D.Tinashe Hofisi: Reflections

1. Introduction  If you are not in Zimbabwe’s entertainment circles, you would be unfamiliar with Vusumuzi (Vusa) Moyo, the sound engineer that Samanyanga trusted for all his live shows. He is highly regarded in the music industry. On 2 August 2024, he was hauled off an airplane on his way to the African Philanthropy Conference in Victoria Falls together with activists Namatai Kwekweza, Robson Chere, and Samuel Gwenzi. They face charges of disorderly conduct in a public place, and their bail application was denied on 16 August 2024. These four join scores of detainees, ranging from Jameson Timba to Jacob Ngarivhume, who were arrested ahead of the SADC Summit on charges related to organizing, or participating in, an unlawful gathering. This clampdown is at odds with the 2013 Constitution's liberal approach to rights and freedoms. In this post, I explain how these arrests are in pursuit of authoritarian legalism, a strategy that uses law enforcement to circumvent the Constitution. ...

It is just days before the deadline for your proposal submission, and you are hurrying to complete your first draft. Or you are still compiling data to extract narrative reports a few weeks before the due date. With each effort to secure the correct information, the prospect of completion is increasingly dimmer. Most of us have been, or will be, in the unenvious position of maximizing writing output in a limited time horizon. Whether as school assignments, activity reports, or longer-term tasks like dissertations, we confront the challenge of overcoming anxiety and stress to produce text that is as legible as it is intelligible. More qualified professionals have published granular pieces with tools for consistent writing over time, including how to complete a dissertation by devoting at least fifteen minutes each day. This post targets those whose circumstances do not permit such approaches. If, like me, you need to multitask extensively in a new setting and must conduct so much resea...