When the Electoral Commission Concurred With God
- Category: Peering Eye
- Date 13-11-2005
- 394 views
Once upon a time, a prominent politician was given an early invitation by God to attend to some urgent business in heaven. This dream-place, known as Heaven, is the everlasting home of the grandest father of humanity and all other living things, perhaps nonliving things as well, and it is from where he persistently issues summons to his worthy grandchildren to stay forever. No appointments or bookings are necessary to take that lovely yet uncertain trip.
Someone preferred to call himself a Messenger of God and would give vivid accounts of the heavenly ambience. He would liken it to Dar es Salaam beaches in Mbezi or Kigamboni, or a holiday visit to the spice islands of Zanzibar.
Plain as the nose on your face, he narrated with inimitable faith that heaven is a place where a believer should expect nothing more than partying and endless leisure. No sweat-educing labour for one to earn a living, no corruption, no brazening coastal sun, no threat of tsunami disasters or bird flu pandemics, no Aids pains and orphans, no political contests and no malicious ministers to block use of a national road to ferry speed boats to Lake Victoria. Heaven is purely dancing and full excitement, he said.
In perspective then came the interesting side of God: he compels people to partake of the heavenly euphoria. Whether you like it or not, he drags you by the collar, places you in his warmly quarters and beyond worldly pains and anxieties. No consultations or negotiations. For the unlucky ones, it was said; they would be summoned and sentenced to hell - the centre for torture, misery and anguish where no amount of personal improvement or contrition could earn one a second chance. Like my schoolteacher would always quote, “God’s Case No Appeal”!
Precisely one believes that man is a powerless item in the eyes of God, having no right whatsoever to query God’s decisions. When he closes a door, nobody can open it. If a political candidate dies shortly before an election, the cluster of humans that make up the National Electoral Commission (NEC) can do nothing but accept the will of the Master; the one who is more powerful than Benjamin Mkapa and Amani Karume combined.
The man who preferred to be called God’s Messenger would stress that an invitation sent from heaven can upset human business on earth. People may be embroiled in political campaigns and about to cast votes for their leaders. Yet the very person every voter would want to cast the vote in favour of, the most hopeful one, may be abruptly summoned to a prize giving ceremony in the clouds or to a whipping service somewhere. In the event of this, the voting exercise must be cancelled and deferred.
No matter what programmes one may have designed, how frantic one’s to-do list is, or how much love people may have for such a candidate, God’s wish is final. Absolute. Period. These were the allegations the self-proclaimed Messenger levelled on God – that he does not care what man may be planning or whether the work at hand remains unaccomplished.
You would think the Messenger had ever lived in heaven himself to witness everything and thus felt it necessary to share his experience with us in our tender age. How could he compare God with a judge of the supreme court of appeal? Someone greater than members of the International Crimes Tribunal Court in Arusha?
The soothing fact however was that whoever we thought had died had actually not - he had merely changed address, having either been served with a pleasant invitation to a never-ending heavenly celebration or simply withdrawn from the worldly quarters to face the law for crimes (sins) against humanity, therefore against the deity himself. It might well be God’s direct way of rescheduling elections from October 30th to December 18th, and the impotent NEC cannot but abide by divine plans.
By Venansio Ahabwe
Source: Peering Eye, Sunday Citizen