The Sunday News
Bruce Ndlovu, Sunday News Reporter
WHEN Heads of States and Government gathered in the coastal city of Durban for the Durban World Sustainable Development Summit in 2002, few among them would have known that they were about to witness one of the most accomplished displays of public speaking in modern times.
It is a speech that resurfaces whenever friend or foe brings up the name of Zimbabwe’s former President and the country’s founding father Cde Robert Mugabe.
While the speech might have been longer, it was the last few minutes that will live on forever, etched firmly in the memories of those that either watched it live or those that, as the world mourns him now, pull it from video archives to remember the orator the great statesman was.
“We don’t mind, having and bearing sanctions burning us from Europe, we are not Europeans. We have not asked for any inch of Europe, any square inch of that territory. So Blair, keep your England and let me keep my Zimbabwe,” the veteran Pan-Africanist thundered.
On paper, in light of everything that has happened in the 17 years since that speech, those words might not seem to have the same weight they carried when they were uttered. Seeing is believing, the adage goes and indeed that particular speech needed to be seen to be believed.
The last few minutes are just a clinic in the art of public speaking. With hands folded in front of his chest, Cde Mugabe spoke with the confidence of a man that belied the fact that his country is besieged by western nations that have taken extreme offence at African country daring to repossess real estate ceased over a century ago in one of colonialism’s worst, injurious and longstanding injustices.
What made that speech better than a lot that are delivered by various leaders in a world whose calendar is filled with occasions when the world’s greatest statesman are expected to speak?
Perhaps it was the veteran statesman’s hand gestures. One moment his hands were folded at his chest and the next he was throwing his right hand into the air, as if to swat away the western nations whose actions threatened to derail his country’s policy of self determination, a policy he authored and was prepared to see through at whatever the cost.
There was power in the movement of his hands and at times the hands seemed to be a speech of their own, containing as much intelligence and emotion as the sheet of paper, containing his speech, that he only seemed to glance at from time to time.
“So Blair, keep your England and let me keep my Zimbabwe,” he said the famous words with one hand held to his chest, as if to signal that the soil that had led European countries to renew old alliance was right there, safe in his chest and roaming with him wherever he went.
With the whole auditorium seemingly united in applause, with his index finger repeatedly stabbing the air, he delivered the punch line.
“Mr Chairman, having said that may I say people must always come first in any process of sustainable development and let our Africans come first in the development of Africa, not as puppets, not as beggars but as sovereign people, I thank you,” he said.
Each of those last few words were punctuated by the statesman repeatedly stabbing the air with his index finger as if he was poking holes into the arguments of the self proclaimed champions of democracy.
Standing at 1,8 metres tall, on that day in Durban, there might have been men that stood taller than Zimbabwe’s founding father. However, height is not the only indicator of stature and on that occasion the medium-sized man cast the largest shadow.
A lot has been written about former President Mugabe in the last few days as national international news organisations scramble to get a bite of the man who has become for many a symbol of Pan-African defiance and pride in a world where, in most cases, the forces of old are still very much aligned against previously colonised nations seeking to chart their own path.
Amid the thousands of words written however, what cannot be taken away from him is his undeniable gift of gab, a quality that his countrymen needed at various times when they were under siege.
“This is just rubbish, absolute rubbish, no one will take cognisance of it,” he thundered as the rogue Rhodesian Government tried to stampede Zimbabweans into an unsuitable pseudo independence settlement.
It was a statement that was needed at the time, when the war drums were still beating and bullets still raining on Zimbabwean sons and daughters that had sacrificed themselves for the greater good.
However, the statesman was not all about blood and thunder. His speechmaking was also marked by poise and calculation, the sort of calculation that allowed him to “read the room” and manipulate it to maximum effect. In 2017 this writer was privileged to watch closely his speech at his 93rd birthday celebrations in Matobo.
In his audience were thousands who had come to celebrate his birthday with him. Also in attendance were the rocks, boulders and hills of Matobo that cast a pleasant shadow over the pomp and celebration that afternoon. Everyone had come there expecting a boisterous speech from the elder statesman. To the surprise of many, he departed from politics and the affairs of state, instead giving those in attendance a glimpse of his soul. So sombre was the beginning of his speech that one could have heard the proverbial pin drop while he spoke softly into the microphone.
“I miss them. I miss them so much and sometimes I ask myself why I have remained to stay this long?” he said as he told the throng about how he only had one sibling remaining in life, leaving many to muse about the gift and the curse that was long life.
Some might have been questioning the former president’s mood but he was only about to reveal the sting in the tail, showing that all the sombre reflection was only a precursor to more upbeat philosophy.
Those who heard that particular speech will never forget its surprising downs and then its sudden ups, illustrating perfectly a master speaker at his best. Over two years after he publicly and theatrically expressed his yearning for the close family members that shaped his early life, he can now finally rest and join them.
