Becoming The Muse

Coffee With WinterABC2024

If you are having coffee with me, I would welcome you to my tangle of words, it’s a new month, the sun’s shining and I have a new folder opened on my laptop…

You know how some go on vacation to warmer climates during the winter season, chasing the sun…☀… well as one who has wintered where I have summered all my life, I find my warmth where I can. For the sixth year in a row I will be participating in the Afrobloggers Blogging Challenge dubbed the WinterABC where for the month of June, digital storytellers from the continent and beyond come together in a storytelling festival….

If you were having coffee with me, I would tell you that having been blogging here for over ten years, sometimes it seems like I have written everything about everything – there is a running joke about how I have a blog post for literally everything… One reason I look forward to the WinterABC Stoytelling Festival each year, is how it pushes me to explore topics and ideas that arent my usual cup of tea and this year has one of the most challenging set of topics. But hey, if it were easy it wouldn’t be called a blogging challenge, it would be a walk in the park and everyone would be out here enjoying their walk…

So I invite you to stop by my blog and learn something new about me and my world. Each June, my personal goal is to blog everyday so buckle up and enjoy the ride. Also do check out other bloggers from the African Bloggers community who we will be sharing posts using the hashtags #WinterABC2024 and #WinterABC24. Because the only thing better than sharing your story is having an audience to share with.

If you were having coffee with me I would tell you that we haven’t had a powercut in a two weeks straight, and it feels worrying considering that I hear my neighbours to the north of us, in Zambia, talking about 12 hour load-shedding schedules.. Maybe our government miraculously solved the electricity issues, one can always wish… I haven’t seen any communication or updates on the power situation which would warrant the uninterrupted power supply we have been enjoying… a part of me feels like its being lulled into a false sense of security…..

The government did do one good thing, they approved Starlink to provide internet services in Zimbabwe, even if the application was approved in a way which seems questionable with regards to how one company was awarded with the enviable position of being sole distributor of Starlink. I wonder how this will work with Starlink’s business model which is client-centric… We will see in Q3 when it starts operating… when is Q3 anyway?

 A few days after Zimbabwe approved Starlink, our neighbour to the west Botswana also approved the satellite internet service. According to media reports, the regulatory authority BOCRA had initially rejected the application leading to a ban on the service, until they got a prod from their president to fast-track the process after a meeting with Space-X reps at an Africa-US Business Summit in Dallas.

Looks like in Africa the Starlink approval process takes a nod from the president for it to get done, in Zimbabwe the regulation authority had also seemed like they were leaning towards rejecting the application with president announcing the approval in a choice of words that could indicate he also nudged the authority. I am guessing that as more countries approve the service, others will also approve or risk being left behind in the connectivity and coverage race, since one simple agreement potentially makes any country boast of having 100% internet coverage.

If you were having coffee with me, I would tell you that in the past week, all eyes have been on our southern neighbour South Africa which had its presidential election on the 29^th of May. When I say Africa is a country, I mean it in the sense that even though the are 52 different countries on the continent most seem to share similar stories in politics and socio-economic narratives. Watching the electoral process unfold in South Africa felt a lot like a déjà vu of not only our elections but other elections on the continent where revolutionary parties have been in power for decades as if they share a handbook on how to cling onto power.

However in an unprecedented outcome in 30 years the ANC lost the 50% majority vote, while they got nearly 40% of the vote the other 60% is distributed amongst other parties with three major contenders being DA with 21.635% MK with 14.71% and EFF with 9.48%.

Some form of co-alition government might be have to tabled but with whom?… unless something changes, for example there is talks of rigging and calls for a re-run… the final results are yet to be announced but at the last update they were over 99% complete….

Sometimes I feel like democracy is an illusion to fool us into believing that our vote matters in deciding the next person to loot the state resources… Anyway whats been happening in your neck of the woods?

~B