When being half as good is good enough

By The NewsDay | Jun. 24, 2016 | 6 Min read

I often wondered where my father, Stanley Gqiba Tutani, who died last week at the age of 92, got his marvellous sense of humour from because he had a long and varied life in which he kept on re-inventing himself.

CONWAY TUTANI

I was rather taken aback in the late 1960s, as a young boy, when the late legendary comedian Safirio “Mukadota” Madzikatire shouted across the street on seeing my father, in his inimitable exaggerated, playful Shona accent: “Ticha-aaa! Ticha-aaa! Ticha-aaa! (Teacher-rrrr! Teacher-rrr! Teacher-rrr!”)

Suffice to say, the whole street erupted in laughter as my father reciprocated: “Safirio! Safirio! Safirio!” with that knowing, intimate and mischievous wink he would often display at home.

Then, little did I know that my father had, in his first teaching post in 1946, long before I was born, taught Mukadota at Government Primary School (now Chitsere Primary School) in Harare (now Mbare) township. According to my youngest sister, Priscilla, there were many “repeat performances” after that after I had gone to boarding school.

My curious young mind began to question: Who influenced who to be so humorous? Who infected who? Who rubbed off on someone? Who picked up someone’s characteristics from being or interacting with them? Well, I hastily came to the conclusion that two kindred jocular spirits had been thrown together and my father might as well have performed stand-up comedy with Mukadota on stage impromptu, without rehearsal. It’s this humorous trait, among many others, which made him navigate through life continuously and smoothly. This reminded of these lyrics from a Beatles song “We Can Work It Out”: “Life is very short, and there’s no time/For fussing and fighting, my friend . . .” Yes, Gqiba — as we used to call him behind his back, of course — had little time for pettiness. He found petulance insufferable. It’s those occasions when he would fly into a rage, hit the roof. I know because I lived under his roof for well over 20 years.

Gqiba, being the offspring of a Xhosa father, Reverend Samuel Zondi Tutani — who arrived in the then Southern Rhodesia from the Eastern Cape in 1891 as a missionary of the now Methodist Church in Zimbabwe — and Shona mother, Agnes Jatisai Kwenda, was also most passionate against tribalism, as he could speak both languages fluently and was exposed to both cultures from birth. Not to mention that he was skilful at ngquzu, the Nguni traditional dance, and was a highly esteemed choirmaster, who also composed hymns and other songs.

Befittingly, among those who led the funeral services for him were Methodist Church in Zimbabwe clerics Jimmy Dube and Reverend Ncube, who spoke Shona with a heavy Ndebele accent, but admirable fluency. Zimbabwe is a tribal melting pot and this was at play at Gqiba’s funeral wake. No one should be left out and left behind merely on the grounds of ethnicity.

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Gqiba always recalled how he often clashed with one Van Nierkerk, a racist Boer, during his long stint in the 1950s at the Police Depot (now Tomlinson Depot) School, and with white school inspectors also because of racism. No one should be left out and left behind merely on the basis of colour. At this juncture, I should announce that one of Gqiba’s teaching colleagues from those days, Josaya Hungwe — now Psychomotor Activities minister — found time to travel all the way to the Tutani family farm in Marirangwe for the burial. Thanks, minister, for being with us on this saddest yet celebratory occasion!

Gqiba led one of the most active lives I have seen. He was a teacher by profession, but kept on re-inventing himself. After retiring from his illustrious teaching career in 1977, his next big step was to be chief commissionaire where he was in charge of security at all government buildings. Following that, he became a High Court assessor in 1989 until the time of his death. This was his element because he had a strong sense of fairness and justice.

Said Judge President Justice George Chiweshe at Gqiba’s burial this week: “The role of the assessor is to assist the court arrive at the correct decision on all matters of fact. He will listen to the evidence, he will assess witnesses, paying attention to detail and be able to make a ruling as to the facts of the matter, rejecting falsities and upholding true testimony. In that exercise, Mr Tutani excelled and won the admiration of judges and fellow assessors.”

After we rushed Gqiba to hospital last week semicomatose, I asked a doctor in the casualty department about his condition. The doctor replied: “He is too unwell.” I quickly detected that it was a euphemistic way of saying he was gravely ill, he was dying. It’s most difficult to watch a parent suffer at the end of his life. His condition at his age — congestive heart failure — was dire. Gqiba himself was realistic about it, saying only the first born in their family had lived as long as him and that, in fact, he had outlived that brother. Even with the best care in the world, Gqiba was nearing death; he would only live in a vegetative state, but that was undignified. He even said so and announced his dying wishes. That’s Gqiba for you — he was practical and realistic to the very final moments of his life.

This reminded me of former United States President Lyndon B Johnson, who was in office from 1963 to 1969, when he abruptly stood down. “I’m going to enjoy the time I’ve got left,” Johnson told friends when he left Washington in January, 1969, a worn old man at 60. He had never doubted that he could have won the 1968 election against Richard Nixon if he had chosen to run for another term. But in 1967 he launched a secret actuarial study on his life expectancy, supplying personal histories of all the males in the recent Johnson line, himself included. “The men in the Johnson family have a history of dying young,” he said in 1971, “My daddy was only 62 when he died, and I figured that with my history of heart trouble I’d never live through another four years. The American people had enough of Presidents dying in office.” The prediction handed to Johnson was that he would die at the age of 64. He did.

We black people should stop this habit of pointing fingers at someone for having neglected someone when, in fact, they were gravely ill. During times of loss, there is always someone saying something about somebody trying to outdo each other in, as it were, grief stakes when they were nowhere to be seen at the height of the illness. This is nothing more than family politics, family rivals, family petty jealousies conveniently channelled through bereavement. It’s not beyond some people to capitalise on death to get their way or to hit back at others. This was anathema to Gqiba.

Said Justice Chiweshe: “During his long association with the High Court, Mr Tutani presided over many cases and was involved in many of our notable and famous criminal trials . . . I wish to thank Mr Tutani for having served the High Court and his country exceptionally well . . . We also celebrate that we had an opportunity to work with this great man. He made a difference in our lives . . .” It made me cry when I finally accepted that Gqiba was going and what the whole clan was on the verge of losing: An unparalleled patriarch being the sole survivor and last born of the 15 children directly descending from the “original” family. He had a prodigious memory and, as Justice Chiweshe said, “a sharp and analytical mind“ and “an acute sense of humour”. Whenever I sat down with him, I always came out second best — although I didn’t admit that to him. How could such a much older person better me in so many ways? One of Gqiba’s former bosses during Rhodesia, a white man called Humphreys, said this to me in 1980 soon after independence: “If you are half as good as your father, then you are good enough.”

Well, I can even afford to be a tenth as good as Gqiba and still be good enough.

Lala ngoxolo, Tata Gqiba, mntakaNgwendu, Zizi elihle!

lConway Nkumbuzo Tutani is a Harare-based columnist. Email: [email protected]