Prespone Matawira

Now is the time to question the terms on which we organise our struggles and wage our battles.
Now is the time to claim our citizenship.
Now is the time to do the work that ensures our lasting freedom.

A rusted wire fence divides the old Zimbabwe from the new.

On the one side lies Effie Malamba, born in 1901 she was buried beneath a granite headstone 90 years later. On the other is Sylvia Ncube, born in 1974 she was laid to rest just 35 years later.

‘Look,’ she said to me, pointing to the multi-coloured powder paint that had fallen onto the tarmac, ‘the rainbow fell on the floor.’ She stood there, eyes wide, hands on her hips, her oversized school uniform making her look smaller than her six years.

The stage glows with shades of blue, the glitter ball casts a thousand stars…

In an unprecedented move in Harare last week, women cabinet ministers, deputy ministers and MPs from across party lines gathered over lunch.

At 6.50am today, International Women’s Day, I joined hundreds of women all around Harare in search of a river.

In Harare now, some say heaven can be found in the middle-class suburbs of Arundel, Borrowdale and the Avenues. This heaven comes in the form of Spar supermarket and the queues of people waiting to get through the metal gates are long. After all, ‘Spar is good for you’!

Zimbabweans are mourning the tragic loss of Susan Tsvangirai in an apparent car accident on Friday 6 March 2009.