Not the Mail & Guardian is Robert Kirby’s startling and savagely satirical parody of the Mail & Guardian newspaper. Any similarity between real people and characters portrayed here is anything but coincidental
Zimbabwe will host the 2012 Olympics or die trying. This was the word this week from President Robert Mugabe, as he officially endorsed his country’s bid to host the sporting spectacle.
Mugabe said Z$12-billion had been budgeted for the construction of an Olympic village and the refurbishment of the Harare Municipal Swimming Pool, which will host all aquatic events, including the various rowing competitions. ‘Except for coxless pairs,” he added. ‘I have banned this event since it is intrinsically homosexual.”
Economists interviewed estimated that Z$12-billion would almost certainly be enough to erect 12 fiberglass prefabs, a communal entertainment hall with ping-pong tables and a black-and-white television, and provide a Kreepy Crawly for the pool.
Launching the bid theme, Mugabe said that Zimbabwean athletes had traditionally combined an iron heterosexual will to win with extraordinary heterosexual grace. ‘This is why the theme of our bid will be ‘Will and Grace’,” said the president.
The bid itself would be presented in due course by the newly appointed Zimbabwe Olympic Legation (Zol). ‘We’ll all be drawing heavily on the Zol for creative inspiration,” said Mugabe.
Meanwhile, Zimbabwe’s Commissar for Mining, Detention, Re-education and Sport, Adolph ‘Breakfast” Matunzi, said that traditional Olympic events were being reviewed, and potential innovations mooted.
‘Naturally certain sports will be unwelcome in our thriving heterosexual democracy, such as wrestling, which was the invention of androgynous British parliamentarians as they grappled on the floor of the House of Commons in ecstasies of colonial depravity.
‘Furthermore, all middle-distance athletics events will also be prohibited in case the reactionary, Blair-controlled Western media try to subvert our revolution by referring to middle-distance champions as MDCs.”
He said the world could look forward to uniquely Zimbabwean events, like the 50m Limpopo Freestyle, in which fully clothed swimmers carried babies, stoves and goats on their heads while fighting strong currents.
Matunzi said that the Zimbabwean International Team (Zit), would be selected according to fitness, voting history, war record (veterans of 19, who went to war when they were two, would also be considered) and the phase of the moon.
‘It is time for the Zit to erupt on to the face of global sport,” said Matunzi. —