Monthly Archives: July 2015

by

Mwizenge S. Tembo, Ph. D.

Professor of Sociology

I caught the radio news story in the middle during the second week of August in 2008.  “….he grew up poor working in the fields in the American South. His rise to fame in his music career came when……he produced the album …..Hot Buttered Soul …….Isaac Hayes dead at the age of 65.” My reaction was “Oh! My God. I didn’t know he was so young.” Another one of my music heroes was gone. What might have appeared as an insignificant revelation about him in the story confirmed something very fundamental that drew me to his music like a butterfly to sweet nectar.  How did an American, Isaac Hayes, influence a teenager who was growing up ten thousand miles away from America deep in Africa in Zambia in the late late 1960s? It happened in the most unlikely way.

I was a poor village kid who was excited to complete Chizongwe Secondary or High School in 1971 in the remote provincial town of Chipata. I got a job in town at a small local volunteer organization Dzithandizeni: Chipata Nutrion Group where an American had just arrived as a volunteer worker. We became good friends. After my first small pay check, I was so proud to buy a small portable record player; about the length of two 2 small lap tops and 4 inches wide. It looked just like a briefcase. I could also only afford to buy my only 45 single of Crosby Stills and Nash “Suite Jude Blue Eyes” for seventy-five cents or forty-five ngwee. I played the record over and over.

As a Christmas gift,  Bob the American friend gave me a couple of Long Play Albums. One of the covers had a huge close up photo of the top of a black guy’s shinny shaved bald head; that was Isaac Hayes’ album “Hot Buttered Soul.” By this time I was an undergraduate at University of Zambia and listened to the album so much in my dormitory room in Africa Hall. The music, the story line of the lyrics of the song “By the Time I get to Phoenix”, and everything about it invoked a certain bitter sweet painful melancholy. I did not understand why his music appealed to me so deeply at the time.

The answer came as I listened to subsequent radio news stories of earlier interviews Isaac Hayes had conducted. He said as he was growing up poor and working in the fields in the American Deep South, he was a “hopeless romantic”. That’s it. That’s what drew me to his music. Looking back I have always been a “hopeless romantic” while growing up all the way to my adulthood. What is a hopeless romantic? Some readers may get the mistaken impression that this is a human being who sits passively, frustrated because girls reject his advances, doing nothing but wait while day dreaming about romantic escapades. Nothing could be further from the truth. A hopeless romantic is a person who is always totally consumed by the deep feelings of passion, awareness, perpetual feelings of romance and desire while involved in some of the most seemingly mundane activities to the ordinary soul.

A hopeless romantic sees infinite possibilities of vivid and intense human experiences in such normal activities as eating food, taking a walk in a botanical garden, riding a bicycle in a remote Savannah bush path, listening to music, walking in the park, fishing, having sex, reading, living in poverty, driving to the store, working on the farm, seeing the sunrise and the sunset, hearing birds singing, crashing waves on a beach, mourning loved ones, and conversation. When some of these activities are combined with the passion of romantic love, it is like pouring petrol or gasoline on ambers of fire. The elevated emotions flood the senses and create a symbiosis of taste, smell, sight, hearing, painful longing mixed with heavy doses of nostalgic memories. The hopeless romantic suddenly becomes engulfed in deep and overwhelming experiences with intense tearful emotional drama and anguish sometimes reminiscent of the Shakespearean Romeo and Juliet.

When Isaac Hayes said he was a hopeless romantic the remark invoked in me those deep memories of the pain and sweet anguish in his music which is the stuff of the soul. The remark validated my lifelong inclination to be drawn to deeply intense soulful music from any genre; from the traditional Mbira music of the Shona people of Zimbabwe in Southern Africa, to the thundering Nigerian Fela Anikulapo Kuti’s 1970s hit “Gentlemani”, to Jim Reeve’s Country intensely romantic love ballads like “A hundred miles to Mariam”, to the American Blue Grass music of  “Seldom Scene”, Alison Kraus and Union Station’s “Every Time You Say Goodbye”, and to the heavy metal Quiet Riot’s “Mama Mama let’s not get crazy now”.

