They Called It Academic Genocide Part 2

Although our reaction was laughing, the reality was pain. I could feel that deep pinching pain in my chest. I could feel it in the deepest where I couldn’t reach nor scratch. It was there, lingering and strolling. That pain which makes people laugh instead of crying. We had gone through a lot already and we thought it was gone with 2008. But alas. We were just coming from a disturbed semester in 2008. These exams which we were now poised to write in February 2009 were supposed to have been written in December 2008. But we could not sit for them because a lot happened. In addition, the fees that we paid then was wiped by inflation that the university could not afford the exam material and everything else required. Then, the semester was extended by a few more weeks after Christmas and exams were subsequently deferred. When the university closed, I didn’t spend a night in Harare. Instead, I booked a train back home, Mutare. The train was the most affordable mode of transport and the least convenient and comfortable. The journey, in the crowded, hot and foul-smelling train, would start at 2130hrs and end at 0600hrs, that’s if everything had gone according to the schedule. But nothing was going according to schedule in Zimbabwe then. For example, we had scheduled elections that year, but results were released in a manner that followed no schedule. One night I slept at the train station in Mutare when the scheduled Harare bound train never took off. Imagine having bidden farewell to everyone and promised to call the following morning only to spend the whole night just a few kilometres from home, sleeping on a very uncomfortable seat – head rested in palms and back leaned forward. In December 2008, I travelled home by train, again, as it had become my religion. Religion influenced and shaped not by beliefs but by the laws of economics. 

As we were awkwardly laughing at the notice, I was reminded of 2008 again. Harmonised elections of March 29^th, 2008 caused the university to open late. Yes, that’s outside the schedule. It only reopened on the 7^th of April 2008. And yes, results were not yet known. Rumours and speculations were awash. Someone had defeated someone but there was no winner. Constitutional lawyers, political scientists and other enlightened minds tried to interpret a certain constitutional clause on what it took for one to be declared a duly elected president. Was it 51% or 50% plus one vote? They debated and discussed without end. But again, why were we even discussing this when the results were not yet announced? Was it not undermining the authority of the electoral body? But the electoral body was quiet about it as if encouraging the discussions. Silence in the midst of evil somehow suggest complicit, or does it? We learnt new things in that period, just as we have always been learning through and through. We learnt of meticulous verification and correlation process, but we could not comprehend it. What was this process about? We were told it was to ensure that accurate results were announced. No need to rush. 

So yes, we waited, waited in silence. But this silence was strange. It had a strange smell of uncertainty. It roamed freely up and down the streets. The silence made unusual noises. The sounds of silence were deafening. Some of us with silent voices were drowned in the bellowing and trumpeting silence. 

We had to go back to school before the announcement of the results, in the midst of the silence. On the 7^th of April, classes were supposed to resume. Fees were $13 000 000 000 (read as 13 billion dollars) for tuition and hostels (food and accommodation).  To those who had accommodation options outside campus, fees was $3 000 000 000 (3 billion dollars). I wanted accommodation on campus, but I could not afford it. In fact, I could not even afford the tuition only. I stayed home for two weeks, plotting how to circumvent this obstacle. Although I was doing relief (Chemistry) teaching, the token that I was getting was not even a fraction of what was needed by the university. One day I went to the bank to withdraw my salary and when I got onto the taxi rank on my way back, I realised the money that I had just withdrawn – my entire monthly salary as a temporary teacher – was no longer enough to board a taxi (kombi) back home. I gave it all away to a stranger on the streets and walked home with tears in my eyes.

The university was waiting for me and my money. I had nothing. My students suggested I took them for extra lessons. I agreed but I decided to do it for free. I had had enough of money-losing value whilst in my hands. “Let’s meet in the lab every day at 0900hrs. It’s not mandatory, come only if you want to”. But they insisted on paying at least something. I asked them to pay whatever they wanted. Some said R10 (ten rands), others preferred meticals (Mozambican currency) whilst others could only do it in pulas (Botswana currency). Yes, the majority could only afford to pay in Zimbabwean dollars. By then the Zimbabwean dollar was exchanged in the regions of US1 to ZW$ 600 000 000 000 (Six hundred billion dollars) and inflation was complementing at 200 million per cent. More often than not, prices would rise at least twice a day. So, in the end, I had a few rands, a few meticals, a few pulas and the sinking dollars. Since we were not yet officially using the multicurrency system – foreign currency - then, I had to find ways of making the money usable. It was called 'Burning!'  

Later, in September, Gideon Gono tried to ‘formalise’ the use of foreign currency in selected sectors and outlets. He dubbed them ‘FOLIWARS’ standing for Foreign Exchange Licensed Warehouses and Retail Shops. Under the FOLIWARS scheme, 1000 retail shops and 200 wholesalers countrywide were licensed to trade in foreign currency to ‘improve the availability of goods on the market’, notwithstanding that these shops were mainly in Harare and Bulawayo. I remember getting into one of the licenced shops at Fife Avenue in Harare, one kilogram of lemons was going for $7.00 (read as 7 US dollars). The National Economic Consultative Forum (NECF) slammed the move saying it was not protecting consumers, but the National Income and Pricing Commission (NIPC) went quiet. Complicit? Gono tried several means and mechanisms to manage what he later termed ‘The Casino Economy’. And true to that, most strategies were typical of gambling. Just throwing the coin and praying it’s a head or tail or whatever you hope for. There were no formulas neither were there any guaranteed results. He too had no idea of the outcome. But there is always a method to the madness. There was 'Operation Sunrise' when he removed zeros to relieve our money of the weight of the zeros, but they came back immediately. From ‘Zero to Hero’ to, well, zero again. He removed them again, this time 10 of them. ‘Dawn of a New Era’, he said whilst reintroducing the old and forgotten coins – carrying the value of the currency of the day. Zeros came back again, this time with more vengeance. The coins were soon back in the dustbins, again. Dawn of a new error? He wasn't done with disciplining zeroes, so he tried to remove 12 of them. But on realising the futility of such an exercise, he tried Bacossi – Basic Commodities Supply Side Intervention – but sooner than later, Bacossi was now a subject of ridicule and jokes. A Casino Economy, it was.

Two weeks after the university had opened, I was still in Mutare looking for $3 billion. I knew no one who knew no one who could lend us such a whopping amount. But I was supposed to be at school. I needed to be there. It was not an option. The school headmaster wanted me to defer my studies and teach the kids for a little longer because he said I was 'very good and the kids liked me'. They like me because I am one of them, I thought. It was just a few months since I had graduated from that same school. I was a student who came back as a teacher within a few months. They needed no introduction of who I was neither did I need any introduction of who they were. On the 19^th of April, I decided to leave Mutare for Harare. I am going back to school, I told everyone. They asked how I was going to do it. ‘Jehovah Jireh’, I answered trying to be brave. Truth is, I didn’t know how I was going to do it and that was scaring and stressing me. Perhaps, that's how Gono used to do it when managing 'the Casino Economy'. I booked the train on the same day, which was a Saturday and arrived in Harare the following morning. What awaited me? Isaac didn’t know. I didn’t know either. Only Abraham knew. 

To be continued...