Here is an interesting tale about aged leaders.
Ntate Mosisili meets Ntate Thabane with his youth league leaders on the 7th floor at the LNDC Centre.
“Glad to meet you here,” Thabane says.
“But Ntate Mosisili why do you always insult my supporters with those harsh words at your rallies”.
“Well,” Mosisili says, “your supporters are stupid!”
Thabane frowns.
“But how do I know the people around me are really silly?”
Mosisili laughs loud and says, “Oh, that’s easy. You just ask them to do a simple task.”
Mosisili then selects one of the ABC youth leaders who are with Thabane and says: “Now boy, go down to the reception at the ground floor and check if Ntate Thabane and me are there.”
The youth leader rushes off to the ground floor like a puppy.
He returns after about five minutes tired, panting and sweat dripping down his wooly armpits.
“No chiefs, you are both not there,” says the youth leader.
Mosisili smiles and says: “See what I mean”.
Not to be outdone, Thabane says: “This silly boy should have used the lift! That was a simple task”.
See what age does to a once agile mind!
That probably explains why, when the old man was recently asked if his bodyguards had clobbered some youths at an ABC rally recently he said: “Beating a lunatic is an error but a constructive one.”
In Zimbabwe another leader is showing vivid signs of what age can do to a human being.
Robert Mugabe was in a foul mood at the weekend at the burial of his sister Sabina at the national burial shrine in Harare that is reserved for Zanu-PF party functionaries.
Sabina died at the young age of 80 last Wednesday.
It was an unexpected death as longevity runs in the Mugabe family.
Mugabe’s mother, Bona, died in her early nineties.
And at 86 Mugabe appears too strong for his age.
“They say ‘remove so and so,’ of course they mean ‘Mugabe must go before we can assist you,” Mugabe said.
“To hell with them! Hell, hell, hell with them whoever told them they are above the people of Zimbabwe that they decide what Zimbabwe should be and by who it should be ruled,” Mugabe yelled at the Western governments that he accuses of interfering in his country’s affairs.
But these are the same western governments that fed his people during the past 10 years of his disastrous rule.
I hear a few western diplomats walked out in disgust.
Those that set the retirement age at 60 knew what they were doing.
The good news is that a charming Casanova is coming to Lesotho next week.
The bad news is that the country does not have enough chastity belts for us women.
A certain newspaper has blindly and naively said Basotho “are pinning” their hopes on him.
Phew!
Are they hoping to give the Casanova a bride to consolidate our relations with his clan?
Scrutator wonders.
But she must admit that she has a soft spot for the charming boy.
She is therefore not ruling out the chances of getting pregnant with her first baby on August 14.
Hopefully by the time her baby is born in April next year it won’t be the Casanova’s baby number 50-something.
The Casanova moves pretty fast, you know!
Speaking of Casanovas, Scrutator could not help but laugh when she imagined what the mood could be like in a country smaller than Lesotho but still very close to South Africa.
Media reports this week said the other Casanova’s 12th wife, a former Miss Teen beauty contestant, had been placed under house arrest after she was allegedly caught with her lover, who also happens to be that country’s justice minister.
Apparently the former beauty queen and the married minister were discovered by the police in what was described as a ‘’sting’’ operation.
They were caught in a hotel room in the capital.
If this story is true, Scrutator does not know who is more foolish — the other Casanova who insists on having 14 women, the justice minister who thinks he can steal some warmth from that Casanova without being noticed or the Casanova’s young wife who thinks she can actually pull off such an act with the countless number of aides and security guards paid to keep watch on her.
What is clear however is that this is a meeting of three characters who think with their loins rather than with their brains.
They deserve each other, as the tabloids would say.
The Casanova must be having a rethink about adding another young one to his harem after this.
Selloane Tsoaeli made history when she won gold and bronze medals at the African Senior Championships in Nairobi, Kenya last weekend.
She won gold in high jump and bronze in heptathlon.
Selkol, a small but very thoughtful company immediately organised a press conference where they gave Tsoaeli M2 000.
The Minister of Gender, Youth, Sports and Recreation Mathabiso Lepono was at hand to present the cheque to Tsoaeli.
Scrutator hopes that little cheque was only a prelude of bigger things to come.
I hope the minister was just dishing the little crumbs to prepare Tsoaeli for the big present that her ministry has in store for the girl.
If the minister does not do anything for Tsoaeli, Scrutator will walk the streets of Maseru naked.
Now, that will be sporty.