The hopeless romantic is not just confined to music but also to readings such as novels. I still remember the most intense romantic experiences of the characters in my few favorite novels down to the page number even though I read these novels decades ago. These are such novels as Charles Dickens’ “David Copperfield”, Mongo Beti’s “Mission to Kala”, and Peter Abraham’s “Mine Boy”. I am hardly surprised that twenty years later I published a sizzling romance novel called “The Bridge” that only a hopeless romantic could write. We should all be thankful and appreciate music heroes such as Isaac Hayes and many others in many genres who especially help validate the intense feelings of all hopeless romantics in us in this wonderful world.

 

by

Mwizenge S. Tembo, Ph. D.

Professor of Sociology

“And Chama said the UPND in Southern Province were polygamous by nature and “may be by having so many children, one day after 100 years, they may lead the country, but not under Hichilema.

If at all they will ever be in power, may be a hundred years from now, they are polygamous by nature so may be as they have more children they can be in power. But under the leadership of Hichilema. I don’t think it will happen,” he said. (The Post, June 9, 2015, p.8)

These are the incendiary offending remarks that have apparently stirred passions of tribalism so much among some Zambians today that there are even reports of a small group of  the Tonga in Southern Province defiantly talking about secession. The purpose of this article is to provide some advice and perspective in the form of the Zambian tradition of mphala, insaka, or indaba on the bigger picture about our beloved Zambian nation. First, I will briefly discuss the offending remarks by the PF Secretary General Davies Chama. Second, I will discuss why Zambian politics may be reaching a dangerous stage. Third, I will discuss the bad news or even potentially tragic news for those all over Zambia who have contemplated secession in the past, the present and in the future. Fourth, I will discuss the great news about our beloved country of Zambia and how anyone can be elected the President of Zambia from whatever tribe they belong. Last, I will mention a few Kaundaisms that all political leaders including the current and future Presidents of Zambia will find very useful in leading the great nation of Zambia.

Mr. Davies Chama’s Tribal Remarks.

Mr. Chama’s remarks were offensive not just to Tongas but may be to Zambians all over the country and the world. The best thing would have been for Mr. Chama to issue an apology but he has vehemently refused. What I found surprising was that the offending remarks were buried deep into his long statement about the PF swallowing MMD and the UPND. This suggests to me that he may not have fully meant the remarks to be harmful. His remarks were actually a form of taunting after someone has won a contest. He may have been carried away in the moment of exuberance and PF party chauvinism after electoral triumphs. This does not excuse Mr. Chama’s remarks. Taunting is unprofessional and is poor sportsmanship. In recent Zambian elections, whenever a particular party has won, the cadres of the winning party afterwards taunt the ones from the losing party sometimes resulting in violence. Taunting after winning elections has to stop. May be one of the reasons we are having so many problems with cadres, some political violence, and talk of secession is that we have too many young people in Zambia and too few elders like veteran politician like Mr. Vernon Mwaanga.

Zambian Population

The population of Zambia is 13 million. The proportion of the country that is under 14 years old is 46.7%, those between 15 and 24 years old are 20%, those between 25 to 54 years old are 28.4% and but those between 55 and 64 years old are only 2.9% and those above 65 years old are even smaller at 2.4%. The age statistics that are the most important in explaining both Mr. Chama’s remarks and how Zambian politics may be in danger of becoming dangerous is that Zambians that are younger than 30 years old may be about 70% of the population which is about 9 million young girls, boys, women and men. And yet those who are over 55 years old are only 2.9% which is only 377,000. Therefore, there are fewer elders to day in Zambia to teach younger people about our political history, customs, and our culture perhaps due to the high death rate of older Zambians who are over 55 years old because of the HIV/AIDS epidemic since the 1980s. Urbanization also takes its toll as the 36% of the urban population is rising. This means increasing numbers of Zambians lose their connection to elders,  rural areas where the source, strength and origin of our Zambian traditions are the strongest.

