First Lady’s cookout competition expands First Lady Dr Auxillia Mnangagwa, Minister of State for Provincial Affairs and Devolution for Mashonaland East Aplonia Munzverengwi and Mrs Naume Chimanikire, wife to Chief Seke, look at some of the traditional dishes prepared during a traditional meal cookout competition in Seke District yesterday.

Tendai Rupapa in SEKE

FIRST Lady Dr Auxillia Mnangagwa was yesterday happy to discover that her mission to unite people is gathering more traction as men and youths joined in when she was invited by the Seke community, who held a traditional meal cookout competition to promote indigenous dishes, a sign that the programme has expanded.

The men exhibited different artefacts they are making using their hands, while tongues of fire licked huge pots as dozens of women of varying ages prepared mouth-watering and innovatively packaged traditional dishes using locally available ingredients.

Through this, the First Lady is aiming to build a complete home where men, women and children understand and play their roles effectively.

The First Lady, who was all smiles, preached the gospel of peace, love and unity to the community.

She spoke out candidly against drug abuse, domestic violence, child marriages and the surge in divorce cases.

Amai Mnangagwa also encouraged people to continue following Covid-19 prevention protocols and to get vaccinated, adding that those who had received the second dose should consider getting booster shots.

It was an African-themed event where traditional utensils like clay pots, wooden spoons, wooden plates and gourds were used as women passed to one another knowledge on how traditional dishes were prepared.

One of the participants, was a 74-year-old granny who attributed her age to healthy eating and sober habits.

The Rastafarai community was also represented for the first time at the cook-out competition by Ms Mavis Nkuwasenga who showcased several vegan dishes and artefacts that included jewellery, bags, shoes and hats.

The First Lady’s traditional meal cook-out competition comes at a time when most youths were shunning traditional dishes which they viewed as inferior, preferring exotic dishes which exposed them to diseases.

Women break into song and dance as they welcome First Lady Dr Auxillia Mnangagwa to their cooking competition in Seke District yesterday.

The wife to Chief Seke, Mrs Naume Chimanikire, was delighted to have invited the First Lady to witness how well her programme had been received even at ward level.

“Today we are grateful for the traditional cookout competition in Seke District. We invited the First Lady to come and witness that after she taught us that in our communities we should consume traditional dishes so that we keep diseases at bay, we did not sit down but we went to the grassroots that is why we have all the wards from Ward 1 to 21 where women came out preparing meals.

“We are showing Amai that her programmes are not in vain. Amai is saying, let us promote our traditional dishes so that our families survive free of diseases.

“By coming up with this programme, the First Lady did wonders for us as a nation. We had lost our tradition and forgotten that traditional dishes must always be prepared the way they were prepared by our grandmothers. Amai asked us to go back to tradition and eat healthy foods because diseases had crept up in homes. We promise to back her as Chiefs’ wives as we carry forward the preparation of traditional dishes.

“She started by giving us traditional grains when we did not understand why she was doing so. We later realised when she came up with the cooking competition that she was preparing us for this,” she said while beaming with pride.

Equally excited was Mashonaland East Provincial Affairs and Devolution Minister Aplonia Munzverengwi, who described the traditional meal cookout competitions initiated by the mother of the nation as highly beneficial.

“Today (yesterday) we are here in Seke where we have come for the district cookout. This is our first district cookout in the province,” she said. “The way this programme started after being introduced by the First Lady, we were taken aback because we thought people resented indigenous dishes.

“However, with the coming in of the First Lady you will see that most of us started shunning exotic foods because they now appreciate the benefits of traditional dishes. Amai started this programme from the provincial cookout and went to the national level.

“Today we are with the wife of Chief Seke who came out tops at national level last year. At the 2022 finals in Victoria Falls we also came back with a trophy after one of our own came second overall and as Minister of State I am pleased.

“You therefore can see that this programme has been well received in this province and we now want that in all districts so that our people can process the foods adding value and enhance access to the people. This will economically empower our women and help the sick.

“We want this programme to go on countrywide so that Amai appreciates that we have embraced her programme to help the nation. We are also thinking of registering these foods as patents so that we can sell our foods outside the country and fulfil Amai’s vision.

“Amai wants our food to be known even beyond our borders. Amai said our people who are outside the country would be happy to see food from their home country on shelves in big shops.”

First Lady Dr Auxillia Mnangagwa looks at the hats, strobes and other artefacts exhibited by men during a traditional meal cookout competition in Seke yesterday.

Mrs Angela Mloyi, who was part of the finals held in Victoria Falls on Africa Day and emerged as the first runner-up, described the cookout competitions as a learning curve.

“At the competition, we were teaching each other to cook as women from all the country’s 10 provinces. After the competition, the First Lady told us to go back to our constituencies and teach others some recipes,” she said.

“Amai’s encouragement was that we had to teach each other to cook traditional meals that is why I am here today. I am not part of the competition today but I came here to teach my fellow women what I learnt in Victoria Falls and motivate them. In cooking, no one is better than the other but we are all good in our own way but if we teach one another we then succeed and unite as a nation.”

Mrs Loveness Shumba (32) prepared among other dishes, a cake made from boiled traditional rice and sweet potatoes which are then pounded together after boiling. It is then mixed with millet meal, flour, rice and milk to make a dough and put in oven.

She also prepared pies, the dough was made from rapoko with matemba filling as well as cowpeas pies.

Mrs Shumba left people spellbound with her banana and baobab yoghurt, watermelon and banana juice.

Gogo Sophia Ziwachi (74) from Ward 14 had a variety of dried vegetables like mushroom (Tsviritsviti, nzeve and Matindindi), dried pumpkin leaves, dried blackjack, tsunga, munyevhe, moringa and different types of okra both fresh and dried.

