Academic illiteracy, African style

There is such a thing as "Zimbabwean English". You can look it up in the Oxford Companion to the English Language, which I'm sure you keep on your night table for bedtime reading. Or you can take my word for it. During my time in the land of bambazonke, I was often amused by the locutions peculiar to its denizens.

The horrible white racists who settled and ran Zimbabwe in the colonial era -- it was known as Rhodesia in those days -- built lots of schools, with the result that the English literacy rate was one of the highest in sub-Saharan Africa.

Since independence in 1980, standards have slipped considerably. But Zimbabweans still have a great love of sesquipedelian words and grandiose phrases. If you know a lot of big words, they seem to think, you must be educated, and therefore not just fit but entitled to lead the country's institutions.

During the Mugabe era (April 1980 through December 2017) it was customary for businesses, government agencies, and individual public figures to insert huge advertisements in the local press, particularly the state-owned Herald of Truth, congratulating Comrade Bob on everything from his birthday to the opening of a new Blair toilet. To describe the messages which took up pages upon pages of newsprint as fawning would be an understatement. "Adulatory" would be a better word.

Following the (mostly) bloodless coup earlier this month, there is a new dictator in town, but the custom continues. But the quality of the English in the congratulatory ads, and in public speech generally, seems to have declined. Walt's old friend Dr CZ printed this egregious example in his column in today's Financial Gazette.

His Excellency Cde Emmerson Dambudzo Mnangagwa, The Principal, Eng T Madondo, Advisory Council, Management, Staff and Students of Harare Polytechnic joins the nation in congratulating Cde Emmerson Dambudzo Mnangagwa on your appointment as Head of State and Government and Commander of the Zimbabwe Defence Forces. You demonstrated resilience, tenacity and composure as you rose through the echelon and fastigium of presidency. The humility you portrayed revealed the axiologies and phronesis of a leader. Harare polytechnic shares the developmental trajectory you enunciated on your inauguration and is ready to hit the ground running.

I cannot add my "amen" because he can't figure out what the principal of Harare Polytechnic (or whoever wrote this for him) is trying to say. [I'm working on it. Always like to increase my vocabulary! Ed.] So all I can do is encourage Comrade ED (no relation to our Ed.) to take Eng Madondo's words for what they're worth -- about $1.98.

Dr CZ ends his column with some words of wisdom which I will copy here, since it seems to me their application is not restricted to the Dark Continent.
The African education system has many surprising outcomes. The smartest students pass with first class marks and get admission to medical and engineering schools. The second class students get MBAs and LLBs to manage the first class students. The third class students enter politics, and rule both first and second class students. The failures join the army and control politicians who, if they are not happy with, they kick or kill. Best of all, those who did not attend any school, become prophets and witch doctors, and everybody follows them!