The Code of Silence

The Code of Silence

The guest room atmosphere of the ex Minister of Police's mansion loomed with gloom, dead like a casket. Just a few lumps of soil and the earth would close in, burying his plot of atonement and redemption.

Only the slow ticking of a large family clock which hung on the walls punctuated this uneasy silence. Just below the clock, a frame of the former president's picture swayed eerily, followed by a line of Muchemwa's political achievements and accolades. On the small table a mug of undrank coffee lay. It had long been left cold. The mug was placed on a copy of a daily R24 copy. Government responsible for the silence in millions of people 

When Kuzo came, a fraction of the door was open. "Anybody home? " The young man felt bile in his mouth as he went into the guestroom where a strong foreboding code of emptiness glimmered. A strong beam dropped from the sagged curtains filling the void and dimness. Kuzonda Mutyawaenda was a freelance investigative journalist who worked with the daily R24 paper in Harare. But what had simply started as a story of courts corruption and injustice had become a clandestine case for human rights against the evil regime. Everyone seemed okay, calm and pulling through the trauma, yet underneath there was deep sorrow, the gloom of keeping quite when you actually wanted to talk. What had happened ten years ago was an unspeakable act of violence against the opposition, an organized plan to wipe out the opposition. But there was one thing everyone seemed to forget, the innocent bystanders who had nothing to do with the opposition, who happened to share their miserable fate. To him, his father would always remain his key motivation, face on the earth, bleeding to death. 

Kuzo had fixed an appointment with Muchemwa. This relieved him because finally the old man wanted to talk. His mentor, the Director of the paper, Meticulous Gwiri had rightly told him to expose the wickedness of a system, concentrate on the weak link. "I don't mean to undermine the work you have been doing, but you do need someone to validate your story, someone inside, someone who can make your story credible," he told him. The right hand man of the former president, the ex Minister of Police, Muchemwa was the weak link in the case against the government's opposition genocide ten years ago. What made him a weak link was his transition from the white supremacist government to the black communist government. This change was what Kuzo worked on to get the man's sympathy. Now he was going to testify. Testifying against the government.

"Minister Muchemwa, you there?" He called, now feeling uneasy because he had been sitting on the couch for long joblike seconds, which the family clock ticked ruefully. The idea of someone part of the systematized violence against the opposition testifying had not occurred to him as he was biased against the oppressor and wasn't sure how this would work out for his story, but right now he was aware what it could do to the government, to the story...Right now the Minister's confession was the only thing he needed, the drop of salvation to make the many victims who lived with an institutionalized code of silence free from the psychological violence. Kuzo had lost a lot fighting for this story. He remembered how his fiancée had left him.

"How did you think this was going to end?" His sore face stared blankly at her, his throat feeling numb and hard. 

"Babes, I thought the two of us were perfect, I thought we had a purpose, a cause." Photographs, clips of old newspaper stories, the walls of his room were a web of a dark unspoken political conspiracy. His hands trembled with a newspaper article he wanted to pin on the wall in his hands. 

"No, im tired of your selfish ambition. Everything you do, everything about you goes back to this stupid case. I'm tired of living under your shadow. I can't do this anymore!" 

"Hey, it has not come to that. We can talk about it. We've been through a lot, you know that, all those years..." 

"I can't live with a death sentence hanging over me for the rest of my life. This, whatever you're doing, makes me uncomfortable, I mean at one time it used to be fun, now I can't breathe thinking when someone can pull on me walking in the streets...Its over between us"

Just like that. And day after day she slipped in front of his very eyes, until there was nothing. Then his job. He couldn't believe it when his Director told him there was no place for him at the office. What had changed? The man had always supported him all the way through, seemed to like this bold idea of writing about the genocide. He knew there was no place their corrupt seed couldn't reach, from your workplace, your family even to your very own girlfriend. But that was not enough to stop his life long dream. He could take more than that to avenge his dad! 

He looked at his wrist impatiently, dialing Muchemwa's private number, tears almost in his eyes. This was the third time now. You have reached the voice box of... He could not imagine that the Minister had been playing him all along, pretending to be the perfect informant when he was a spie. He could not. There was something gentle about him, something genuine that he felt as they drank coffee at the Sunrise Cafe that day.

"You know this is a critical decision, man. Do you think you're ready?"

"I will send my family to the UK, I can't put them in this situation."

"You intend to be away from your family in order to testify? He knew Muchemwa would not answer, but he was impressed.

Had he send them to the UK? Where was security? Where was everyone? How could the minister's home be so empty. The answers were in the suite, pulling him to climb the stairs. Slowly, Kuzo began climbing, his heart palpitating with a strange nervous excitement. After witnessing his father's face crushed with a military boot to the ground, Kuzo had never been the same again. In journalism, he had one goal. Just one goal. And now with his informant's phone going straight to voicemail, his security detail gone and his house entombed with an unusual silence, his goal seemed to slip right in his very eyes.

There was brute anguish in his eyes as he starred at Muchemwa's body sprawled senselessly on the chair. The bullet had gone straight to his temple. The killer had taken a lot of the victim's blood on his person from the spatter. A small piece of burning cigarette lay, slowly turning into residual ash. Meanwhile, news played on the enormous tv plugged on the wall. If there were any tears left Kuzonda would break into a cry, but he had to save them. This was simply the beginning of his misfortunes. For the first time in his life he knew he had to run. Quickly, he left the suite, descended the stairs and left the house. Just as he left the house, a secret operative made a shot right on his face. This would be the perfect alibi in the homicide.