The Bad News about Political Future

When there is political frustration in a young population, certain people in Zambia who might feel they are not getting a fair share of the resources might contemplate revolution and violence as the sure and quickest way to getting what they want. This will not work in Zambia and may not be working very well in many countries where people have tried revolutionary violence. Peaceful secession is very rare. The vast majority of Zambians today have access to the internet through cell phones. There is Facebook, email, twitter, web pages, blogs, and Instagram. We read and see exciting images of the Arab Spring revolution in Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, Syria and many other places.

It is tempting for many younger Zambian leaders to assume we will just import whatever is abroad to solve our problems. While some of the information is good, some or much of it may be unrealistic and just plain dangerous and destructive for the nation. This author is advocating peaceful solutions for the Zambian nation not because he is a coward, scared and deathly afraid of revolutions but because I know we have a very peaceful country. We do not need revolutionary violence. I just love and cherish the peace that we enjoy and I am sure many Zambians would like to maintain it too. Many younger Zambians may have no idea how badly people are suffering with violence and chaos in the Eastern Congo, Libya, Somalia, Syria, Boko Haram in Nigeria, Iraq, Central African Republic, and many other places. I will discuss more of this later about Kaundaisms.

The Great News about Our Country

The greatest news about our country is that we are probably the most integrated in the world. Our founders were intelligent enough to create the foundation. This is our greatest strength that very few countries in Africa and the world have. Even some of the most powerful countries such as the United States, the oldest European and other countries are not as integrated as Zambians. We Zambians do not have the deeply entrenched deadly hatred and segregation of one tribe against another of  the 72 tribes. Our founders made sure that we loved each other. This does not mean we have no problems or internal political differences. I had to laugh when there was news about Tonga secession. I was thinking if Southern Province seceded, I would need a passport to go to Mwanamayinda on the Kafue Road on the Mazabuka road. I am a Tumbuka from the Eastern Province. I have a sister who is married to a Tonga man who is my mulamu (brother-in-law) and I have more than 8 nieces and nephews and grand nieces and nephews in Southern Province. Would they suddenly be in another country? All of us Zambians have close friends, blood and marriage relatives in regions and provinces all over Zambia in the 72 tribes.

Any Zambian Can be Elected President

Because we are so integrated, that’s why anyone in Zambia from any tribe can be elected President. The talk that a Tonga, Lozi, Kaonde, Namwanga, Chokwe and any member of the 72 tribes cannot be elected President is just not true. Who would have thought President Obama, a black American, would become the President of the United States which has deeply entrenched racism against African-Americans? This is the advice that every political party and individuals who aspire to be elected President of Zambia should know. If you are a Presidential candidate who is Bemba, Lozi, Ngoni, Chokwe, Nkoya. Lozi, Tonga, Soli, Lenje, Lamba, and many others, don’t waste your time campaigning in your province or region. You already have that vote in your pocket. You need to have a good manifesto, organization on the ground, and then travel to all the other provinces to personally appeal for their votes. If you are genuine, Zambians can see you are  serious, fair, determined, you have a vision for all Zambians and you are genuinely non-tribal, Zambians will vote for you irrespective of your race, ethnicity, tribe, man or woman. This is why any Zambian man or woman can be elected President of Zambia.

Kaundaisms and One Zambia One Nation.

The younger generation of political leaders today in Zambia might take the peace, tranquility, the One Zambia One Nation we enjoy for granted. That is the most dangerous attitude. There are two of the many Kaundaisms that might help all of us Zambians which we should always remember.  First, if you advocate revolutionary violence, when the country of Zambia is up in flames, you won’t enjoy whatever you thought you will achieve. President Kaunda addressing a rally in the 1970s even said that once the whole country is engulfed in violence, thieves, saboteurs, those who are holding dark corner meetings, political opportunists, tribalists, racists, and even those engaging in corruption will not be able to enjoy their spoils. Second, if you as a President unjustly politically verbally or physically attack or imprison a particular opposition group leader(s) or political party leaders, the supporters of that party or group will hold a grudge against you and you will be creating more martyrs and enemies as a political leader or President. His advice was that it was best as a political leader to be fair minded, make just decisions, follow the law, be reconciliatory, be kind, and respect others including the opposition because you yourself as a leader might be out of power one day.