Learning From a Committed Activist
Michael Staresinic
Lead political transition, democracy, governance, &rights programs in complex political & security settings. Among more, City50 Project: Cities Transforming. Writing. Encouraging the next generation of leaders.
I just learned Dennis Murira is late in Harare. Rest in Peace and Power, Shamwari.
I wish to eulogize Dennis for anybody thinking about their civic and political activism.
Dennis was a good, active, brilliant person and an organizer, brilliant in the many things he was brilliant at. I admire about Dennis and his many committed political party members, is their unending commitment to cause and team.
Physical bravery when it was required, can't go unmentioned.
One example was a willingness to go to jail and risk all that happens there: lousy food at the maximum security Chikarubi. Maximum security for political prisoners! Unconvicted! Bogus charges! Being detained just to mess with them, make them suffer, drag things out. Cruelty was supposed to discourage you. Bad food is a blessing because the opposite in almost no food. Lice. Sleeping on cement floors without blankets. Cold winters and hot summers.
Not to exaggerate the point. In a similar case, the fellow detained had to sleep in a cell made for 4, with 28 prisoners. They took turns sleeping. They had to line up on the bare cement floor and sleep on their sides. There was no room to sleep on your back. You can imagine this cruelty was hard for people to endure. Then, one prisoner died in the hardship. The government left him there for three days. This traumatized everybody else, as you can imagine.
What Dennis said about these times was, "I never ate better." (Church volunteers cooked up fresh food and quite often got it into the prison, who could resist mothers singing Christian hens? which itself was an achievement).
"Before or since, I never had so much time with my comrades," said almost like the Robben Island prisoners Dennis and comrades look up to.
I met Dennis many years ago - 2 decades! - when he was just a "kid", I liked to tease him, youthful and skinny with eyes growing big when he spoke fast with laughter, a round head and little ears, the only one in a black T-shirt among older lawyers in dress shirts. Then I could tease him years later when he rounded out a bit and was no longer skinny. And when changed a T-shirt for a suit. Always ready with a story or something he was working on.
Rest in Peace, Friend.
#resistance #political #activism #lifetime #commitment #MDC #Zimbabwe