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fights go no beyond the rudimentary: a bare fist here, bare foot there or even a bare tooth or nail. Asunya arwa!

And nothing goes back home: Chihwerure hachiende kumba!
Suffice to say, the petty differences and jealousies and rivalries that might occur leading to the fights only but strengthen the community of villagers who tend to appreciate each other more.
This is no less evident when there is a menace to the village and people bundle together against the external enemy. Then you get the village warriors and lesser species coming together against those, that would wanted to steal, rob or otherwise disturb the rhythm of life in the village.

The life in the village pulsates in harmony as marked by seasons and by human nature. While the elements define the terrestrial and even the cosmic, human nature dictates that there be times of waking and sleeping; eating and relieving; courtship and marriage.
The gist of this villager’s recollections of life in the village is to illustrate how the violence that has been taking place in Zimbabwe, especially Harare and Chitungwiza differs from the beneficial and desirable fights dzekumombe, back in the village.

The violence, graphically portrayed in the media at home and abroad, is just sick. It is destructive.
It is sowing divisions in the nation, communities and families. It is an eye for an eye: did somebody not say that this makes the world blind? Some Ghandi from the land of spices! Some people out there are taking advantage of our divisions. They fan them and conquer us as a whole.

While we trade blows and blame somebody is benefiting from our folly, division and weakness.
Will we know how to keep our fights to reasonable levels? It is to be admitted that fighting is both inevitable and functional.
Fighting does not always mean being physical and deploying axes, spears, machete, hammers and clubs.

We can fight without fighting. We can fight with words and deeds. This is why it is heartening to know that the principals in Government are meeting over violence.
President Mugabe has times without a number decried violence and urged restraint. PM Tsvangirai has all but complained that violence is being perpetrated against his supporters, even when the same supporters are engaged in fights themselves.

But the violence has been perpetrated by all sides!
This is fact, not fiction. Now it is time to face the truth. It does not matter whether you are MDC-T, Zanu-PF or MDC anything, we must be ashamed as Zimbabweans to engage in such violence and still claim our fame as a peace-loving country that respects our humanism, our national values, beliefs and ethos.

The basic value of our hard won independence was and still is, to live in peace and harmony, to love each other and respect ourselves and our neighbours as underpinned by the peace and tranquillity brought about by the sacrifice of those living and fallen, who dedicated and committed their lives to the creation of a free Zimbabwe.

The recent orgy of violence that rocked Chitungwiza and the City Centre is portraying us as a rogue nation, a nation with youths who can beat and kill their own people over 2 litres of opaque beer, a nation of youth who can commit evil over 250 ml of Zed.

Violence should be everyone’s concern; it should be a national issue. We should not promote our political ego through violence and cry the loudest when it is perpetrated against us.
The main political parties in the country should certainly be able to control their youths unless it becomes a case of a tail waging the dog and not the dog waging the tail. The violent youths belong to political parties and it is the duty of those parties to whip them into line or re-align them to understand that Zimbabwe has, since independence, largely remained peaceful and that what we enjoy today is a product of sacrifice and commitment that involved loss of limb and life at the hands of white Rhodesians.

This is very critical for nation building. We cannot continue to play our cattle herding antics right into our adulthood and turn a nation upside down because we want to support this and that candidate.
Why should the whole nation be subjected to violence by a bunch of drunks masquerading as masters and shapers of our national destiny? Why should Zimbabwe fail to deal with the violence once and for all? We must in our combined effort deal decisively with violence and tame the shrews!

After all, we are Zimbabweans and we should enjoy our country but we might disenfranchise ourselves by allowing these youths to run riot at will, even against national police.
That kind of behaviour must never be tolerated as human rights or rights to express whatever grievance. Lets us respect ourselves by ensuring that Zimbabwe is safe and violence free.

This villager wishes everyone the best in dealing with this ugly phenomenon that is erupting in some parts of the country.