Let us celebrate Nutifafa's wonderful life!

We met at work, and friends we became. He was biggish in stature, light in complexion, with full bulging hands. He was a lawyer par excellence. God took Nutifafa away last month.

It was a shocker when I got the news. I was in Nairobi. I did not go for my intended beer afterwards. I know he wanted to be a political power player, a kingmaker. He did not want to be the face of politics, he wanted to control politics from behind. He had already begun this tiresome journey. I know he was going to complete it.

He was loved by his daughter. And he loved her as much. We sometimes spoke about his wife. He loved her too. I never met her, maybe I will. We sometimes spoke about sex. He loved sex too. We were the only two guys married at the firm, so we had a connection. Sometimes when I got too busy, he would advise me to go home to my wife.

We went together to the Volta region. We went to his father's house. We chatted all the way and back. We had wanted to start a flower project in Ghana, the first of its kind under greenhouse. He was providing the land. We found the water salty. We had wanted to desalinate it, creating another project. i will still have to set up a flower project in Ghana. For him. I will. I already have the land. I now need the money.

The same aflao road that we used took him away. the same road we traversed in tranquility. I had wanted to visit the accident scene. I had very little time. In Ghana they celebrate the life of a person when he passes on. In Zimbabwe we mourn, sometimes for weeks, or even months. We bury our dead within three days, four at most. We slaughter a beast to feed the people. It is said if you do not weep visibly at the funeral of a friend or relative, you are a witch. you may be accused of having eaten the dead.

Nuti, you made a mark in my life. I will never forget you. You remain my hero! go well dear friend, till we meet again in Heaven, rest in eternal peace!

Ramblings from Harare

It has taken me much longer than I had anticipated to blog. There are many reasons: work, family, social commitments, career development etc. So many things have happened. I left Ghana. I had a second child. We formed our own law firm. We formed the Zimbabwe Ghana Business Forum (ZGBF). It metamorphosed into the Zimbabwe International Business Forum (ZIBF). I am the Vice Chairperson. I convinced the Deputy Prime Minister to accompany us to Ghana. We did business. We were successful. I have basically summarised my life of the last nine months, time enough for a child to be conceived and born.

It has not all been easy. I did not expect it to be. Life is like that. But it was never impossible. It has always been achievable. It feels good to count your successes.

I have been forced to change my lifestyle drastically; to split my commitments between work, family, business initiatives and my own personal relaxation. I am very fond of relaxing, I think sometimes I am very lazy. Its all part of the game.

Zimbabwe is in winter now and temperatures have plummetted to below ten degrees at night and no more than twenty during day. July will be worse, we expect temperatures below five degrees at night and no more than fifteen during day. And the winds will pick up, howling across our stone cold faces day and night. Already our power untility, ZESA, is facing a tremendous challenge to keep us supplied with power. Fortunately for me, because I stay in town, we rarely have power cuts.

The country itself has been shaping up, slowly but with visible signs of progress. I was away in Accra when we hosted Brazil. I dont think this would have been possible five years ago. We now use the US Dollar (mostly) as our currency. You can also interchangeably use the Rand, Pula, Pound or Euro. Politically we may have lost a part of our sovereighnity, but economically we have made a stride. Inflation is now at 4%, projected to close the year at 6%. Our GDP is still rather low, infact rather embarrasing. Our Finance Minister tells us we are likely to formally generate as a country only 1,6 Billion US Dollars. At peak we hovered around five to six Billion. its still a steep climb. Unemployment is subsiding, no one was sure of the figures anymore, but our industrial wheels are slowly turning again.

We now have food in all supermarkets and stores. We now have adequate fuel. One of the Country's major projects, the construction of Joina City ( a 24 storey building in Harare) was completed two months ago. I hear they now want to pull down one of our very first malls, Ximex Mall, and replace it with an even taller building. Karigamombe Centre, where my offices are on the 14th Floor, used to be the tallest building in 1986 when it was completed. And then came the Reserve Bank building with 24 Floors. then there was the Trust towers. I dont think we were on the wrong path. All the other buildings in harare average fifteen floors.

These are just but my ramblings. Iam still here, and alive