Advocate Fadzai Mahere: Wheelchair-metaphor to depict our aged President- a joke that crossed red line!

Mr. Collen Chifamba wrote a passionate letter to Advocate Mahere about her the insensitivity and indeed an insult to the disabled people generally.  The content letter of Collen Chifamba is of a person who has been deeply offended and rightly so: the joke is offensive.  Is this wholly a tasteless joke coming from the whole Advocate: a lawyer by profession, she can afford to use this joke that gave all of us a sick feeling in the pit of the stomach? But human dignity is inviolable; a legal person should know this; to say such a joke in a country that gives scant attention to people living with disabilities is a sad way of joking. Those are jokes dished and thrown to us unasked usually to get a good laugh at them. Someone from a foreign land and of African origin said: because of the hardships they are subjected to these in their country of origin, Zimbabweans can actually laugh at anything however sad: This is true in this case: It did not matter how Mr. Collen Chifamba explained his frustration about this particular joke that was misplaced: here is the response he got:

"Again anyone who tried to point out how problematic your post was: was immediately told they were "reaching" and there was no need to be offended. I remember someone went as far as saying taking offense to the post was "majoring in minors" when there is a bigger oppressive system to fight. I was really taken aback by all these insensitive comments and I really tried to keep quiet but as a disabled Zimbabwean, I have to tell you that your wheelchair joke was offensive."

But we do know the message she was putting across and Collen Chifamba too highlights this in his letter: she used the wheelchair, an object that is an extension of a disabled person, as a prop to make fun of another able bodied person: Robert Mugabe. Advocate you do not poke fun on object extensions of people with disabilities. With that porn-language: you consciously objectified the people with disabilities for the benefit of the message you want to put across to President Mugabe. Let it be repeated: Advocate Mahere should never use objects of extensions of peoples with disabilities to poke fun as a way to inspire her to much higher political scores with the President of the country. You used the wheel chair as a metaphor to depict our very flawed President: Robert Mugabe. 

Disability conditions and their extensions are not a joke; it isn't a joke to be disabled together with those objects that assist their lives to be manageable. Some people living with disabilities will require the assistance of wheelchairs, service animals, interpreters and many other devices that assist to enhance their lives. Because these objects act as extension of a person whose life depends on them, we should respect these objects as they are part of those persons who live with these disabilities: these objects are spaces that define their spaces in their lives. Now to go so low and have some fun-day literally using those very extensions that define them smacks of sick humour.

However, this sad joke should be a wake-up call to all of us Zimbabweans. Our attitude to people with disabilities is a sad one. Yes Jairos Jiri made his mark regarding his project that actually shone in the nation even in the pre-independence times: how he looked after people with all forms of disabilities in a dignified way. This project sadly died with him when he passed on: U Dwayi ufa le nsiba zakhe!  The people in Zimbabwe who live with disabilities are the most marginalized people and the most ignored constituency: often times looked down upon. Most of them live rough in the streets: blind women are not spared, are raped and they become pregnant; left to look after their offspring in the streets in absolute dire straits. It is the tourists who give them some left-over dollars and never a Zimbabwean can part his/her penny or cent to a beggar: at best they laugh at their disabilities: it is the moment of a poor Zimbabwean that suddenly feels better than persons who lives with disabilities in the streets of Zimbabwean towns.

According to the World Disability Report of 2011: 15% of the population in the  world have some form of disability but the majority of this number is in developing countries where there is mostly no technical, medical and social support that could improve the quality of their lives. The Report also highlighted the need some instruments to break the cycle of poverty and marginalization of people living with disabilities in developing countries. In Zimbabwe the situation for all people in extremely challenging: when one member of the family is disabled the life becomes double challenging because the government does not have the means to assist those families and the donor funding has dried to all time low. The National Council for Disabled Persons concur this problematic situation the families with members who have to live with disabilities in Zimbabwe.  Mr. Andrew Mutimutsvuku from Masvingo has been reduced to begging ever to put bread in his table for his family. All this information our learned Advocate Fadzayi Mahere should know that it is not a joke to live with disabilities at all. Never ever poke fun on their extended objects that make life easier for them: Again the words of Collen Chafamba: "there is absolutely nothing funny, I repeat there is absolutely nothing funny about you an able bodied person using a device that thousands of your fellow Zimbabweans rely on for their mobility as a prop to make fun of another able bodied person. He said. In Shona they say: seka hurema wafa! We hope the learned Advocate will be humble enough to send her apologies to the National council for Disabled Persons in Zimbabwe: We give a closure to this unfortunate joke.