Cletus Mushanawani |Manica Post | THE United States of America’s Ambassador to Zimbabwe, Mr David Bruce Wharton received more than he had bargained for when a female demonstrator stripped naked in protest over the illegal sanctions imposed on the country.

Mr Wharton had to make a hasty retreat after Ms Sheila Mutsenhu confronted him in her undergarments during his brief tour of the American Corner at the Turner Memorial Library near the Civic Centre.

The visit was Mr Wharton’s first official visit to Manicaland after he presented his credentials to President Mugabe in November last year and his visit saw him coming face to face with the wrath of angry Zimbabweans who want the illegal sanctions imposed on Zimbabwe lifted immediately.
The Mutare demonstrations come barely 24 hours after villagers in Makoni District forced him to abandon his tour of Sangano Diary Farm on Tuesday. The villagers were also protesting against the illegal sanctions imposed on the country by the US and its Western allies.

In an interview, Ms Mutsenhu said as patriotic Zimbabweans they wanted to send a clear message to all those who imposed sanctions on Zimbabwe that they were hurting ordinary people.

ZANU PF demonstrator, Ms Sheila Mutsenhu (in her undergarments) telling US Ambassador, Mr David Bruce Wharton in no uncertain terms that sanctions against Zimbabwe should be removed forthwith.
“Our beautiful country is reeling under the effects of illegal sanctions imposed by the West, yet we have an Ambassador coming here to tour what they say are developmental projects. How can they say they are developmental projects which employ a few people, yet the majority of Zimbabweans are wallowing in abject poverty due to the effects of sanctions? Poverty is well documented in most communities because of the sanctions, our hospitals have no medication and unemployment is rife everywhere, yet we have an ambassador who is doing nothing to have the sanctions lifted.

“We can not wine and dine with the enemy and the message we are sending to them is that enough is enough, we want the country’s economy to be back on track and this can only be achieved if the illegal sanctions are lifted,” said Ms Mutsenhu.

She said Zimbabwe was prepared to work with positive-minded nations.

“We cannot continue to be slaves in our own land. The US Ambassador’s visit is a bit suspicious because it comes a few months before the elections. He is on a spying mission and this is the time to tell them that we are fully aware of their mission and they will not succeed,” she said.
Another demonstrator, Mr Ernest Tazvida, said he was a victim of companies’ closure in the province.

“I am a family man and I am struggling to make ends meet. My family is surviving on handouts, yet at one time I was gainfully employed.
“You cannot expect me to have a smile when coming face to face with the architects of my misery. I want the best for my family and not the miserable lives we are leading. We will not entertain such visits until sanctions are removed completely. They are spending millions of dollars on trivial issues and not caring about our welfare. Gone are the days of the master-servant relationship,” he said.

In an interview, the embassy’s deputy public affairs officer, Ms Jillian Bonnardeaux, said the demonstrations were an expression of the people’s feelings.

“People should be able to express themselves like what they are doing through these demonstrations. We are here in Manicaland to have a feel of what is happening in the province as well as touring some of the projects being sponsored by the US government. We got the message being expressed by the people that they are looking for jobs and they are blaming that on sanctions.

“There is a difference between the Zimbabwe Transition to Democracy and Economic Recovery Act and targeted sanctions. Our secretary of State, Mrs Hillary Clinton recently said sanctions will only be removed if conditions change, but nothing has changed for the sanctions to be lifted. We will continue assessing the prevailing situation, but we are never happy to see people suffering. The sanctions were not intended to make the people of Zimbabwe suffer, but they are targeted,” she said.

The Ambassador was expected to tour Sakubva District Hospital yesterday.

Is Everything That Happens God’s Will?

Although Job knew that the calamity that had befallen him was not due to sin in his life, he did not understand why God (the only possible source of his suffering based on his understanding of life) had afflicted him. Throughout the book of Job, he continues to ask God, “Why me?” and often does so very angrily.

