Privileged, blinded by luxury & hopelessly clueless: Open letter to Jean Gosho

To Jean Gasho on "#HowTheyRobbedUs, another pity party for the cream of Zimbabwe"

If you have got the luxury to go online and publish on how the pity cries of Zimbabwe are rather a waste of time or nauseating as you put it, then you have not been robbed. The fact that you put your energy to criticize and judge your nation for crying on how they have been robbed by their government means you are incredibly blessed and living the life, you are probably enjoying some quality street chocolate as others go on about how they have been robbed by 'ROB ert Mugabe'
 
As a human, you are entitled to your own opinion. But if it goes otherwise, then we are also free to point at your shortcomings. Nothing about you earns you any word brewed in finery or sugar coated, but to use your own words against you is to also express how your opinion is more than 'nauseating'. A pinch of surprise, for the first time you are not the victim.
 
Now before I go into this article, may we place its foundation on how you are part of the diaspora. For all we know, Zimbabwe is no longer home to you. Its quite obvious you lose nothing from losing a couple of followers, no one can shed a tear over it : fact. But the truth of the matter is, 5000 likes do not validate the worth of your being. Society has crafted its manner in a way that a terrorist will announce a new attack and get over 10 000 likes. You can be relevant today but what for?
 
You are indeed blessed to be where you are today. One classic read, The Great Gatsby, starts off with the text :
 
"Whenever you feel like criticizing any one," he told me, "just remember that all the people in this world haven't had the advantages that you've had."
 
You are one of the lucky ones, I must say. But why in the first place are you living your land to be a foreigner elsewhere? What desire will bring a British man to the dust of Zimbabwe? You earned yourself a passport, another Zimbabwean robbed by this government has never been on the passport list.  The same Bible you read, they read. Your God is their God, but their president is not yours. They are less blessed in their own land, and here you are, flattered by your own life story so much you have been blinded.
 
You have a man who loves and appreciates you a lot, you are now a princess, is it not? Blessed are you, that husband is still there, your children are still with you. Why should a woman who lost her husband to police brutality or boarder jumping not be able to mourn him by sharing her story? I have no doubt your children are all in school or have been to school, have you taken time to consider how a mother out here is struggling to raise only $20 to see her child through just one term.

The Zimbabwean government has scattered our brothers and sisters all over the world. Some went to suffer abuse in Kuwait, in search of greener pastures, provably due to the failure of not being able to attain a UK visa. Your life is flourishing, you have been blessed, but what about the disadvantaged? Those you left home? If I were to leave Zimbabwe, I wouldn't change it for anything! But thats the case, you do not preach of the pain of flames whose fire never burnt you. Zimbabwe is no longer home, it can only be the blood in you, the stories from family, friends and media...

A distant memory. But it doesn't say the same for where you are. You may live and dine with the British, but you will never be one of them. You are merely a ghost, roaming in between heaven and earth, nowhere to call your own anymore. Maybe the UK is your home now, yes, so what's it to you if the home you left is burning and the children left are crying? Does it still feel like another pity party for the cream of Zimbabwe?
 
No one cares if you live in a big house or not, whether your husband loves you or not. The struggle is in Zimbabwe where a child will live in that big house with a man four times her age, she was robbed off the benefit of having a decent life with a man of her choice, a man who loves her like you are loved.

The only reason you laugh and smile is because your 'struggle' is barely a struggle. Ask the mother who failed to feed her children the previous night. If you are able to crack some ribs, blessed are you. And may your blessings multiply, but what these people need is a life. A compensation of the things the government robbed them. A stop to more robberies.
 
One can turn into a billionaire from nothing. Or can suffer at one point in there life, what if their whole life has been a struggle because of an irresponsible government that preys on them? You should stop preaching against things you are not aware of. Its ridiculous. Its stupid. Why was the milk spilt in the first place?
 
Its good to be grateful to Zimbabwe, the government and Robert Mugabe. If you are not one us, you are one of them. If you are for them, you have everything to say for them and against us. Such is life. You have nothing to mourn, good for you. Do not interrupt the mourning of those who actually have something to mourn about. Life is not about marriage, finding the man of your life or living in a big house. If its your family that your life revolves around, that's normal, but our families have been victims of the government and our lives also revolve around them. Stories of funds abused, tear gas, the Jonathan Moyo thieveries, do they mean anything to you or are you concerned about the pound losing value and Scotland threatening a break free? 
 
