The ManicaPost
Morris Mtisi
NOTABLE in this year’s speech and prize giving was a brother’s-keeper kind of love between two brothers who combined to give the occasion brotherly colour and a lesson God would have loved Abel and Cain to learn from the Mawadzi brothers.
Young brother Dennis Mawadzi flew all the way from the UK to be guest of honour and speaker at big brother Gumisai Mawadzi’s Manicaland Christian School 2017 Speech and Prize-Giving Day. Our ancestral Biblical brothers Cain and Abel demonstrated toxic jealousy when one killed another because God accepted the one’s animal offering and rejected another’s inappropriate vegetable offering. Abel brutally killed Cain and from there the virus of jealousy infected mankind.
Not so at this year’s Manicaland Chrsitian School. Brothers demonstrated untouchable, unbreakable and un-understandable love when big brother invited young brother to be guest of honour on this colourful occasion. The latter and his beautiful wife Ratidzai flew all the way from Britain to be there with big brother. (Big brother’s wife is also called Ratidzai). This family re-union proved one thing: The devil is a liar.
We will come back to the family historical miracles in a while. For now we want to focus on the Speech and Prize–Giving.
Everything else in content and method is exactly the same with all other private or independent ECD and Junior schools. That is to be expected. They all are assisting government in its business to educate children. The effort is clearly the same and all are striving to offer the best and be in compliance with the updated curriculum intended to prepare a child for 21st century education characterized by critical thinking, creativeness, artistic expression, love of sport and use of hands, use of mobile technology and internet connectivity, learning by research and doing as opposed to being told or taught. This is no surprise that the story of education looks the same throughout all these oases of learning in the country. The parent ministry of Primary and Secondary Education closely and carefully coordinates business in these schools.
What differs of course is style and depth of teaching and learning and the taste of achievement. Each one of the many schools is unique in character and provides a learning curve for the public observer. Each of these many private education investment centres displays a unique understanding and mastery of purpose and direction.
Manicaland Christian School clearly exhibits typical British education with a Zimbabwean relevance. Not surprising. Mr Gumisai Mawadzi and wife, Ratidzai Number 1, (Dennis’s wife is Ratidzai Number 2) lived in Britain for many years. They mastered the best of methods and strategies to approach primary teaching and learning and added Zimbabwean values, especially Christian ones to mould an intelligent, open-minded and multiple-talented learner or child who is wise responsible, patriotic to his or her country and above all God-fearing. The inclusion of the word Christian in the name of the school is not incidental. It is a deliberate expression of vision, purpose and focus.
As the school head Mr Jonah Muchayi highlighted in his speech on the day, “The school’s vision is an attractive, creative and inspiring learning environment where learners flourish and achieve divergent and unlimited successes. At Manicaland Christian School we enhance delivery of the highest quality in academic achievement, sports and arts. Our teachers are highly qualified, experienced, competent, friendly and motivated to deliver the best,” said Mr Muchayi.
In his short and sweet speech, guest of honour Dennis Mawadzi emphasized two unique and important points. “Schools thrive on support from the parents of the attending children. It is such volunteers who make schools big and successful,” he said. “I want to thank a few of the parents who volunteered to partner with my brother’s school, for once your child enrols, you become a partner indeed and become an important part of the school’s development process.”
As a gesture of appreciation, the young Mawadzi volunteered to financially reward the volunteers who assist his brother to develop the school in various ways for three months.
It is this reporter’s thinking and submission that if some private schools must emulate concepts of development from MCS, one of them is this great idea of school volunteers: parents who work, work and work for a school because they consider it their own too, not because they want money in return.
Speaking on the occasion punctuated by the theme Leaving In A Changing World, brothers, Dennis and Gumisai, concurred on the need to uphold Christian values, to run a school that is a role model, a school that produces future Strive Masiyiwas, Serena Williams, Tiger Woods and Lewis Hamiltons.
UK-based young Mawadzi also emphasized that parents need to be extra careful about who spends time with their child or children. He warned parents about the danger of child abuse by unexpected family ‘friends’ and relatives…even maids. ‘Make sure you know these people and trust them. Many parents discover that their children were abused in one way or another when it is too late. Be very careful,” he said.
The big brother, Mawadzi Gumisai thanked parents for the support they give to the school and promised to give their children the best. He thanked the teaching and ancillary staff for a splendid job emphasizing the criticalness of team work. He warned parents not to give their children too much of anything: not even food, money or love. “Too much love has destroyed many wonderful children. Whenever you give more than any of the above, that is no more love. It is a recipe for disaster. It does more harm than good to a growing child,” he said.
It was the fable-kind of story about the relationship of the two brothers and each one marrying a Ratidzai of his own that amused the audience most; A TALE OF TWO RATIDZAIS. The two bare-footed brothers both went to Domborutinhira Primary School, then together to Mwoyoweshumba, then together to Britain, then graduated at the same university, they both have each a beautiful Ratidzai who gave them each four children.
Certainly no big surprise that brother invites brother to be guest speaker at his school! Also not a big surprise that young brother obliges and flies with his own Ratidzai, to be guest of honour and speaker. Most humbling perhaps is the love between ‘Cain and Abel’ Mawadzi. God bless you both and your families.
Gumisai Mawadzi is a business man in practice. Three years ago in 2015 he diversified into investment into education, but is a philanthropist at heart. He picked two children from a terribly disadvantaged background, one of them straight from street life, and paid their school fees from Form One up to Form Four and gave them upkeep.
“I will make sure they go to a high school in the coming year if they pass well in their examinations. Another option is to push them into some polytechnic programme. So long as they end up able to look after themselves, I will be happy. That’s the idea,” said Mr Mawadzi.
While it is some people’s job or interest to eagerly look for the bad or weak side of others and criticize them for being like everybody else; faulty and weak, create untrue stories about them even, it is this reporter’s attitude and principle that we all fall short of the glory of God. Only the best in people must be focused on, for only that is developmental, while we thrive to pray that our faults and weaknesses which are not developmental issues, be dealt with by He who created us.
