The Sunday News
Bruce Ndlovu, Sunday Life Correspondent
IN one of the pictures that made rounds on social media, a solitary member of the Zimbabwe National Army is flanked by a group of young women, all flashing smiles to show their pleasure at sharing a snap with the man in uniform.
Ladies love a man in uniform, the popular saying goes and as the four young women cozied up to this lone uniformed, one would be hard pressed to find anyone that argued against that sentiment.
In another, a boy who looks barely older than a toddler sits on army tank, his hand on the lap of a soldier who has an arm wrapped around the young man’s shoulder. The hand on the young boy’s shoulder seemed to be one of reassurance, as if to tell him that he should not worry as everything would be alright.
Ever since the military announced, on the wee hours of 13 November, that it was rooting out corrupt elements hell-bent on ruining the country, it felt like the country’s defence forces have had planted a reassuring arm across the whole country.
As religious a country as any, Zimbabweans would have no doubt said a prayer for salvation. When that salvation came, it did so through the swift and calming hand of the army, which put its hand up and took the task of holding the country’s hand as it walked towards a new dawn.
When Zimbabweans, led by the country’s liberation war fighters, poured onto the streets of Harare, Bulawayo, Gweru and other major cities in the country, they showed their gratitude in a way that is all too familiar nowadays: they took selfies.
In a social media dominated age where people share their experiences as they happen, the selfie has become as common as the air people breath. So when Zimbabweans took to the streets to march in solidarity with their armed forces, they made sure that they took snaps to make sure that their moment of glory would never be lost or forgotten.
When one imagines soldiers, they usually envision fearsome men of action whose very existence is meant to strike fear in opposing combatants’ hearts.
However, soldiers can be an oasis of calm and tenderness if the trail of selfies that littered the Zimbabwean social media landscape last weekend are anything to go by. Men, women and children all took the opportunity to stand, smile and take a picture with the men who form Zimbabwe’s last line of defence.
Not a bruise was reported as the armed forces put up an exemplary display that showed that law and order could be maintained with a calm and caring hand. When all was said and done, thousands went back home with the assurance that they have a defence that is staunchly behind them and they had the selfies to prove this too. —
