We need a national service programme

Kgosietsile Ngakaagae | Friday August 3, 2018 13:19

That means work, sometimes against own will, for no pay. Just so we are clear, that is the very definition of slavery. For those of you who are always attacking the Leader of Opposition for his use of Latin but make no issue with the names given to dead chicken in restaurant menus, remember that we are the only people living in the medieval era. For whatever it is worth, pro-deo means “for God”. Apparently work you do for God must not be remunerated. I am well aware that some men of God have hefty salaries nowadays.

In essence, we are the only people who truly work “pro deo”. Since no one has challenged the status quo, I will count my slavery for national service. So I did national service and I am still doing national service.Make no mistake about it. I am one for national service in all its forms.  I believe there is a fraction of our time and energies as individuals who ought to be devoted to the national interest. For example, I believe in compulsory military service.

All these delusive pubescent boys with baggy jeans and funny hair cuts will be shipped off to Pandamatenga. All of them, including their girlfriends. If I become President that will be a key initiative. I am serious. As serious as a heart attack.

I am talking about national duty. There is no virtue grander that one’s duty to country.

That is why I look at my national service years with a lot of pride. So many of my friends do. Thanks to national service, their first born children are 24. Mine is 13. National service marked that time in life when I gave back to my country and virtually asked for nothing in return.

“Ask not what your country can do for you”, someone said. “Ask what you can do for your country”.  So I still lament the termination of the national service. Resources permitting, some form of national service must be restored. I would suggest anti-poaching, disaster management and police service. 

This thing of having an entirely professional military and police service is nonsensical. Let us bring back national service.

We should do it both on a voluntary and on a conscription basis. It would be a better investment in national security than stupid Gripens. And, for another reason; so we may all know that we all have a role to play in the development of our country. There is so much negative energy in the country it is baffling. It is true there hasn’t been much to smile about in the last 10 years.

That is unless your idea of happiness is the Rasesa Air Show and seeing white folks fly motor bikes. That’s all fun and we all need and deserve some fun. But it is not happiness.  You can get that kind of fun from weed. With good weed, you can see airplanes flying everywhere. You don’t need an airstrip. Just a private corner. Better still, you can personally fly the plane to any place with any one. 

Happiness is a relative state of physical and emotional contentment generally. It is not a fleeting situational occurrence in the national calendar.

Of course, I am into social media. I am yet to go into Instagram though. My friends say that I wouldn’t make the cut because I am a rural breed. Instagram is where you are passing by a hotel lobby after your cousin smuggled you into a wedding invitation list and take yourself a picture on a nice couch and tell the world that the hotel lobby represents your lifestyle.

After that, you return to peasant-hood where you join us Facebook folks braaing chicken feet. But who am I to complain. In fact I celebrate the Instagram guys.

Since our politics are not issue-based and are all about personalities, there is too much negative energy. Everyday someone is insulting someone because they are not capable of engaging them intellectually. Everyday, somebody is criticising government. People see negatives in just about anything and everything. I mean, there are as many things going right about the country as there are going wrong. Put anything on Facebook and try and complement government for something positive that is happening and the forces of negativity will come crashing down upon you like a tonne of bricks.

Most of these guys are people who may never have done anything for the country in their own right. Everything is government.  If a condom breaks during sex, it is government.  I am tired of negative people.

It must be fair to ask what cent’s worth one is putting in for country purely out of patriotic duty.

What their role is in crime prevention, what their role is in caring for the orphaned, what their role is in ensuring clean surroundings, what their role is in contributing to the development of their villages and dealing with social challenges in their communities. Citizenship is not all about rights. It is about responsibilities too.