This
is why you love it, cautiously, from a distance. You nag constantly
about its deplorable features. Especially about its airport, which has
gulped millions of dollars but is hardly more functional than airports
in poor countries wallowing in sanctions like Zimbabwe.
In fact, you have made a note not to write about this again, before someone asks if you have nothing else to write about.
Abuja
is that flagrant rascal that mocks you while revelling in scandals of
unimaginable proportions. Scandals that make you ashamed when foreigners
ask about it.
It
is in this state that you check in to the hotel in the Bvumba Mountains
of the Eastern Highlands of Zimbabwe. You have since come to the
conclusion that patriotism does not lie in putting up desperate defences
for Abuja’s contradictions; you are not a patriot if you justify the
absence of electricity in a country that exports electricity, or the
poverty rate of close to 70 per cent in Africa’s biggest oil-producing
country. You simply sigh when any of these issues are raised.
Abuja
is that lover that makes you hot and sweaty on the inside, but angry on
the outside. You imagine that the Zimbabweans you meet must feel the
same about their country, about a land so blessed and beautiful, yet
having its development truncated in so many ways.
You start to make jokes about the near centenarian Mugabe whose 90th
birthday billboards you saw in Harare. You talk about his most recent
speech, reciting the words in an accent as close to his as you can. You
watch the Zimbabweans around you cringe. Not ordinary Zimbabweans;
Zimbabwean writers.
People
in these parts speak about Robert Gabriel Mugabe in whispers, one
writer tells you. Agents of the secret service are everywhere. At first
you laugh, thinking it is a joke that in 2014 writers speak in
undertones about their 90 year old president who is rumoured to have
crocodile farms where people disappear.
You
think of the many columns you have written about your president, of
whom you are often ashamed, and his ministers whose propensity for
making vast sums of money disappear is unlimited. You think of the many
cartoons in the national dailies that depict your president as clueless
or make fun of his wife.
You
think of how often you have accused the government of complicity in
deaths and violence. Reading of a people trapped in fear of its leader
is a different animal from seeing enlightened adults look over their
shoulders before they whisper what they really think about their
president.
‘The
walls have ears here – anyone can just disappear,’ another Zimbabwean
tells you. Not long after, you hear of friends of yours who have
organised a protest in Abuja and of their eventual arrest and release.
While
you sent out frenzied tweets condemning their arrest and brief
detention, you cannot help but wonder what would have happened to them
if they were in Harare. The freedom of speech you often take for granted
suddenly takes on new significance.
You
return to Abuja after spending two weeks in Zimbabwe. You can still see
the inefficiency of the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport through
all the cosmetic makeovers and shiny columns. But at least you can
complain aloud without thinking of a crocodile farm.
Abuja may be an insensitive, abusive lover. But at least she lets you complain.
Please come to Johannesburg so you can write about her :)
ReplyDeleteSomeday... :)
Deletei haven't heard many warm things about south Africa. It would be interesting to hear your first hand opinion about SA.
ReplyDelete