Luke-ing the Beast in the Eye: Pfira Dandy: My stern message to Zimbabwe’s shameful men

We have simply become a despicably shameful species of men in this country.

This week, we learnt with utter shock that a Bulawayo man raped a 9-year old girl on the pretext of offering her extra lessons. Not only did the paedophile rape the innocent girl twice without protection; he even took nude pictures of this girl and sent them out, according to Bulawayo’s police provincial spokesperson Inspector Abednigo Ncube.

Meanwhile, we also read this week that a Chipinge man, a cattle herder, kissed and raped his employer’s 5-year old granddaughter.

In yet another disturbing report two weeks ago in Chegutu, at Umfuli Banks, 78 year old Enery Nankuku was raped and killed.

And just three weeks ago, in Madlambudzi in Plumtree, a man was arrested for raping an 85-year old granny after threatening to stab her to death. Yet again in Plumtree in June this year, two men were arrested after they broke into a house and took turns to rape a 76-year old woman.

In Bindura, a 78-year old father is now in prison after raping his 15 year-old mentally-challenged daughter.

The list is endless of these shameful rapists on the prowl; these despicable men who have now taken to raping babies and our grandmothers—our maternal ancestors in their 70s and 80s.

In the olden days, it was unheard of that anyone would rape mere babies and old women.

But things have changed. Is it rituals? Is it witchcraft? Is it high libido? What exactly is the reason?

Is it the now readily available Congo dust?

If it’s the aphrodisiac gums and other chewing sex stimulants, then my stern message to these men on the prowl is “ Pfira Dandy !”

Indeed, there are aphrodisiac chewing gums on the market, the type that Islamist movement Hamas has in the past accused Israeli spy agency Mossad of throwing along the Gaza strip to corrupt its young fighters by increasing their sex drive, thereby weakening them on the war front.

In our culture and other African and Arab cultures, the chewing gum fruit known as matohwe in Shona or uxakuxaku in Ndebele is also widely regarded as an aphrodisiac gum.

If it’s these aphrodisiac gums that are forcing our warped men to force themselves on women, including innocent babies, then my message is Pfira Dandy , to quote a trending line from Superman, a Gutu-based Zimdancehall free-style lyricist.

But on a serious note, dear reader, I wish to state from the outset that I hold the Emmerson Mnangagwa regime partly to blame for not taking stiffer measures to curb these heinous acts.

Only last week in nearby South Africa, one Nkosinathi Phakathi was sentenced to 42 life sentences for a spate of 90 counts of rape committed between 2012 and 2021.

But early this year here in our own country, I publicly raised issue with Mnangagwa for granting Presidential clemency to one Bobby Makaza who raped a 10-year old girl in Murehwa.

Makaza was convicted and sentenced to 18 years in prison. But while the innocent girl was still trying to come to terms with her gothic and traumatic life-changing experience, Mnangagwa pardoned Makaza, who came out of prison and immediately coined what became Zanu PF’s 2023 campaign slogan—-Mnangagwa Huchi (Mnangagwa is honey).

Makaza was conscripted into Mnangagwa’s Presidential campaign trail and was introduced at every campaign rally.

Shockingly, this convicted rapist was feted with a car from ED’s sidekick and Zanu PF moneybag Wicknell Chivayo. He was given thousands of United States dollars in cash while Cabinet Minister and Zanu PF youth league boss, Tino Machakaire, said he would build this convicted rapist a house.

On 15 March 2024 in this column, I publicly expressed outrage here on this platform that by pardoning Makaza and pampering him with a car, cash and a house, Mnangagwa and his government were sending a message that rape is not a serious crime in this country.

When you have a President and his Ministers not only pardoning a convicted rapist but showering him with gifts, then you are obviously giving an incentive to rapists, both current and potential, that the crime of rape is a trite matter.

But perhaps it is no surprise that ED and his team would do that. They are fellow rapists in their own crude way!

For ED is the same man who, together with his acolytes, have raped this country without protection, allowing connected proxies from the criminal underworld to disembowel the earth, excavate our vast mineral wealth and spirit it out of the country for a song.

The Gold Mafia documentary is highly instructive in this regard.

Now we have shamefully become a country of rapists and the menfolk of this country have shamefully gone rogue.

Our men have gone rogue.

Going rogue is a phrase first used around the year 1835 to refer to elephants that had strayed off the herd and had become dangerous. Later, the phrase evolved to simply refer to people that had gone waywardly dangerous—away from the expected norms of human behaviour.

This is precisely what Zimbabwean men have done. They have just gone rogue.

In 2022, a 9-year old girl gave birth in Tsholotsho while at the same time; another eight year old girl was reportedly pregnant in the Mashonaland Central provincial capital of Bindura.

And all this amid worrying national statistics of young girls and women, including grandmothers in their 70s and 80s, who are being raped every other day.

That a man could sleep with an eight-year old girl was unthinkable years ago but it is now happening every other day.

