1990s AD

Editor's Note: The names of all the students mentioned in the article have been changed to ones conveying the same ethnic background.

I lived in Zimbabwe from 1995 to 1997. At the time it was a country that functioned. It was not a real democracy: people were not free to oppose the government. When I spoke about Robert Mugabe with my friends they would always joke that the walls had ears. And once I met a journalist in a bar who had had a gun put to his head after he had investigated too deeply into the provenance of the fleet of Mercedes driven by the police force of a small town. It was said at the time that Zimbabwean ministers had the lowest life expectancy of any in the world--mostly car accidents: 'A dog ran in front of the car', was the line. Clearly it was even more dangerous for politicians to oppose Mugabe, than for normal people.

Of course there was a lot of poverty, even when I lived there, but then unemployment was at about 40 per cent, now it is 80 per cent. In 1996 inflation was around 20 per cent, now it is in the thousands. The human impact of these economic statistics is horrifying--when I lived in Zimbabwe the life expectancy for a woman was 65, now it is the lowest in the world, at 34 years. Ten years have completely changed the country--now anyone who can, leaves.

I taught music at Prince Edward School, a state high school in the capital Harare. It was the most prestigious state school in the country and until the end of the Ian Smith regime it was all white. From 1980 it began to take black students and by the time I worked there it was an ethnically mixed school: the majority of the students were black, but there were also a lot of whites, coloureds (coloureds refers to a mixed race ethnic grouping in Southern Africa) and Indians. The students were mostly middle-class. Schooling was not free in Zimbabwe, but fees varied from school to school, and Prince Edward School was the most expensive.

It was run like a British 1950s public school. The students wore long grey socks, khaki shorts, shirt and tie, and they had to raise their caps and say 'Morning ma'am' or 'Afternoon ma'am' when I passed. On special occasions they had to wear 'best dress': grey trousers, shirt, tie, blazer and a straw boater. Sport and extra-curricular activities were much more important than lessons, as was reflected in the terrible exams results, and to a girl from a not very good English state school the variety of sports and extra-curricular activities was astonishing. In addition to a huge range of sports, numerous drama and music groups, there was a Latin club, a French debating society, an astronomy club, a bridge club, even a young farmers' club. And there was a special handshake so that 'Old Hararians' (the old boys) could recognise each other.

The school was run by Mr. Clive Barnes, who strode about in his academic gown, and was feared as much by the teachers as by the students, a fearsome deputy head, and the prefects. The rest of the teachers had little authority. The prefects were chosen for their sporting ability (playing first team rugby was a good way to become a prefect), for their charisma, for their popularity, for their leadership skills, and sometimes, even for their sense of responsibility. Some of them were brutal operators, who enjoyed the power they had over the rest of the student body. Others were truly extraordinary young men, who at the age of 18, helped run a school of 1,500 boys, 300 of whom were boarders.

The group of prefects that I knew, finished school in December 1996, three years before Mugabe started his disastrous policy of land redistribution. What are they doing now? These boys were, as the headmaster would have put it, the cream of Zimbabwean youth. I decided to find out.

All the students I managed to track down were living abroad--some in South Africa, some in England and a couple in the United States. Some left Zimbabwe as soon as they finished school. Many left to study. Zimbabwe had only one university and it was very difficult to get into--you needed 'A's at 'A' level (at that time in Zimbabwe students took 'O' levels and 'A' levels) to get a place. As Prince Edward School was famous more for its sport than its academic excellence, few students got good enough grades to study in their home country. Other students left later on, responding to a lack of opportunity in Zimbabwe. And some left only once life had become impossible. Tandai Mudzudzu left in 1999 to study and work in South Africa. He is now a teacher at a prestigious private school in Cape Town. His parents are retired and he has to send them money home otherwise, 'life would be pretty tough'.

Otis Chikerema left in 2006 because he could not afford to continue living in Zimbabwe and he felt he could serve his family better by living abroad and helping them financially through remittances. He now lives in the States and works with children with disabilities and emotional problems. His brother lives in the UK. They both send money home: without it his family would struggle to survive. Otis played first team basketball for the school and was a total flirt. He cannot have imagined he would end up supporting his parents.