State of our estate, one year later

We write to honour a pledge we made when, one year ago this week, we last sat in our patented corner at near Black Box in Chemusa to savour, as we had done contiguously for 10 years previously, life as lived by the pipo and to get the journalistic renewal that we so dearly needed after a week of newsroom and classroom tribulations. Remember? It was during our last evening out that you commanded us that if, sorry, when you finally went away, we should regularly brief you about the state of our common estate. In default, you warned, you would come back to harass and tear us into edible portions.

Edward, wherever you are, with whomsoever you are, under whatsoever circumstance or influence you are, listen carefully. We, the Bottom Up expedition, must admit hic et nunc that we have failed to wash the eyes of our pipo clean so that they start seeing what all normal people ought to see. We have failed to sponge the wax out of our pipo’s ears so that they hear what all standard people ought to hear. As the great prophet Isaiah said, our pipo can see but they can’t perceive; they can hear but they can’t understand. As Shakespeare put it in Macbeth, our people’s eyes are open but their senses are shut. As another great seer noted, pipo of this estate perish for lack of knowledge.

Briefly, here is the state of our estate one year after you left for mayiyiyi. First, we are pleased to report that Moya Junior, the Petit Kahuna, the head of our estate, is no longer that quiet or inaudible speech mangling stock. These days, he threatens, challenges, talks confidently and jokes seriously.

To show how familiar he is with the language of the pipo, he one day even sang, ‘Nilebe Pulobulemu’, a bubblegum song from neighbouring Marambo, to the cheer of his ardent supporters. However, the joke wasn’t taken jokingly by some of the pipo since the cost of living has skyrocketed partly because of food inflation caused by shortages of maize; the unholy devaluation of the legal tender of our estate and other endogenous economic encumbrances inflicted upon the estate by these Box 48 boys. We will not comment on this at length since the deputy head of our estate is quoted to have described us, the commentators on every subject under the burning sun, as idiots.

Secondly, we are pleased to inform you that the University of Malawi (Unima) recently awarded the first lady a doctor of philosophy degree for cleaning Malawi and Malawians. Some quarters have been jealously dismissive of the honour. However, the sober members of this estate see no issue to foam and cartoon ourselves about. The Unima saw something in the first lady that we, the pipo, did not see, and honoured it. Recall? The Alfred Nobel Prize Committee saw a peacemaker in President Barak Obama and awarded him the Nobel Peace Prize even as USA troops massacred and water-boarded suspects in Iraq and Afghanistan and tortured inmates at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba.

Thirdly, there is a circus going around our estate in the name of debating inequality. You should have seen the speakers, so-called panellists, and the chief critics of inequality! Believe it or not, Edward, they are all rich! The poor are excluded from even discussing poverty and inequality. Such is the state of our estate.

These rich people blame corruption without mentioning their own role in corruption. They blame lack of visionary leadership without demonstrating that leadership. They rightly blame inequality on our estate unequal distribution of resources, but only yesterday the same people were vociferously against subsidies and welfarism.

In other estates, inequality is sorted out not by governments alone but also through contributions the rich make through their philanthropic engagements, donations, foundations and charities. Here, the nouveau-rich, our bourgeois, don’t practice such umunthu. When Shepherd Bushiri, the self-proclaimed Major 1 Prophet decided to buy and distribute maize to poor starving people, rulers of our estate threatened to kill him so that the poor remain poor.

Such is the state of our estate, one year after you left.

Yours,

Abiti Joyce Befu, MG 66; the Most Paramount Native Authority Mandela; Alhajj Jean-Philippe LePoisson, SC (RTD) and the Mohashoi.