Is There Something UnAfrican?—Ndaba Sibanda

Sibanda is a Bulawayo-born poet, novelist and nonfiction writer who has authored twenty-eight published books of various genres and persuasions and coauthored more than 100 published books. Some of Ndaba`s works are found or forthcoming in Page & Spine, Piker Press, SCARLET LEAF REVIEW, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, the Pangolin Review, Kalahari Review ,Botsotso, The Ofi Press Magazine, Hawaii Pacific Review, Deltona Howl, The song is, JONAH magazine, Saraba Magazine, Poetry Potion, Saraba Magazine, The Borfski Press, East Coast Literary Review and Whispering Prairie Press. Sibanda has received the following nominations: the national arts merit awards (NAMA), the Mary Ballard Poetry Chapbook Prize, the Best of the Net Prose and the Pushcart Prize.

Books

Page & Spine: fiction showcase

Ndaba Sibanda

The theme and mood of the poem is connected to the following book whose discourse is on afrophobia, xenophobia, human rights and justice: Notes, Themes, Things And Other Things: Confronting Controversies, Contradictions and Indoctrinations

Is There Something UnAfrican? 

It is a country on the southernmost tip

of Africa, and it`s a proper name 

that has the word Africa in it.

Some of that Southern African nation`s

official languages entail: Zulu, Sotho,

Ndebele, Xhosa, Venda, Tswana and English.  

This African nation is separated by the Limpopo River

from a landlocked country in Southern Africa whose political,

historical, cultural factors influence its linguistic landscape. 

  

That both countries share historical, cultural and linguistic 

similarities is no debate, for instance, both citizens speak:

Sotho, Ndebele, Xhosa ,Venda, Tswana and English.

It is a country on the southernmost tip

of Africa, and it`s a proper name 

that has the word Africa in it.

What is improper is the lack of respect

for the sanctity of life, brutality and criminality, 

whether perpetrated by a citizen or an immigrant. 

African leaders have a duty to serve the interests

of their nations and citizens in a total and true fashion, 

anything else is inexcusable, unfit and unacceptable. 

What is also inexcusable, unfit and unacceptable

is to slay another African citizen by virtue 

of that he was an undocumented immigrant.

How sad that the words Africa, African

have lost their essence in a heartless pool

of Afrophobia, Xenophobia or Anti-Africanism.

In both countries, one can find a Dube, a Khumalo,

a Mudau, a Ndlovu, a Nyathi and even a Dlamini–

does their brotherhood diminish by virtue of borders?

How sad that artificial, colonial boundaries have

overridden historical, cultural and linguistic affinities   

and humanity and haunted, blinded brothers like ghosts. 

Indeed there is a race for wealth, jobs, power and survival, 

but what boggles me is that an undocumented non-black 

African can live in there without hassles or eyebrows raised.         

     

It is a country on the southernmost tip

of Africa, and it`s a proper name 

that has the word Africa in it.

Is there something UnAfrican?