Not entirely. Being a malignant parasite, MMD is eating too much, and is destroying its host body, Zambia. Not being content with just staying in the bowels and taking their share of the regular budget supply, they have now become so greedy that they are eating at the organs. The body is dying bit by bit, causing an increasingly nasty smell which is beginning to stink in people's nostrils.'
'But how do these mere nasty little parasites, previously specialised in eating shit, manage to break out of the bowels and begin eating the other organs?'
'They have many strategies. For example, the Police Corpuscles, that
are supposed to control parasites, have instead been infiltrated by
MMD parasites. This has allowed the parasites to run out of control.'
'But surely,' said Amock, 'our body has a strong constitution, which keeps a balance and separation between one organ and another. The bowels can't just start eating the kidneys and the liver!'
'So we were taught at school,' said Jennifer. 'But a destructive
parasite called the Nasty Cardiac Creeper, the dreaded NCC, has crept
into the heart and destroyed the body's entire constitution.'
'Even so,' I said, 'parliament is the brain which remains in overall control. It can pass statutory regulation to stop the MMD from eating the entire body.'
'Unfortunately,' said Jennifer sadly, 'the Movement for Mental Deterioration has caused the brain to slip down into the bowels. Instead of speaking sense out of the mouth, parliament now speaks nonsense out of the rear end.'
'No longer the voice of the people,' said Amock.
'The voice of the parasites,' said Jennifer.
We all stared glumly into our empty glasses. 'I know what we can do,' I said brightly.
'What?' they all said, hopefully.
'We can have another round!'
Which we did. But still we sat there glumly, without any further
inspiration from the bottle. 'We need a French brandy,' said Amock.
'This South African is too dull.'
'I know what,' I said brightly. 'Since statutory regulation can't work, we must try self regulation. It's in all our interest that everybody restrains themselves. The parasites must eat only half the food in the intestine, and not eat the essential organs, or interfere with the body's constitution. Excessive parasitism will destroy Zambia and we shall all die, including the parasites themselves. We must appeal to their intelligent self interest.'
'Parasites,' said Jennifer slowly, 'don't have intelligence, they only have self interest.'
'In that case,' said Amock, 'it's inevitable that the body will soon
be destroyed by this Massive Malignant Disaster of insatiable
parasites.'
'We need some strong medicine,' said Sara, 'to deal with the situation.'
'Yes,' said Jennifer. 'We need a bottle of Jerry Rawlings Parasite Solution. One dose of that would flush out and destroy all the parasites.'