A NEW ZIMBABWE AFTER MUGABE!

Zimbabwe cannot be content with minimums of production today, the crying need is maximums. Out of the supreme tragedy must come a new order and a higher order, and I gladly acclaim it. But madness has not abolished work, has not established the processes of seizure or the rule of physical might. Nor has it provided a governmental panacea for human ills, or the magic touch that makes failure a success. Indeed, it has revealed no new reward for idleness, no substitute for the sweat of a man’s face in the contest for subsistence and acquirement. There is no new appraisal for the supremacy of law. That is a thing surpassing and eternal. Contempt for international law wrought the supreme tragedy, contempt for our national and state laws will rend the glory of the republic, and failure to abide the proven laws of today’s civilization will lead to temporary chaos.

Let us stop to consider that tranquility at home is more precious than peace abroad, and that both our good fortune and our eminence are dependent on the normal forward stride of all the Zimbabwean people. Nothing is so imperative today as efficient production and efficient transportation, to adjust the balances in our own transactions and to hold our place in the activities of the world. The relation of real values is little altered by the varying coins of exchange, and that Zimbabwe is blind to actualities who think we can add to cost of production without impairing our hold in world markets. Our part is more than to hold, we must add to what we have. It is utter folly to talk about reducing the cost of living without restored and increased efficiency or production on the one hand and more prudent consumption on the other. No law will work the miracle. Only the Zimbabwean people themselves can solve the situation. There must be the conscience of capital in omitting profiteering, there must be the conscience of labor in efficiently producing, and there must be a public conscience in restricting outlay and promoting thrift.

Sober capital must make appeal to intoxicated wealth, and thoughtful labor must appeal to the radical who has no thought of the morrow, to effect the needed understanding. Exacted profits, because the golden stream is flooding, and pyramided wages to meet a mounting cost that must be halted, ought speed us to disaster just as sure as the morrow comes, and we to think soberly and avoid it. We ought to dwell in the heights of good fortune for a generation to come, and I pray that we will, but we need a benediction of wholesome common sense to give us that assurance. I pray for sober thinking in behalf of the future of Zimbabwe. No worth-while republic ever went the tragic way to destruction, which did not begin the downward course through luxury of life and extravagance of living. More, the simple living and thrifty people will be the first to recover from a war’s waste and all its burdens, and our people ought to be the first recovered. Herein is greater opportunity than lies in alliance, compact or super government. It is Zimbabwe’s chance to lead in example and prove to the world the reign of reason in representative popular government where people think who assume to rule. No overall fad will quicken our thoughtfulness. We might try repairs on the old clothes and simplicity for the new. I know the tendency to wish the thing denied, I know the human hunger for a new thrill, but denial enhances the ultimate satisfaction, and stabilizes our indulgence. A blasé people are the unhappiest in the entire world.

The Zimbabwean people will not heed today, because world competition is not yet restored, but the morrow will soon come when the world will seek our markets and our trade balances, and we must think of Zimbabwe first or surrender our eminence. People will trade and seek wealth in their exchanges, and every conflict in the adjustment of peace was founded on the hope of promoting trade conditions. Knowing that those two thoughts are inspiring all humanity, as they have since civilization began, I can only marvel at the Zimbabwean who consents to surrender either. There may be conscience, humanity and justice in both, and without them the glory of the republic is done. I want to go on, secure and unafraid, holding fast to the Zimbabwean inheritance and confident of the supreme Zimbabwean fulfillment.