And we are also more frequently hearing stories of mothers sleeping with their children. Is the world coming to an end?

Amid the shocking news of vana vari kumahumbwe falling pregnant, we must reflect and honestly ask ourselves whether our Zimbabwean men are still ok upstairs!

And I am talking of all men regardless of class or status.

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There is this other one with a very high position who reportedly raped a then 15-year old Susan Mutami, as she said herself. Then there is yet this other one who has manipulated the courts to torment his ex-wife and denying her access to her own children. The wife has now had her hand and leg amputated.

Legislators of this land, our esteemed lawmakers, have also been accused of this heinous crime.

But for whatever reason, it appears Zimbabwean men have simply gone rogue.

Indeed, Zimbabwean men are acting far outside the known masculine syllabus and are now behaving like wild animals.

Yes, our men might well deserve their own DSTV animal channel, like Nat Geo World. They have completely gone off the rails.

In December 2021, Zimbabweans learnt with shock that only one female student at Maringani primary school in Marondera wrote her Grade 7 examinations.

Only four female Grade 7 students at the school had registered to write the exams as the rest of the Grade 7 girls at the school had all gotten married earlier in the year.

But by time the examinations commenced, even the other three who had registered to write had gotten “married”, leaving only one girl to write her Grade 7 examinations at the school.

A brief historical context may be necessary.

When I did my primary education at Tsatse Primary school in Domboshava in the 1980s, a Grade One pupil would be just about 7 years old.

I went for my primary school soon after the war in 1980 and the village girls, most of them already grown up and in their late teens, had decided to go back to school as the war had disturbed their education.

It was therefore possible in those years to hear that a Grade 7 pupil had gotten married because most of them were in fact adults.

During our days in primary school in the early 1980s, the likes of Sarudzai, Irene, Sinikiwe and others who did their Grade 7 just after the country attained its independence in 1980, were in fact young women.

But times have changed. A child now does two years of preschool education, generally referred to as the Early Childhood Education (ECD) classes at a far much early age.

On average, a child now goes for grade one at five years of age after doing preschool, which means most of them will be around 11/12 years of age when they do their Grade 7.

This is the age that was married off at Maringani. The children were in fact raped, if the brutal truth be told as one cannot legally get married at 11 or 12 years of age.

Yet we did not hear of any mass arrests for rape in Marondera. This means the parents quietly married these girls off, without raising any legal stink—which all points to a society that has become complicit in this despicable practice.

The Maringani experience is an eye opener as it means that the kids that got married off were just about 11/12 years. Vana vekumahumbwe .

For me, this is a cause for serious national concern. It is an issue that requires a robust national debate with the aim of plugging all loopholes, including stiff deterrent sentences for anyone found guilty of taking part in this reprehensible but growing industry of child marriages.

What kind of men is our nation breeding that can sleep with—or purport to have married—an 11-year old girl?

Just what has this country come to?

In December 2021, a paedophile from the Johane Marange apostolic sect, Hatirarame Hombarume, skipped bail while awaiting trial.

Hombarume was a member of the Johanne Marange Apostolic sect who had impregnated an under-age girl, Anna Machaya. The girl died of complications while giving birth on July 15 2021.

It was a story that caused national outrage, leading to Hombarume’s arrest.

Hombarume, who was granted bail because of the notion that one is innocent until proven guilty, was slapped with a warrant of arrest by a Manicaland regional magistrate after it turned out he had skipped ball.

Mnangagwa has addressed the church’s annual gatherings several times but has not for once raised this stinking practice of child marriages within the church.

The world’s men, especially Zimbabwean men, have simply gone rogue. There are increasing reports of fathers sleeping with their own daughters. The press is also replete with repugnant stories of relatives and trusted friends that have sexually abused children left in their care.

It’s an abomination—as they would say in the Nigerian movies.

What exactly is the reason why any man would sleep with a child?

And why would families sit down in their numbers to marry off children still in primary school, and even shout with pride that: Mari yedamage raRumbi yakauya nezuro (We gathered for Rumbi’s lobola ceremony yesterday). Even when the Rumbi in question is just an 11-year old Grade 7 pupil?

Is it sorcery and rituals? Is it religion? Or is it that humanity in general and our men in particular have simply gone rogue?

And yes, we have also heard about women abusing under-age boys. That too should be condemned but this week I am on the men.

I have two lovely daughters and one of them is 12-year Lee-Anne Tapiwanashe. My heart sinks when I read of these rogue men on the prowl and I shudder to think about these monsters pouncing on my young daughter.

Well… that is certainly the day when I will commit murder.

But as a nation, let us seriously reflect on this creeping despicable behaviour by this country’s men.

It’s a serious cause for national concern.

To those of our men chewing aphrodisiac gums, I reiterate my stern message: Pfira Dandy.

Luke Tamborinyoka is a citizen from Domboshava. He is a trained journalist and political scientist by profession. You can interact with him on his Facebook page or via the twitter handle @ luke_tambo.