She also prepared Musvisvinwa tea, baobab coffee, and zumbani tea.

“These are the kinds of food that made us grow to this age. We used to and still eat healthy and maintain sober habits. This largely explains my ripe age of 74. I wish the younger generation could listen to the First Lady it is for their benefit,” said Gogo Ziwachi.

First Lady Dr Auxillia Mnangagwa comforts a girl who broke into tears after the mother of the nation pointed out the effects of divorce to families and children during an interactive session in Seke yesterday. The Grade 7 girl, who used to be brilliant in school, is starting to lag behind because of her parents’ divorce.— Pictures: John Manzongo

Besides cooking, there were also women and men who are doing works like knitting, sewing, beading, weaving and crotchety among other projects.

The First Lady applauded them and implored them to rope in youths and teach them the work they were doing so that they stay away from mischief like drug abuse and prostitution.

Addressing the Seke community, the First Lady said: “If you want to appreciate a woman’s skill, take her into the kitchen. This is where you will appreciate whether or not you made the right choice as a man.

“This is the room which will show the manners of this person whom you want to be separated from only by death. Now if the cooking skills are bad, will we be separated only by death? It will be a tricky situation isn’t it?” she said jokingly.

The mother of the nation said a woman’s smartness is also judged by her kitchen.

“The way she arranges things and how she moulds the family and how she serves her food will show her character,” she said. “There are some women who ask their husbands to serve food on their own. Kwete madzimai hatidaro ana baba vanobikirwa vopakurirwa. All these things have their aftermaths.

“Yes, I have cooked but how am I going to serve the food? When dishing the food, is my face happy? Is the food easy to eat when the one who serves you is not happy? All these attributes are looked at on wome.”

Dr Mnangagwa said she was gratified to see women showing their cooking skills, but the story does not end there.

The First lady chronicled how she started the programme by giving Chiefs wives traditional grains and imploring them to grow the crops.

She implored chiefs’ spouses countrywide to take the programme seriously the way the wife to Chief Seke was doing.

“All chiefs’ spouses countrywide, we do not want this programme to be for Seke alone because we agreed kubva pakutanga madzimai, we have our own agreement and we want to see you leading in a big way because what we have seen today is a sign that our programme is growing and men have joined too. Today we are at the highest level. I am also learning and that is why I also asked questions when I was moving around the tables,” she said.

She said the spouses of chiefs had to take a leading role in advocating indigenous dishes which were made from locally available ingredients, some of which people produced in their fields.

The activities, the First Lady emphasised, were now for the whole family and not women alone.

“It is now for the whole family,” she said. “I saw men who were making hats, whips, shoes and bags among other things. It all points to the growth of our programme.

“I saw some girls dealing with beauty stuff like wig making, this is not cooking but it is also the growth of our programme. If you look at all ages each and every one is doing something that is different from cooking. This is a complete household we are talking about.”

The mother of the nation implored men who were involved in the programme to rope in their children as a way of dealing with the challenges of drug abuse.

“We have children who are troubled by drug abuse,” she said. “Some of the drugs are smuggled into the country while the children are manufacturing some of the drugs. Children are being ruined please

get some who can join you so that you teach them and that way we will not fail to get others who change. You will never hear a child of that calibre having gone to take on drugs.”

While tackling social issues, Dr Mnangagwa said; “Is there still domestic violence here? This issue of violence must end. It must end completely because this is your partner whom you took. She is your helper so we do not want to fight and get infamous for domestic violence when compared to other countries.

“Marriages are breaking apart, marriages have crumbled and people are marrying off young children because of a quest for niceties. The children are into drugs and you do not know where the country is heading to. Let us take care of our country and be happy to live in it because there is no other country we will go to. Let us love one another in our own country which was bequeathed on us by God.”

The First Lady threw a challenge to churches to join the bandwagon and prepare traditional dishes so that their members also benefit in a big way.

“What we are doing is not child’s play,” she said. “We are building unity here. We now know each other and are building relationships and friendships. I want you to leave this place with a lesson that you must not continue gossiping.

“You will leave this place united. You churchgoers, we haven’t seen where you are cooking. Prepare meals at your churches and invite me over to see so that we see whether your food differs with this one. Tinoda kubatana nekuti ini saAmai ndinoda vana vangu vese handisarudze. Ishuviro yangu kuti even those in the diaspora vatsvagewo nzvimbo dzekubikira vachibikawo chikafu chedu like mazondo nesadza rezviyo, mufushwa and road runner chickens nezvimwewo chokwadi vana vangu ndakumbirisa, I will find a way to work with you and provide you with recipes so that you put our country on the map. It is important to preserve our identity.

“I have seen skills that are bigger than the way we started and urge all women to do something for their families, communities. Do not make a bad name for yourselves. Make a good name for yourself through good deeds. We now want to see some shops in all the provinces that will specialise only on finished packaged traditional products.”

When the First Lady was speaking about the effects of divorce, a teenage girl wept uncontrollable showing the pain children endure when parents’ divorce.

Amai Mnangagwa had to sit down with her while comforting her.

She was told by the child’s teacher that the girl who was a bright child was now failing to concentrate in class following the separation of her parents.

Dr Mnangagwa pleading with couples to live in peace and shun domestic violence which mainly leads to divorce.

She asked the gathering on the effects of divorce and the responses she got from the children and the elderly especially women, were heartbreaking.

This shows that the First Lady is hitting the nail on the head in addressing issues that affect people in their day-to-day lives.

The First Lady also gave lessons to the young on the ideal courtship process and further urged mothers-in-law and their daughters-in-law to always live in harmony.

This was after the elderly complained that they were being given nicknames by their daughters-in-law who were not in good books with them.

Winners went away with various gifts which were presented to them by the First Lady.

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