Inspiration with Cynthia Chirinda
The trail of destruction from flooding caused by Tropical Cyclone Idai that hit south-eastern Africa mid-March, has left Zimbabweans shaken with heavy human and infrastructural losses. Despite the gloom left behind by the cyclone, a strong spirit of love and ubuntu has manifested, which has seen the nation united in efforts to bring back normalcy by rallying together. This is a nation many have perceived to be divided. Zimbabwe has proven the power of what can be achieved when the nation rallies together for a common cause.
This is a commendable effort against the backdrop and narrative where Africa often tends to stand helpless by outsourcing her problems to the international community without accompanying proactive approaches to address these as a united, collective force. The nation has shown a united front with people and corporates alike responding overwhelmingly to disaster relief efforts in the affected areas.
Benjamin Franklin rightly said: “Well done is better than well said.” Reflecting on the recent solidarity efforts permeating nationwide, inclusive of participating diasporans, all driven by love and sacrifice, as a Zimbabwean I am fully convinced that “the things that separate us are not nearly as big as the things that bring us together.”
No differences
I recently read an article titled How Disasters Like Floods Can Bring a Nation Together, written by Pastor Jack Wellman. He said that: ”When natural disaster strikes, people who were opposed to one another ideologically, politically and socially, including people of different colour, different incomes, and different in many other ways, now join together to work for a common goal, and that is to help those who have had their lives disrupted. There are no differences anymore because now it is human life that matters the most. When others suffer great loss, our problems shrink to insignificance and It’s as if everything else is not important anymore because our neighbours, fellow citizens, or people of the state need our help, so now we seek to join hands in reducing the human suffering, and we want help in any way that we can. When lives are threatened, all other things pale in comparison. When disaster hits, suddenly there is no red or blue, Democrat or Republican, black or white, or rich or poor…we are all one because tragedy draws us all together like nothing else can, save for the Spirit of God.”
Do we need tragedies to bring us together?
On September 22, 2017, Saul Levine MD, a Professor Emeritus in Psychiatry at the University of California at San Diego, wrote an article titled Do we humans “need” tragedies to bring us together? He reflected on the sad realities of how it seems that we strengthen empathy and communality during tragic events. During such times, natural human impulses of empathy and communality are aroused and intensified. People of different ethnic groups, races, ages, and socioeconomic levels feel just as we do, and we sense an implicit kinship. During these crises, our various media screens are “quieter.” We hear fewer antagonistic political and social conflicts and more discussions about the needs of victims and how we can help. With all this in mind, the question that has been nagging me over this recent past is, “What can we do as Zimbabweans to maintain this kinship and become more socially cohesive in the absence of tragedy?”
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Nationhood and social cohesion
Among the vexed questions in the evolution of humanity’s systems of social organisation are issues of nation formation and social cohesion. Nations, widely understood, date back centuries and have reflected different forms in various parts of the world and in different historical epochs. The organisation of humanity into nations provides a functional utility to human relations. Yet the notions of nation states, nationhood and citizenship — conferring a sense of belonging and exclusion, representing organisational forms around which endowments are appropriated, and reflecting markers of collective identities — do evoke much emotion.
Indeed, in most parts of the world, blood was shed in building nations and in asserting their rights in relation to other nations. This is even more acutely manifest in postcolonial polities, straddling the very acts of conquest and dispossession, imposition of geographic entities, enforcement of discriminatory policies, mobilisation for national emancipation and building of new societies.
Connectedness and nation building
In looking at the prospects of Zimbabwe as a nation, through the hopes and aspirations of its people we have to distinguish between the national mood of this moment and the protracted process to attain nation formation and social cohesion after almost four decades of attaining independence. Faced with a myriad of difficulties — problems in governance, economic development and demographic changes — the tendency may be to focus on the negative of the national mood instead of the beauty of the unfolding nation formation process. But the reality is that national identity does not fill the leaks in the roof, the potholes in the road; nor does it fill empty stomachs.
Human self-worth, respect for others and empathy for the most vulnerable in society are among the core values that should define relations in society. This should inspire the fashioning of individual interactions at the micro-level between individuals and within geographic communities; and at the macro-level between employers and the employed, between educators and learners, between those who wield state power and authority and the “ordinary citizens” and so on.
Trying to build institutions without linking them to shared values and inclusive notions of citizenship and political community can result in the persistence of divisions. Perceptions of nationhood and state legitimacy are fostered through a sense of belonging and connection to the state and to wider society.
Our humanity brings us together
We all hope to be esteemed, valued and socially accepted. We all seek to be secure and safe. We all love and aspire to be loved. We all hate and dislike to be hated. But still we have more in common that brings us together. We all feel. We all fear. We all aspire to get somewhere. Mortality is our common fate. It is important to recognise that nation-building is a long-term indigenous process and that, similar to issues of legitimacy, there is a limit to which external actors can play an active role. We need to let love lead, because legitimacy and nationhood require that central institutions engage with local, community and customary governance. This can give people a stronger connection to the state and a greater sense of belonging.
Cynthia Chirinda is an organisational and personal development consultant, life coach, author and strategist. Her two new additions to the Connection Factor Collection — The Connection Factor for Leaders and The Connection Factor for Women — speak to matters that position organisational leaders and women respectively, to achieve greater levels of success through their strategic connections. Looking at improving your career, personal effectiveness, communication skills, relationships, focus, faith and happiness? Wholeness Incorporated Coaching offers you strategies you can implement today to review your progress and achieve your goals. E-mail: [email protected]. LinkedIn: Cynthia Chirinda Hakutangwi. Mobile: +263 717 013 206. Website: www.cynthiac.net.in