Does God answer Job’s questions? Not in Job’s lifetime, nor throughout the Old Testament Scriptures. Jesus Christ, however, taught truths that do answer Job’s questions. Kushner has some excellent insight on the record of Job:

To try to understand the book and its answer, let us take note of three statements which everyone in the book, and most of the readers, would like to be able to believe:

A. God is all-powerful and causes everything that happens in the world. Nothing happens without His willing it.
B. God is just and fair, and stands for people getting what they deserve, so that the good prosper and the wicked are punished.
C. Job is a good person.

As long as Job is healthy and wealthy, we can believe all three of those statements at the same time with no difficulty. When Job suffers, when he loses his possessions, his family and his health, we have a problem. We can no longer make sense of all three propositions together. We can now affirm any two only by denying the third.

If God is both just and powerful, then Job must be a sinner who deserves what is happening to him. If Job is good but God causes his suffering anyway, then God is not just. If Job deserved better and God did not send his suffering, then God is not all-powerful. We can see the argument of the Book of Job as an argument over which of the three statements we are prepared to sacrifice, so that we can keep on believing in the other two.

Job’s friends are prepared to stop believing in (C), the assertion that Job is a good person. They want to believe in God as they have been taught to. They want to believe that God is good and that God is in control of things. And the only way they can do that is to convince themselves that Job deserves what is happening to him. [1]

Job, for his part, is unwilling to hold the world together theologically by admitting that he is a villain. He knows a lot of things intellectually, but he knows one thing more deeply. Job is absolutely sure that he is not a bad person. He may not be perfect, but he is not so much worse than others, by any intelligible moral standard, that he should deserve to lose his home, his children, his wealth and health while other people get to keep all those things. And he is not prepared to lie to save God’s reputation.

Job’s solution is to reject proposition (B), the affirmation of God’s goodness. Job is in fact a good man, but God is so powerful that He is not limited by considerations of fairness and justice. [2]

Kushner correctly states that Job considered himself an innocent victim and that Job thought that God afflicts both the righteous and unrighteous. Often Job attested to his own innocence. He said, “I had not denied the words of the Holy One” (Job 6:10b); “Show me where I have been wrong” (Job 6:24); “I am blameless” (Job 9:21); “You [God] know that I am not guilty” (Job 10:7); “Can anyone bring charges against me? If so, I will be silent and die” (Job 13:19); “As surely as God lives, who has denied me justice” (Job 27:2); and “Let God weigh me in honest scales and He will know that I am blameless” (Job 31:6). Job made his case that God does whatever He pleases and afflicts both the innocent and the guilty: “…I say, He destroys both the blameless and the wicked” (Job 9:22).

Under this assumption, Job wished there were a mediator or an umpire that could help him out. “If only there were someone to arbitrate between us, to lay his hand upon us both” (Job 9:33). Of course, no umpire or mediator appears. What does appear is a storm, and God Himself speaking from it (Job 38:1). What did God say to Job in answer to his pleading questions? Well, one thing is clear— God did not give Job any reason for the problems besetting him.

Many theologians and Bible teachers rightly point out that God never gave Job an answer to the question of [why he was suffering]: “…God never answers question one about Job’s predicament…” [3] “With all due respect to the many capable and godly preachers and writers who have taught that the major question as addressed in Job is why do the righteous suffer, we note that if this is the question, it is never answered in the Book of Job.” [4]

Why not? Because the truth about the Devil as the source of human suffering was not revealed in the Old Testament. It was Jesus Christ who first openly revealed the true source of mankind’s suffering.

Interestingly enough, Rabbi Kushner comes to the same conclusion we do, that proposition (A) is the proposition that is in error — “God is all-powerful and causes everything that happens in the world. Nothing happens without His willing it.” We do not, however, agree with his overall understanding of the book of Job, by which he arrives at this conclusion. We arrive at our conclusion from the teachings of Jesus and the New Testament. Nonetheless, we applaud Kushner’s insight about people’s reaction to this conclusion. He states:

