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Elliot Ziwira @ The Book Store
HOPE seems to be that elusive harbinger that constantly shifts positions when the oppressed and downtrodden vainly seek solace in its receding enclaves. Hope cannot be any other colour but green – the colour of abundance – fruition and regeneration. In a hilarious satirical repertoire, the playwright

Tabana Lo Liyong captures the bane of ancient cultural customs in an ever changing world, displacement, deceit, hypocrisy and hope through a closet drama. Partly inspired by the Kenyan general elections of 2007, the violent disturbances following hard upon and the subsequent strange marriage of the averse ideologies of the parties involved, “The Colour of Hope” (2010) implores Africa to look beyond itself and at the same time remain itself if at all it entertains hope of disentangling itself from the intricate web of history.

Imperialism did not only establish hegemonic ideologies on the African continent, but it also brought a bastardised society that seeks change through its refusal to change.

Change for the mere purpose of change is not the panacea through which the continent can find its footing in the quagmire it is currently perched on.

The exuberance and inebriation of youth alone are not enough for procreation in the same vein that the wisdom of experience and age cannot be relied upon for a healthy seed of tomorrow.

Interfaces should be created to merge the strong aspects of yore and those of today which may either be locally inspired or foreign.

Therein lays the colour of hope -green.

Using the satirist trope; ridicule, sarcasm, humour, iron and cynicism, the dramatist chronicles the voyeuristic nature of man as he exploits culture to nurse his ego.

The story is even made more poignant through the use of an exotic setting which can easily be interpreted as any African country. Though the story interprets the tragic nature of post-colonial struggles in the 21st century, it heavily draws from folkloric drama, as the setting takes the reader generations back in time.

However, the past portrayed through culture and dressing is superimposed with modern a mathematical, scientific and biological allusions which is not only hilarious but apt, as it maps the way forward for a continent besieged by tribal in-fighting and betrayal.

In the first Act the reader is treated to the age-old misinterpretation of facts, as regards the boy child vis-à-vis the girl child.

The Chief, who we are told is son to the first colonial chief who dislodged the legitimate local chief, is in conversation with his wife, the Queen.

The Queen is native to the chiefdom as she was given as a pawn to thwart any future bloodshed against the locals.

Since she is pregnant there is great anxiety as to the child that will come out of the royal womb. As per culture the Chief anticipates a boy; an heir to take the throne into the future. Because of his impatience he has sent messengers to a diviner to foretell the sex of the child.

The Chief Messenger brings the news that the diviner says: “Tell His Excellency the Chief not to worry himself unduly. His wife the Queen will deliver a healthy human child. A child whose life will bring transformations into the chiefdom… Let him sit and wait.”

Eventually the Queen delivers a daughter, Princess Royal, much to the chagrin of the Chief and his patriarchal advisors. The issue of culture assumes an ugly form here as the Chief is filled in by the elders led by the Native Elder and the Chief Adviser, about the existence of certain norms pertaining to a girl born as a first child to a chief.

The native culture subscribes to the norm that the girl may be married off “before puberty so that she does not waste much royal resource”. On the other hand, it is norm in the Chief’s culture, according to the Chief Adviser, that royalty should not marry outside the palace gate. He tells the Chief and the elders: “In our customs, dear native Elders and in-laws, a princess has a bitter fruit. And the head of it has to be bitten off by the person with the stronger teeth. For the princess possesses such potent powers that it corrodes her. So the Princess’ cosmic force has to be decapitated by the Chief, her father. It is he who can neutralise her powers.”

Because of an ancient custom which seeks to keep royal blood pure, the Chief finds himself at the centre of a storm that drags the entire palace into turmoil, when he is caught by his son deflowering the Princess Royal, who later on falls pregnant. The incestuous affair becomes a public secret as the Crown Prince tells his mother about it and the princess’ tummy bulges.

Meanwhile, the Queen is trapped in a cuckolding tempest when she is caught with a lover who is one of the palace guards. She opens up to the audience through an aside that the said paramour, her cousin is the father of her two children; the Princess Royal and the Crown Prince.

In a nerve-wracking expose, she chronicles how everyone was made to believe that she was a virgin on her wedding day because of “the blood on the bridal sheet” which they thought was hers; yet it was the Chief’s, as “he did not know what to do, coming from another race or another tribe altogether”, and “ended up lacerating himself.”

However, as it is an open palace secret that the children are not his, the Chief orders the execution of the palace guard.

Fifteen years on the Queen, still bitter, attempts to play the role of the official tester of men who intend to marry as is custom, pertinently the Niece at Court’s fiancé, who runs away and exposes her.

Aunt Makadzie, the official secret tester, and the Chief’s sister, sets her up.

Having fallen out of favour, the Queen attempts to poison her husband but is seen by her daughter who warns him, earning the Queen a public rebuttal, trial and death sentence. To the Queen’s relief, however, the popularity of the Chief and his sister, the Queen Mother alias Auntie Makadzie is on the wane. The natives decide to side with one of their own and not with imperialists, thus the executioners let her free. Like her son, she goes into exile in the neighbouring chiefdom which is under her brother.

Liyong also castigates cultural customs that destroy individual freedoms through Auntie Makadzie who is taken advantage of by her brother, the Chief, with whom she has a daughter, the Niece at Court. In her anger she tells him that her husband left her because of the custom that robs women of sexual gratification – mutilation. This culture, she says, covers up men’s weaknesses, as they only have to satisfy themselves and not their partners.

In the end, because of greed, carnal desires and deceit, the Chief is murdered by her sister through chemical poisoning at the testing clinic, where he has gone to be tested as he wants to marry two more young brides offered by the Women Par- liament.

Unfortunately, Isanusi, the third in hierarchy reads through her and makes her taste her own medicine. Isanusi is in turn assassinated by the General of the Army, Otumfwo, with the help of the Chief Guard. General Otumfwo, whose real name is Emor-emor, the unifier hands over the throne to its legitimate heir, the Princess Royal, who seeks advice from her uncle and brother.

The Princess Royal, an embodiment of youth and the emancipation of women does not only seek guidance from her uncle, a proponent of experience and wisdom, but she also seeks the invocation of the spirits of great African heroines; Queen Nzinga ka Nkuwu of the Lunda-Lunya of Angola, Queen Cleopatra, who won the hearts of Caesar and Mark Antony, and the Queen of Shebba “who talked philosophy with wise Right Royal King Solomon”. She also ropes in the Sojourner Truth to help her deal with Western machinations as she quips: “Can’t I get the respect due to all women in America? All men in America?”

Debunking cultural norms and values that reduce women to victims, Taban Lo Liyong christens the colour of hope to a continent that is not only united by its rich history, but is also adaptive and dynamic.