(THIS ARTICLE IS MACHINE TRANSLATED by Google from Norwegian)
Blessing Musariri is one of Zimbabwe's leading and award-winning authors. She writes exclusively for Ny Tid.
Harare, Zimbabwe. If need teaches a naked woman to spin, then politics learns to reinvent. In recent years, Zimbabwe and the Zimbabweans have had to reinvent themselves – find new ways to live, survive and succeed in a situation that has recently been unusually challenging. During the last ten years, when we thought we had understood the new order of things, most things changed – new laws, new monetary policy, new parallel markets, every day could bring something new. Thus, the Zimbabweans learned to adapt, their survival skills were honed, their minds alert and enterprising.
These days, the Zimbabweans see the world: We have become more courageous, we have become Knights of the Order of the Loophole. If there is a way to avoid a problem, we detect it. What has clearly emerged from the "crisis", which is relatively encouraging, is that we are an innovative nation.
In the heyday of fiscal confusion – when five US dollars on the open black market could give you five million Zimbabwean dollars in the bank, as opposed to 500.000 in cash – people quit their jobs to spend their days inside and outside the banks, where they "scorched »Money, inflated the bank accounts and then swiped the credit cards in the stores all they could. Relatives of emigrants discovered that the family subsidies stretched and well saw it. Smart young men shopped in the streets all day, fixed bank checks, real-time money transfers (RTGS) at black market prices. The rest smuggled diamonds and gold.
But as the saying goes, nothing lasts forever. The Zimbabwean dollar took an extended vacation and there was a drought on the US dollar in the streets. Those who had abruptly left their jobs, wished they had not done so, while those who had no interest in formal positions found other pursuits – the burglaries increased in our neighborhood and to comfort us, we said the only thing that makes sense to the offenders: " The owners came to pick up their things at night, and were caring enough not to wake us up. "
It is ironic, a friend and her husband changed pastures, and one of her first comments was that it was not as interesting to live in a stable country and that strangely enough it was almost harder to get things done because you could not take any shortcuts . When the abnormal becomes normal, one must question the concept of normality in a world where change is the only lasting element. One can only conclude that it all boils down to the idea of «the greatest good».
With the coalition government, the fall was gradually stopped, and for the first time in a decade, several days could pass without the news channels reporting a dramatic development in Zimbabwe. The country breathed a sigh of relief, and not for the first time, people were filled with hope for better times. The history of the "Zimbabwe crisis" is long and has never been properly laid out – just another African country that has gone wrong, a conflict area, a feature in the evening news, a reason to invite an expert to the studio and meanwhile the reinvention continues.
Today's multi-currency economy is a more cautious animal than the economy with parallel markets. It is no longer as easy to find, earn or "burn off" money. The loopholes have now become restrictions on par with the biblical problems a rich man encounters as he tries to enter heaven. Some days it feels like Zimbabwe is a ship trapped on the Pacific Ocean, while the real events take place far below the surface. In the global village – if we consider this as the political response to the African saying that it takes a village to raise a "child" – solutions (or the beginning of solutions) to disadvantaged countries are given by a well-meaning council of "elderly" . It remains to be seen whether first aid has been given to a patient who should have been admitted. If a placebo has been prescribed, everything now depends on the collective will to recover. A well-known TV personality quoted a guest who should have said the following: "As long as I wake up with clothes on and clear in my head, I'm grateful." We may have recovered from the madness, but I suspect we need to look for the clothes. ■
Translated by Remi Nilsen