There may be a sense of loss at coming to this conclusion. In a way, it was comforting to believe in an all-wise, all-powerful God who guaranteed fair treatment and happy endings, who reassured us that everything happened for a reason, even as life was easier for us when we could believe that our parents were wise enough to know what to do and strong enough to make everything turn out right. But it was comforting the way the religion of Job’s friends was comforting: it worked only as long as we did not take the problems of innocent victims seriously. When we have met Job, when we have been Job, we cannot believe in that sort of God any longer without giving up our own right to feel angry, to feel that we have been treated badly by life.[5]

The New Testament makes it crystal clear that not everything that happens is God’s will. For example, Jesus instructed his disciples to pray that God’s will would be done on earth (Matt. 6:10). If everything that happens is God’s will, such prayer is superfluous. In Romans 1:10, Paul said he prayed for “a prosperous journey in the will of God” to see the believers there. Another meaningless prayer? No. The will of God for an individual, whether revealed in the written Word of God or by direct revelation, generally comes to pass only when that person understands it and, by his own, acts accordingly.

Rather than sit passively by waiting for God’s will to happen, we must make a diligent effort to learn God’s Word and then aggressively obey it. God’s will, for example, is that people do not steal, but rather that they work to earn what they need (Eph. 4:28). Very simple. We just do what He says. But are some people stealing? Yes. If everything that happens were God’s will, then nothing would be sin or disobedience. What a travesty of logic!

Going a step further then, if it is so easy for us humans to disobey God, what about the Devil and his spirit army? Can humans sin by choice while evil spirits cannot? Obviously spirit beings can sin, since sin was the reason the Devil and his hosts were thrown out of God’s presence to begin with. Via Adam’s sin, the Devil was legally given authority over the earth. The Devil did not and does not obey God. The Devil has been sinning for a long time (1 John 3:8). The Devil is a murderer (John 8:44), a liar (John 8:44), and a thief (John 10:10).

The Feminization of Hip-Hop: Is It a Plot To Undermind the Power of Hip-Hop and the Image of the Black Man ??!!
January 30, 2013 | Filed under: Commentary | Posted by: johnhennry

By: John “Hennry” Harris

Hip-Hop used to be one of the most feared entities on the planet that forced America and the World to take notice and LISTEN. You had a suppressed people with a platform to motivate, change, and provide a voice to the voiceless. This machismo was exhibited in the language and fashion of hip-hop and its participants. Fast-forward to 2013, and you have artists rocking skinny jeans and other “suspect” clothing like the outspoken Kanye West and newcomer A$AP Rocky wearing dresses as “fashion”. Even Diddy has been spotted rocking a kilt onstage !! o.O !!!!

Recently, Lord Jamar of revered hip-hop group Brand Nubians spoke of the new trend trying to infiltrate hip-hop.

“First of all, it’s not just jabs at Kanye West,” Jamar explained to SOHH. “It’s anybody promoting the feminization — of the Black man in hip-hop culture. Anybody that I see out there, rocking dresses and all of that type of sh*t, I might shoot a jab at. But Kanye is one of the ones right now that’s representing that movement. He’s one of the first ones that you see in a skirt. Now you got other people following suit and rocking full-out dresses or they’re trying to rock kilts. We’re not Irish. We’re not Europeans. Rocking kilts and all that is just another excuse to introduce that skirt style. You understand what I’m saying? And I’m not with it. This has nothing to do with sexuality, who they choose to be with and all that, I’m not even talking about that. I’m talking specifically about, what is hip-hop? And that’s not hip-hop. Rocking dresses with mean faces, that’s not hip-hop.” (SOHH)

Hip-Hop has taken the lead in setting the trends for youth in this country for some time. During the ‘Golden Age’ of rap, conscious lyrics spurred its listeners to be aware, acquire knowledge, and to live in a responsible manner. Gangsta Rap used to be our CNN reporting on the injustices going in our inner cities not recieving the light of mainstream consciousness. The LEAD that Hip-Hop used to take, has been replaced with marketing plans and stylists more interested in conforming to the status quo. Even if it means wearing a dress.

What man can really be taken seriously wearing a dress ?? I think the trend needs to heed the words of Brand Nubian’s classic song and Slow Down !!

