Cathy Buckle – Why so hush, hush?

Dear Family and Friends,

When I arrived at my local Post Office this week I couldn’t believe
my eyes as I squinted through the brick dust and picked my way around
the rubble. For the past six weeks there have been increasingly loud
whispers that the Post Office was moving out of the Post Office. (Yes
you read that right!) At first I thought it was some sort of mad
Zimbabwean joke and just shook my head, muttered under my breath and
laughed. As the days went past and Christmas drew closer, the story
kept coming back. In the end I asked the counter staff and, like
everything in Zimbabwe, it was a mission to get to the bottom of the
story. First look over your shoulder and make sure no one is
listening, then check that no one is watching and then talk in the
quietest of whispers. Eleven years of fighting for political power
have turned us into the most suspicious, untrusting people you can
imagine.

Anyway, it turned out the whispers were true, the Post Office staff
told me. The owners of the Post Office building had put the rent up
and when the Post Office management said they couldn’t afford the
new rent, they were told they would have to vacate the building by the
31st of December. A few days after Christmas, Post Office staff were
packing things in boxes and a computer was being dismantled. It’s
really happening, they said, the new rent being demanded was a
staggering seven thousand US dollars a month and they had no choice
but to vacate. Like everything Zimbabwean, there were more questions
than answers, uppermost was who actually owns the Post Office. It
sounded like a silly question but I asked it anyway: “Doesn’t the
Post Office own the Post Office?” More glances over shoulders and
whispered whispers before I was told that the government Post Office
had been sold in 2005 to the government telephone company’s Pension
Fund. For the last six years the Post Office had been renting the Post
Office. Confusion reigns, but it’s laced with suspicion. Why all the
whispers; why no publicity or protest, no public meetings; why so
hush, hush, is there politics behind this?

New Year came and the Post Office was still open and functional. They
had been given a reprieve of one month, time in which to dismantle
parts of the building that were essential for the continued operation
of postal businesses. They were referring to the many hundreds of
steel post boxes cemented into the walls of both the main Post Office
and another smaller, circular brick building in the grounds. As the
days of January passed there was no sign of movement or dismantling
infrastructure and no notice to the public about the pending move.
Perhaps it was a mad Zimbabwean joke after all I thought.

Three days before the end of January 2012, I arrived at the Marondera
Post Office to be met with the sound of banging and hammering as I
made my way to my steel Post Box cemented into the wall. Chips of
brick and cement flew in all directions, there was no barricade or
notice to deter pedestrians, no warning of falling rubble. A pair of
builders wearing goggles and armed with hammers and chisels, were
smashing the steel Post Boxes out of the walls. I felt sure someone in
authority would have emptied the letters from the post boxes before
they started smashing down the walls but thought I’d better check,
just in case. Wiping brick dust out of my eyes I unlocked my box and
sure enough there were all my letters, sitting under a coating of
brick dust.

The Marondera Post Office has been in its present location since 1977.
On the 27th January 2012 a handwritten notice, stuck to a signboard
was propped up outside the door. “To our valued customers. The Post
Office will be moving to new premises at Marondera Country Club with
effect from 1st February 2012. We sincerely apologise for any
inconvenience caused.”

I stood outside for few minutes watching people’s reaction to the
sign. One after the other people exclaimed in disbelief: moving the
Post Office to a Club where the main activity is a bar? Situated on
the outskirts of the town behind a sprawling commuter taxi rank and
huge flea market, the Club is hardly a safe and secure place for a
Post Office. No one has forgotten how this same Club was taken over by
war veterans in 2001. How they planted a Zimbabwe flag in the main
driveway, renamed it The Laurent Kabila Memorial Club, cleaned out all
the food in the kitchen and drank the bar dry. I took a trip to the
Club to see where our new Post Office was going to be. At the gateway
the grass is two meters high, the Club signboard is promoted by a beer
advertisement. The buildings are in a bad state of repair; grey,
chipped, run down. There is no mention or indication that the
Marondera Post Office is about to arrive here and I found myself
filled with sadness. Small towns around the country are falling apart
at the seams.

Until next time, thanks for reading, love cathy 28 January 2012.
Copyright Cathy Buckle. www.cathybuckle.com

For information on my new book “IMIRE”, about Norman Travers and
Imire Game Park, or my other books about Zimbabwe: “Innocent
Victims,” African Tears,” “Beyond Tears;” and “History of
the Mukuvisi Woodlands 1910-2010”, or to subscribe/unsubscribe to
this letter, please visit my website or contact cbuckle@zol.co.zw