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LET’S BURY VICTOR, NOT HIS VISION

21/01/2018 00:15:00 By Musa Hlophe

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It is a deep and excruciating pain for the KaLanga Community in general and his family in particular.

We should have buried Victor Gamedze but his soul is resting with Jesus Christ, waiting for that wonderful moment when He shall raise all those who died in Christ, lift all those who shall be still on this earth to meet Him in Heaven to be with Him before

His father for eternity. Amen to that because we shall be raised to be with Him and to rule the world with Him, never mind how we shall have left this evil world.
But before I continue with my tribute to my son and lovely neighbour, allow me to address all those who are celebrating Victor’s death on social media.

It may be Victor today whose death you are celebrating, saying all the filthy things you are saying about him at his death. But know this: death is also certainly coming to you as well. It may not be today but it is certainly coming and those with whom you are enjoying this time shall be celebrating your own death.

turn to Christ Jesus
Please do think about these things and then turn to Christ Jesus for repentance. Thank you!
Now back to my tribute to the man himself and his vision for success in life. Victor ‘Maradona’ Gamedze, the last born in a humble family whose children rose from the ashes to be not only a wonderful surprise to their humble parents but each one of them, the pride of the KaLanga community and Swaziland.

Victor had just introduced his mobile company to break the monopoly by the long serving MTN which introduced us to mobile technology and saw us totally liberated in terms of effective communication. Wherever one could be in the world - driving a car, in the plane, in foreign countries and everywhere one finds oneself.

And for this, we thank MTN but it was now time to widen the competition which resulted in much reduced communication costs.
On Wednesday, this very week, on page 4 of the Times of Swaziland, under a heading: ‘Youth robbed of a promising future’, I was quoted as having told the journalist about the advanced plans of Victor and I, working together hoping to rope in the KaLanga Chiefdom later on for the setting up of a Foundation which was going to take care of the unemployed but educated youth of this community to develop self employment projects in our community and later on, in Swaziland in general.

At the time, we did not know what name was going to be given to such a Foundation. Should we call it Chief Mlimi Maziya foundation or Chief Jozane Foundation?

These were the questions, but what was not in doubt was that Victor Gamedze was going to be the first to put in his E1 million to open the bank account and have the foundation registered; before anyone else was to put their resources into this well thought out project.
We were waiting for the schools to open and the weeding of Imfabantfu to be completed and then sit down to draw up the Vision and Mission Statement of the Foundation, costs, activities and then take it to umphakatsi for its blessing!

The issue had arisen from an article I wrote in my column sometimes last year in which I gave an account of a young woman from the area who had set next to me while on board of the J. Sousa Bus, coming from Manzini. I wrote the complaints of that certain girl, which actually reflected how our children in our community, having acquired high education qualifications but find themselves having to roam the roads up and down the RM16 road from Lukhula to Big Bend, never mind its poor condition. But as I am writing this article, I can still see the boys and girls walking under the scorching sun, roaming the road .

The article had raised quite an ire on the part of the authorities here, such that I got a call from the acting Chief of the area, asking why I did not discuss this issue with the leadership because had I done that, I would have known what plans was the umphakatsi thinking about in order to address the issue raised by that young woman?

Fortunately for me and all those who are concerned about the plight of our children, the acting Chief then replied through the media, outlining what plans they had towards addressing this issue of unemployment affecting youth in the area.
It was from that dialogue through the media that Victor was encouraged to be involved.

He saw the need not only to ensure good education opportunities for the children of that area but also to create structures which would capacitate the youth to be able to generate their own livelihoods. He saw agriculture to be the starting point. Train the youth on how to ‘fuya’ the goats and sell either the live goats to the growing population of people of Asian origin or the meat being sold to the members of the community .

I quickly bought into the idea and we began phoning each other about how to move forward - the establishment of the foundation , the cost of setting it up, registration after having received the blessing of umphakatsi.

LET HIS VISION LIVE ON
So! Now that he is gone: rudely taken from his family and all of us who loved him, by the two bullets from the assassin’s gun. What are we going to do? Bury his vision with his body or let the vision live on?
My answer is No!

Let us never think about burying his visions with him because while the flesh goes to where it was taken, his soul lives on forever ; and it is his soul which we must let ,live on by continuing with his visions.
This can be achieved through the success of all the businesses he had established. These must prosper to the disappointment of those who planned his death . His family must be given all the support they may need as they come to terms with the reality of his death

His vision about the foundation now has its name .”The Victor Gamedze Foundation for Youth Development!”
This is the name of the foundation which must be established in his name and made to fulfill the vision he had chosen to accomplish for the well-being of the children from his community of KaLanga.
My condolences go to his family , his siblings , his grandparents , the KaLanga community , his many employees, to Mbabane Swallows Football Club, the entire football fraternity in the country , his business colleagues and to the government and Their Majesties for losing such a creative man in the country .

MAY HIS SOUL REST IN ETERNAL PEACE!!!