THE bitter rift between Tarrant High Principal Garfield Higgins and the school’s teachers and board widened yesterday at a Parent/Teachers Association (PTA) meeting during which parents shouted down the guidance counsellor as he launched a verbal assault on the principal. It took the spiritual intervention of PTA President Reverend Patrick Jordan to calm the parents, whose anger resulted in the guidance counsellor, Stephen Simpson, abandoning his report and leaving the meeting.
But even as he left the room, Simpson accused the principal of lying about what is happening at the St Andrew school.
“Him lie and wicked. The people don’t know the truth,” Simpson yelled. Earlier, during his report, Simpson claimed that what Higgins said had nothing to do with the issue the board is having with him. However, he said he was not at liberty to discuss what was at the heart of the matter because of legal restrictions. “As staff, we have to work long hours, nights and weekends, and this principal call us slackers and lazy teachers,” he said. But the parents objected, responding with a resounding, “ah true the principal ah tell!” Some parents began walking out of the meeting, while others were overheard insisting that the principal was speaking the truth about teachers being habitually late for class. “Ah true, because my son tell me seh some ah di teachers dem no come class,” one parent hissed. Higgins and his staff have been at loggerheads for some months now, and last week he insisted that he would not grant their demand for him to resign.

The dispute intensified after the board recommended that Higgins be dismissed. However, he filed an injunction in the Supreme Court to stay the dismissal. Yesterday, the board chair and the principal used the regularly scheduled PTA meeting to tell their sides of the story, or as much as they could, given the legal restrictions. The meeting got off to a fairly good start with the board chair, Marston Thomas, addressing the parents on the vexing issue. Thomas opened his brief remarks by telling the parents that the board’s first interest was the students. Thomas, who has served as board chair for three years, said the board never had a problem with the previous principal. However, he noted that there has since been a “lot of conflict” between the current principal, teachers and other staff members. The board, he said, has been receiving letters of complaints from teachers, parents and students about the principal. This, he said, led to the board’s December 18, 2012 recommendation to the Ministry of Education that Higgins’ provisional employment not be extended. According to Thomas, Higgins didn’t wait for a decision from the ministry, but instead took the matter to court where the next scheduled hearing will be tomorrow. At this point, Thomas proceeded to lambast the media, in particular “the newspaper”, which he accused of not carrying a release issued by the ministry on the matter.

“The release did not come in the paper because they only interested in juicy story about teachers late and selling,” he said in obvious reference to the Observer’s report on the matter last week. He told the parents that there was much he had to say on the matter, but was constrained because of the court action. One of his grouses, however, was that students were being expelled or suspended without the board being informed. He said that the school has a “good bunch” of teachers, with only “one and two who may be causing problems”, but added that this happens everywhere. Thomas, who had earlier announced that he could not stay for the entire meeting, ended by asking the parents not to take sides, but to “hear the truth” before deciding. When Thomas started leaving the room, Higgins, whose turn it was to speak, said: “I’m sorry he can’t stay, because he mentioned about truths and I’m about to give some truths.” Noting that his objective is to transform Tarrant into a school of choice, Higgins said the teachers at the heart of the problem have been tardy for years, and he intends to put a stop to it. “Teachers have been doing these things since the previous principal and they have been getting away with it,” he said to loud applause.

According to Higgins, the board continuously failed to act when he complained to them about the chronic lateness of some teachers. “The teacher who was late 89 times has been here for years, and no one has challenged it,” he said, again to loud applause. “They say I’m a dictator and I don’t have any respect. But if you don’t do your work I have no respect for you,” he said.
Higgins told the parents that under his watch the school has been reaping academic success and he pointed to the education ministry’s inspection report which gave Tarrant a satisfactory grade and which, he said, was better than some traditional schools.
“Children are passing exams because I’m insisting that teachers go to class and teach your children,” he said, again to loud applause. He pointed to his decision that no child will be allowed to be a part of the graduation ceremony unless they have four subjects as evidence of where he is taking the school. He, too, promised to speak more on the matter once the court case is settled. At least three parents got up to commend him on his efforts when he opened the floor for questions. The Dean of Discipline later noted that the situation had started to affect students.