When I invited a few colleagues to join the Youngambitiousbusinessachievers club, on Yahoo Groups, one of these responded favorably and mentioned how concerned he was that [1] he was getting grey-haired and [2] he was now a grandee and yet he had done very little to bequeath something of worth to his future progenies. This then reminded me of a piece—called 'Mut'oyera-Grey Haired'—that I had done in 2002.
Now I reproduce it here—because despite the passage of time and the fact that the most recent book publication around here is normally from 15 years dated—things don't change much. We live in a time warp. My piece is still very relevant! By the way none of the friends I invited to the club—almost a month now—has yet registered; despite having expressed the desire and/or excitement with the possibilities. Time Warped!
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For donkey years—to no avail—you've sent out your CV to collegemates—now senior managers in various organizations. Unfortunately everyone is “too dense” to recognize the uncut diamond you are to this nation's processes of economic development.
Instead, you sit and bemoan your misfortunes arguing:
“There aren’t special graveyards for “unsung heroes”.
And—rather too frequently—nowadays with some colleagues you turn up at the corner bottle store—the “Drunkie”—to drown your sorrows.
While there you “jaw” all day: criticizing THIS government and swiping at the “Under 45s” college graduates now holding decent jobs in town. En masse, you always arrive at the conclusion that most of the "Under 45s" are in those jobs ‘courtesy to their brainlessness’. This is because you erroneously believe—may be rightly so—you have superior ideas and skills to pull this place out of its ‘forex and fuel crisis’ instigated by Kamuzu Banda and perfected by us all thereafter.
Of course you know your vibrant ideas and skills are wasting. Last time you suggested a brain-challenging adventure to your local Lions Club the colleagues in there all stared at you like you had just smeared horse manure onto your nose. But why worry with the Lions Club? Isn’t that a union of some sort? Their first priority is with protecting like members' interests? Brainy ideas—no matter how potentially good—are not encouraged in there: especially if they threaten the reputation of the management committee.
Yet, the wealth of the massive knowledge in you is hurting. You'd love to purposefully use it. So why not organize your own ‘Lions Club'—invite all those “jawing” friends of yours into an indigenous “Mut’oyera” Club—‘whiteheads’ because you're now grey haired? Of course—because you are unemployed and reliant on your wife’s sweat—make sure that you tag along an “Over 45” lawyer to donate your ‘start up’ legal fees because—in these days of litigation and injunctions—you shall have to be legally registered.
Once the Mut’oyera is up and running, you can share constructive ideas towards “novel, unique and applicable solutions to everyday development problems of this country”; because those above you are simply lost in this wierd wilderness of 'development cognitiveness'.
In this Mut’oyera—without brain-confusing fumes of alcohol and the usual Lions Club nkhukutembo-ism—organize yourselves into various “job and hope-creating” interventionary groups. I’m currently not talking about picking a hoe, a plastic plate and heading down the Kanjedza “shortcut” to clear out some footpath brush. But there is sense in that too!
Rather, it’s about major brainy things done through self-help and—where not possible because of the size of project—then petition THIS government to release some of your “Youth Development Program” VAT-generated funds. There are there. If not then ask them to impose such a source within the fuel levy.
But—if government is not forthcoming on that—then talk/ write [in that specific order] to certain private companies where those mystically powerful “Under 45s” are currently holding sway. They will probably chip in with their idle marketing and public relations budgets. In short, grab whatever “starter funding” is available and get going. Of course, don’t start an “overheads-hungry” NGO!
What good things can old guys like you do?
A good example is: whatever happened to all those Youth Training Bases from Kamuzu’s days? Were those not categorized as “abused” government properties during the Second Regime? Well, its high time THIS government made them available to you—decent, behaved and well-meaning nationals. Get organized, invite a few Kibbutz Israelis—damn the political connotations—and pile into there a few idle and “unemployable youth” roaming the streets and now breaking into houses in broad daylight.
Between you and your “never-to-be-employed again” Mut’oyera colleagues assemble all that corporate drive in you and panel beat this youthful raw material into a new and vital national development resource. Not Young Pioneer drills—that’s old cloth. But get them to grow more cabbage or raise chicken feet—the Chinese need those a lot! Meanwhile let me plead with your socially responsible economic intelligence to make sure those places are self-sufficient within the four months a crop of maize is harvested! No dilly-dallying, you hear?
Your first target is those Young Pioneer bases close to perennial water sources—irrigable land capable of a million tons of exportable surplus! So who said you will never be gainfully employed and unselfishly available to your nation? But, this is not an opportunity for you to get your belated pension through the back door!
A second and low-cost concept is to avail your Mut’oyera Club to anyone needing “senior intelligence” to transform this country into a workable MGDS Export-Orientated system. Four, now going five years after the MGDS—with everyone “Under 45s” in their offices mouthing sweet terms like ‘value-chain’, ‘value-add’ and ‘beneficiation’—you will be surprised to tears with the answers you get when you further interrogate:
‘What do you actually mean by that?’
They have no idea—all round—and if they do they don’t even know which soft belly point we ought to trigger to get the process going. They are fobbing us all the while the economy goes to the dogs. It's about protecting their 'msuzi'—nothing else much! And who is to blame them if those who assigned them are equally foggied?
The reality, though, under the veneer of “brass button shine” smiles these people are actually screaming for help. Simply venture into any local government office today and bear me witness by asking—it is your democratic right too—to see the local authority’s so-called “Economic Development Plans”. I did once.
In a flash the secretary—keen to defend the night allowances she earned at a series of ‘Development Plan Consultation Conferences’—fished out one glossy, overpriced and professionally printed document. But—I must warn you because I wasn’t forewarned—be prepared to be shocked! The ‘Plan’—funded by some foreign donor and technical support to boot—turned out to be the stuff we used, in those glorious colonial days, to call ‘Compendium’ or ‘Background and Environment analysis" notes!
‘That’s it!’ I had inquired.
She had looked at me with the lesbianite peacock-ism today's young girls adopt towards potential 'adult male molesters' and had asked: ‘Pali china?’
The “plans” being developed on our behalf—and I advise you Mut’oyeras to improve on these otherwise this nation is on a journey to Heaven in a leaky basket—are mere lists of what is available in a particular specialty. Finito! Whereupon they declare war on Rudyard Kipling’s six honest serving men: What, Why, When, How, Where, and Who. They contain no action plans, no deliverables, no champions and no delivery dates. Zilch!
So—I dare urge you—set up those non-profit "Corporate Systems Empowering" Mut’oyera Clubs. Go in there—with the executive government blessings of course—and give these “plans” some export-creating teeth. Hopefully—as you leave—someone will offer you a much-needed bottle of beer!
Seriously, Mut’oyera Clubs should offer an exports-hungry nation more than the biblical “fishing net”. In the trembling hands of a hungry man fishing nets—without a canoe, a water body full of fish and a forest for canoe logs etc—are useless luxuries. That was the problem with Kamuzu’s ‘tool box’ model and it is still we us to this day.
Mut’oyera Clubs go in there and provide hungry men with carpentry skills to hew out trees for canoes, strip bark for fishing net ropes and ability to paddle to where they smell fish. The rest—should they ever get hungry again—is easy.
While we feverishly work to sort out the "comments' problem, please feel free to contact the author at zivaiclaude@gmail.com
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