You have been robbed more by white supremacy than Mugabe. Do you see where you stand? You are out of the circle and far from it. We have been robbed by our own kind, by a man we put in power because we were sick of white supremacy and abuse. Its not about the white privilege, will speak of that when we to get into foreign lands. Sometimes its not even about white supremacy, but an ambitious black female in the midst of a foreign fraternity.

You don't belong there, that is why you suffer the lose of what meritocracy owes you. And if you thought you were the only one being robbed by white supremacy, you should come and see how we have been affected by the Chinese investing in Zimbabwe at free and cruel will. What was once Zimbabwe broadcasting cooperation is now the Zimbabwean Broadcasting China. Why do we deserve any of this abuse, why are they robbing us of things belonging to us. Our diamonds, our holy diamonds! Our workers, our hardworking miners, suffering from the abuse of foreign bosses!
 
Do you not have compassion for what you left? If you are biased to this extent, then clearly you are either dumb or haven't been in contact with the friends and family you left home. #HowTheyRobbedUs does not make you a worser hypocrite than you already are. If someone else will wail on the hashtag whilst they are leaving in the diaspora then let them be. They have stories on why they left in the first place. They know the stories they left at home. That McDonalds burger can be harder to swallow when you know Ambuya kumusha barely has enough to sustain herself.
 
You only live once. But we live lives we do not enjoy, lives where a walk in the park is potential murder or more robbery. A life were you can have a degree and still sell airtime in the street corner, a life mothers are turning to works of the night and all you can dream about is...well... NOTHING.  What's there to enjoy if your life is but one big joke because you suffer everyday. Breathing can become a curse you know. Jean, what you don't know does not kill you. Let those who die everyday tell their stories.
 
What Zimbabwe was 30 years ago is not the only  reason why people are crying. Its also about what Zimbabwe is today and what it shall be tomorrow. If a house burns and you can not save yourself from the inside, do you not cry for help to the outside?
 
Whose life do you change when the government makes it hard for you to even change your own life? If we are going to take care of the poor, offer voluntary work and all the more, who will take care of our own families? Its not only about those who left Zimbabwe, they were robbed, we are still being robbed. Clearly this is news to you. This is why you see Mugabe as a hero, you are all of the same religion. Mugabe I will praise on the things he has done well, praise be to him for keeping the peace in the country ( AND NOT THE PEACE IN OUR STOMACHS).

But he has a heavy baggage full of errors of commission and errors of omission. If Morgan Tsvangirai was nearly stoned to death in the UK, then Zimbabweans in Zimbabwe might just do the same to you. If you see it easy to help just anyone, who have you helped, oh, by the way, you have the means is it not? Lying to get asylum is a hustle - thats so called hustling, why does one have to lie in the first place? Because Zimbabwe can be unlivable and sometimes there's nothing better to do about it. If the government robbed its people, then clearly it has far worse effects than you might know.
 
Evan Mawararire stops investors from ploughing in Zimbabwe? Are the sanctions against Zimbabwe not because of this regime? So has Evans suddenly become the worser evil of the two? If they are the same, say it! Stop protecting the evil. They are both in the wrong and we have no need to hide it or wrap it. They both robbed us when they had our trust, they have all broken our hearts.
 
Like I have said before, democracy is a whole lot of things. Its frustrating the way it is. They can never be way for a government by and for the people to function without frustrating most of the people in it in one way or another. Patson Dzamara is one tale of bravery, but does the same thing happen to some random Tom or Ben who decides to demonstrate or protest against the way of rule in the UK?

And that's the way you are blessed, you have a real democracy in your hands.  Zimbabwe will never be one happy family, but it will always be family. A family with greedy aunts and uncles, awful step mothers and terrible brothers. And this is what the government has robbed us : happiness.
 
You, little princess, are happy. Or somewhere there. We are far from it. With echoes from the past silencing us into utmost poverty and suffering in the name of Mugabe and his government. They are no opportunities to start our lives or build homes or secure our futures in Zimbabwe. You have all that and you are still on the go.

Now tell me, should we still keep silent just because its social media?
 
#HowTheyRobbedUs

Rayanne P Chidzvondo is a social commentator. Article appears on Khuluma Afrika.