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Embassy of Zimbabwe in Washington, DC

Nick Mangwana View From Diaspora

An ambassador is an envoy of a principal. There are way too many misconstructions about Zimbabwe. Do we have to confirm them by this laissez faire and a we don’t give a damn attitude? Or is it that we have heard the lies about us too many times that we have decided that if the lies were actually true maybe that wouldn’t hurt too much?

When the Parliamentary Committee on Foreign Relations in the esteemed company of the Speaker Advocate Jacob Mudenda went to Kuwait, they worked wonders and emancipated Zimbabwean women who we hear were being treated as slaves.

Reading their report to Parliament in the Hansard one has no option but get disappointed by our Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

They are reported to have ignored letters from their man on the ground Ambassador Grey Mark Marongwe regarding this plight of citizens. That culture of ignoring Zimbabweans who find themselves in a bad place in a foreign land should not be allowed to continue.

But that is a secondary matter to this piece.

The primary matter is that they ignored the President’s representative in Kuwait, His Excellency Ambassador Marongwe.

Yes, His Excellency, for that is how he is addressed there.

For he represents the Sovereign that is Zimbabwe.

When they eventually made one curt response, it was to say you are on your own mate.

This column is a major supporter of Government policy, but it has built a reputation for calling a spade by name, now it intends to do just that in the name of Zimbabwe.

It is an honour and a privilege to serve your Government in a foreign land.

But who would raise their hand to take up that job if they are informed that when you take the job and your dear wife dies in that foreign land, you will have to borrow from a local bank so as to pay funeral directors who prepare her body for repatriation and the airfares for the repatriation?

Those offered that job would not only refuse, they would run in the opposite direction.

Well, in June 2015 Ambassador Marongwe had to suffer that very indignity when his wife passed on.

Surely what will the President say if he finds out this is how his Ambassador was treated by someone in his Government?

What will he say when he discovers that in February 2016 his Ambassador was summoned to the Kuwait Ministry of Foreign Affairs to be dressed down for rent arrears accrued by his Mission and its employees to local landlords?

What would he think when he becomes aware that one of his employees in a foreign land delivered a baby and the institution the baby had been delivered at, temporarily detained her because of unpaid hospital bills, prompting the intervention of his Ambassador. Surely, wouldn’t he think that his country is now being misrepresented?

Maybe he would even think that sometimes it is better to be unrepresented than misrepresented. But diplomatic relations are a matter of Presidential discretion and we dare not delve into that.

What is very clear is that an Embassy in foreign debt is not the right face to project when one wants to attract investment and respect.

Which investor would make any further enquiries when they discover that the telephone is not working, because it has been cut off for unpaid bills of only $2 000?

How about when they discover that the local people employed by the Mission have not been paid for months?

These local people live in their communities and they also have to give reasons why they are not paying their own bills and utilities.

What will they say when they are asked?

Trying to guess would depress any patriotic Zimbabwean, for surely that description would not be in flattering terms. When the President becomes aware of this, wouldn’t he think that having this Mission projecting this face of Zimbabwe is a self-defeating mission? Who knows what presidents think?

But this we know, he is likely to be happy to learn that during the Xenophobic attacks in South Africa, his Ambassador Isaac Moyo represented the best of Zimbabwe. He was hands on. He visited Zimbabwean victims, liaised well with families and the media.

Facilitated treatment for some as well. This columnist dealt with him on behalf of members of his party who had affected families. This clearly was Zimbabwe putting its best foot forward. But giving the President one piece of good news would not probably show him that he probably has a good team, but he just needs his Government to treat them better.

Ambassador Gabriel Machinga took advantage of the Olympics to shine in London. There the best of Zimbabwe was showcased. The same for Mary Muchada when she was in Brussels and the likes of the writer were all for massive demonstrations against sanctions. So the team might not be a bad team at all. What with activist ambassadors like Chipo Zindoga putting up a fight to defend the motherland in a foreign land (then)?

But do these good people and their staff need to be humiliated by going for months without being paid? It is common cause that resources are a challenge in Zimbabwe’s current economic climate, but if the truth be told, sometimes this is just skewed priorities. Surely these good people host our ministers and other State dignitaries who they pick from VIP lounges from their first class flights into their five star hotels, yet they themselves have gone 15 months without a salary. Living in a foreign land is not easy. But it is worse when there is the diplomatic code limiting what you can or cannot do to augment your non-coming income.

Most of these countries besides the UK (and may be a few more this columnist is not aware of) do not allow wives of ambassadors to work. It means being a spouse to an ambassador comes with a lot of personal and family sacrifices. Whatever choice a family makes as in whether to stay together or apart is not an easy decision. Should they then choose to stay together and the wife passes away and we fail to repatriate her remains, we are guilty of serious dereliction of duty as a country.

There is no need to sugarcoat this irresponsibility.

If a country cannot let its soldiers go to war in rags why are we letting our embassies become so indigent?

One hopes he is made aware that this is not a use of poetic licence by this columnist but just modest reality. This columnist has a lot of interaction with different Missions and this is the situation.

Now that this week it’s on the Embassies, one of the greatest wrongs and oversights that this columnist has been at pains to make people understand is that how can an Embassy like the Zimbabwe House in the UK fail to lead Independence Celebrations in the UK year after year because they are not resourced enough to do that?

There are many groups of patriotic Zimbabweans who try to make it happen but there are too many divisions as long as this is not led by the official representative of the State. If it was only a question of money, then there is no doubt that there is a large body of patriotic minded Zimbabweans who are happy to push around a hat and jointly fund a Zimbabwe Independence celebration which in all essence is a National Day. Zimbabweans in the Diaspora can disagree on a lot of issues but not their Independence.

Ours is the only Mission in London which does not lead Independence Celebrations because it has no money. By the way, Harare has not been represented in London at Ambassador level for two full years now.

An ambassador is an envoy of a principal. There are way too many misconstructions about Zimbabwe. Do we have to confirm them by this laissez faire and a we don’t give a damn attitude? Or is it that we have heard the lies about us too many times that we have decided that if the lies were actually true maybe that wouldn’t hurt too much?

Or is it that we have decided that there are low expectations of us anyway so it wouldn’t hurt after all to live to those expectations? None of these are good for Zimbabwe. The nation should value its ambassadors who in turn should value every single citizen resident or who visits the nation they are based in.

Zimbabwe is a brand. Our embassies have a duty to sell that brand, they have to protect that brand and they have to enhance that brand. But to do that they need all the tools. If they are deprived of them the tools they automatically and unwittingly damage that brand. If they project an impoverished image abroad, no one would like to invest or be a tourist of such a country.

They also have to treat Zimbabweans living in the country of their postings right. By so doing they foster patriotism in foreign lands.

But if someone at Head Office in Harare stops caring about how Zimbabwe is perceived, how the President is represented in a foreign land then they should reconsider their position. For Zimbabwe’s international brand is its reputation, the very thing that gives citizens a feel good factor.

But how can they, when that brand is being represented as an inferior one in the diplomatic communities?