- Dear Family and Friends,
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- The Litany Bird is back in my neighbourhood
this week and it is cause for considerable comfort to hear its voice these
evenings. The fiery necked nightjar is a nocturnal bird and lays its eggs
on the ground amongst a small scratch of leaves. Its piercing call, such
a familiar Zimbabwean sound in the early evenings and on moonlit nights,
is matched to the words Good Lord Deliver Us.
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- It is amazing that the nightjars have
managed to survive another year in our dirty, plundered and ravaged semi
urban environment. They have survived the fires that scorched every inch
of bush 6 months ago. They have survived the endless flow of men, women
and children who walk out into the bush every day with axes to chop trees,
hoes to dig roots and packets to collect mushrooms and fruits.
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- The Litany Birds have miraculously survived
the boys who aren't in school anymore because the fees are just too expensive;
boys who harvest birds with catapaults and boys who climb trees to take
eggs and fledglings in every nest they find. The Litany Birds have also
survived the unemployed young men who walk into the bush in small groups
every day. They are armed with crude home made weapons and follow lean
and fearsome packs of hunting dogs which flush out every living creature.
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- This February the Litany Birds are back,
they have survived the piles of garbage dumped in the bush, the people
and the plunder and they cry out defiantly every evening. Their voices
give hope for a similar resilience for our people and country.
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- The call of the Litany Birds is particularly
appropriate for Zimbabwe this week. Over 150 women in Bulawayo and 240
in Harare were arrested for trying to march on Valentines Day. Unarmed
women, calling only for dignity and food were arrested. Some of the women
carried babies, they too were taken into police cells.
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- As I sat in the dark this week, in these
evenings of incessant power cuts, I listened to the Litany Bird calling
out Good Lord Deliver Us and I struggled to find peace. It was hard not
to think of ordinary women: mothers, daughters, sisters, some with babies
- crammed into police cells. I feel such shame that things like this are
happening in our beautiful country and so ashamed that for 6 years we have
watched helpless, rudderless and aimless as everything has deteriorated
to the most appalling levels.
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- In one week in Zimbabwe there are now
so many horrors that it is hard to accept that such things can really be
happening. This week we hear that the Gweru mortuary which can only hold
24 bodies, has over 100 corpses in it. State media reports that the cooling
plant in the mortuary has broken and that nurses and doctors are complaining
of the smell. This week we hear municipal authorities in Harare blaming
overflowing sewers and burst pipes in the Capital city on dumped babies
and aborted foetuses. The cold, callous and inhumane way in which the reports
are presented are almost as unbearable as the facts they tell of.
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- Good Lord Deliver Us.
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- Copyright cathy buckle 18 February 2006
http://africantears.netfirms.com My books "African Tears" and
"Beyond Tears" are available from: orders@africabookcentre.com
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