A Quote by Petina Gappah

The struggle for Zimbabwe lit up the imagination of people around the world. In London, New York, Accra and Lagos, bell-bottomed men and women with big hair and towering platform shoes sang the dream of Zimbabwe in the words of the eponymous song by Bob Marley: Every man has the right to decide his own destiny.

Petina Gappah

Quote Topics

Around Around The World Bell Big Big Hair Bob Decide Destiny Dream Every Every Man Hair His Imagination Lit London Man Marley Men Men And Women New New York Own People Platform Platform Shoes Right Sang Shoes Song Struggle Up Women Words World York Zimbabwe

Quote Author

Petina Gappah
Zimbabwean - Writer
Born: 1971

Set it up in Zimbabwe, Every man gotta right to decide his own destiny, And in this judgment there is no partiality. So arm in arms, with arms, we'll fight this little struggle, 'Cause that's the only way we can overcome our little trouble.

Bob Marley

On April 18, 1980, the last outpost of empire in Africa died. From Rhodesia's ashes rose a country that would take its place among the free nations as Zimbabwe, the last among equals. And men and women leapt to embrace this dream called Zimbabwe.

Petina Gappah

Zimbabwe is a lost country. There is no money in Zimbabwe, everything stands still. The economy of the country is in shambles, the inflation is the highest in this world.

Thomas Mapfumo

What is the worst, is that you will have the meltdown of Zimbabwe that the IMF is talking about. And indeed what you will have is growing unemployment in Zimbabwe, growing impoverishment among the people, growing social conflict. And I think that is the worst sort of outcome, that collapse of Zimbabwe certainly would have a much, much worse effect on the region than mere image.

Thabo Mbeki

I'm not even sure that I want to go back... The Zimbabwe that I really loved, the Zimbabwe that I grew up in, just isn't there anymore, and I'm not sure about the country that has replaced it.

Petina Gappah

We moved to Zimbabwe when I was five, some years after Zimbabwe had gained independence.

Danai Gurira

Every man gotta right to decide his own destiny.

Bob Marley

My view is that the time has come for the international community to act on Zimbabwe in the way that it did in Bosnia. I do not think that we are going to get free and fair elections in Zimbabwe.

Raila Odinga

Only al-Jazeera is allowed to report from Zimbabwe, but it is unwatchable. Their Zimbabwean reporter Supa Mandiwanzira was one of Zanu-PF's praise-singers at the reviled Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation.

Petina Gappah

If the situation in Zimbabwe continues to deteriorate, Britain will argue for Zimbabwe's suspension from the Commonwealth at the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting in March.

Jack Straw

The matter of who governs Zimbabwe is a matter that is in the hands of the people of Zimbabwe.

Thabo Mbeki

I grew up in Zimbabwe in Southern Africa, and I moved to London when I was 17. And I started commuting and, actually, to go to college. And I used to really enjoy that part of my journey where the - it was actually a Tube train, but it was over ground, and it went right past the backs of people's houses, and I could actually see right in.

Paula Hawkins

I've been a big Bob Marley fan forever. Forever. Like big, huge. Bob Marley and the Beatles, that's my big, giant music influence. I can listen to them all the time.

Eddie Murphy

Shoes divide men into three classes. Some men wear their father's shoes. They make no decisions of their own. Some are unthinkingly shod by the crowd. The strong man is his own cobbler. He insists on making his own choices. He walks in his own shoes.

S. D Gordon

I arrived in Tokyo in around '81. Around that time, I visited London for about two months - it was the period just before Malcolm McLaren released his solo album Duck Rock. I'd met him when he came to Japan, so I visited him in London and spent one evening with him and his girlfriend over at his house. He told me, "London is boring right now. You should go to New York." So he called a friend in New York, who I think was an old assistant or someone who helped him record early hip-hop stuff over there.