Waiting for Superman

This blog post is inspired by a song done by John Legend and the Roots entitled “Shine or Waiting for Superman’’. It is also inspired by a play I once listened to on the BBC World Service radio entitled ‘’Waiting for Baba’’ or something to that effect. The song has John Legend cooing as only John Legend can, to lyrics that paint this picture of hopeless kids who are somehow waiting for superman to come to their rescue. The play carries a similar theme, although set in Nigeria. The wait for an all-conquering incorruptible saviour (who I choose to call superman), to right the wrongs and provide justice. Unfortunately the wait seems to go on forever.

I can understand why the idea of superman is so appealing and perhaps that is why it has made itself such a mainstay of popular culture. Who doesn’t want a superman, a superhero to simply swoop from the sky and miraculously turn water into wine, leave the meal bin brimming with mealie meal and the fridge nicely stocked with all kinds of goodies?

The idea of superman appeals to our basic aspirations as humans; avoid pain and maximise on pleasure. In each one of us is embedded the extremely basic need to prolong pleasure, leisure while at the same time to reduce on whatever makes us uncomfortable or go through pain. Many of us only work because we have to and given all the money in the world would happily spend our days seating on the couch flipping through TV channels.

The biggest problem with the waiting for superman mentality is that, bereft of ideas and actual supermen, we more than often impute superman qualities on mere men and expect them to miraculously turn into one. Perhaps nowhere is this more prominent than in our treatment of political leaders. Now do not get me wrong, our political leaders have greatly failed us and will continue doing so as long as we continue having these extremely weak and fused institutions. But to expect politicians to swoop down and with a single wave of the magic wand fix the economy, speak roads into existence and build each one of us a toilet and perhaps even be so kind as to take us to the toilet, is not only unrealistic but setting oneself up for disappointment.

 But then we never learn.

You only have to be there when the president is with his handlers to realise just how deep this complex goes. I remember when I met the Late President Michael Sata with his ministers and handlers falling all over themselves to be of service to him and re-assure him that he was the most important human being in the word. He was always referred to in the third person, whatever insipid joke he came up was met with laughter fraught with such hilarity Chris Rock himself would have been envious. But it gets worse.

It turns out that those chosen by society to be super men and women, foolishly begin to believe that they actually have supernatural powers. Make no mistake, power they have and lots of it from the look of things. They can speak districts into existence, they can fart and everyone around them will laugh and take in the smell like they were smelling some top grade roses, everyone laughs at their insipid jokes and they can turn you instantly into a pensioner and give you back gainful employment just like that. But supermen they are not, and they should know that.

Unfortunately many start out fine, before the folly of self-deception overtakes them. Kaunda started out fine, proving a very popular and unifying president to the extent that many left their parties to join him so much that the 1972 declaration of a one party state did not even meet a whimper of discontent. You can say that about virtually every political leader our country has ever had.

In a way it is a vicious cycle. It goes something like this: The people clamouring for superman, identifying one among them, assigning those qualities and basically calling the chosen one ‘’superman’’. Superman is at first shocked by all of this. Maintains a semblance of humility initially, for when he looks in the mirror he knows he is far from superman. But then slowly he starts to believe the lies, well he has a bit power doesn’t he?

But then fate does not always read the script.

Last year our superman then, got to parliament (I was going to say walked into parliament, but that would be grossly inaccurate) looking like death itself. His parched lips, the unnatural sooty black colour of his face sending the house into a morbid silence. He staggered through his speech, barely controlling his spittle. You could aslmost see the grim ripper impatiently tapping his foot right behind "Superman" as if to say "It is time".Was our superman merely human after all? His handlers wouldn’t let us even for a second entertain that thought, choosing to play an extremely warped version of “The Emperor’s New Clothes” on us. The rest as they say is history.

A new man was installed in early this year, slowly we turned him to superman. But alas humanity would not leave him alone, he collapsed in full view of the public while officiating a public ceremony. No, ‘’superman doesn’t collapse’’, we were quickly told, ‘’he falls on others like a ton of bricks when he wants to’’. His handlers went into over-drive, to the extent of trying to convince the naked eye that what it saw was otherwise. ‘He did not collapse’ they insisted. ‘’He just expressed his fatigue horizontally, having had a few traces of malaria’’.

‘’He is superman after all. He doesn’t suffer from the ailments that ordinary men suffer from. If he is to suffer from Malaria, let it be ‘traces’ of malaria. If he is going to be operated on, let it be a minor medical procedure. Africa, Zambia and its supermen!’’

I agree, there are those privileged with leadership among ourselves. But it is our duty to remind them that they are also part of the collective human predicament, with its limitations. We do ourselves and them a disservice every time we elevate them to superhuman status. In the end we are all just humans, caught in our quest for meaning, our paths crossing on this journey between birth and death. Once we embrace humanity, it is with the limitations and weaknesses that come with the package. Super-humans only exist in comic books.

Will they learn, “No!” Aspiring supermen are daily duping people. They preach about how they are going to fix the economy, reduce unemployment, create wealth and so forth. If you are a student of history, even the most contemporary history, you will know that waiting for them is like waiting for superman.

 Do the best you can, don’t wait for superman.