via Zimbabwean play a ‘distortion of history’ Eyewitness News | 1 May 2014
One of Africa’s largest arts festivals, the Harare International Festival of the Arts, has just started and already it has run into controversy.
State media says a play about Zimbabwe’s resistance heroine Mbuya Nehanda, who was executed by white settlers in 1898, is an insensitive distortion of history.
The play Lovers in Time was written by Zimbabwean playwright Blessing Hungwe.
Actors taking part in it say it is meant to be funny and they warned before the play was staged that it makes fun of the white settlers.
But the Herald newspaper takes a different line.
It says a scene showing Nehanda and Sekuru Kaguvi just before they are executed by two drunk officials is far from respectful.
Independent television producer Clive Mandizha reportedly tried to get the play banned on the basis that it was insensitive and distasteful.
Well-known Zimbabwean actress Chipo Chung, who watched the play, described it in a tweet today as hilarious.
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