LET US BE PROUD OF WHO WE ARE

Mambo Guramatunhu's new book, Bvute, challenges Africans to embrace their languages, traditions, and identity without apology.

NAMA Award-winning poet Mambo Guramatunhu is asking us to look at what we have been running from... our own shadow.

In his new book, "Bvute", he reminds us that a shadow never leaves you. You cannot outrun it. You cannot hide from it. It walks with you, whether you love it or not. "Bvute" is a fearless homecoming to self, a mirror held up to our shadows, a bold reclamation of who we are, a poetic journey back to our roots, and an unapologetic celebration of BLACK IDENTITY

The image is simple, and that is why it cuts deep. A shadow is faithful. It does not ask for permission. It does not change its mind when you move to another city, learn another language, or wear another life. It stays. Mambo uses that faithfulness to ask a hard question: "If our shadow refuses to abandon us, why do we abandon ourselves?"

Many of us learned to do that quietly. To soften our mother tongue in public. To be embarrassed by our own food. To treat our totems, our names, our ways of greeting, our ways of mourning, as things to hide.

We were taught that to be modern was to be less African. To be educated was to be less African. To be successful was to leave "Bvute" behind. "Bvute" refuses that lesson. "Our languages speak for us long before we open our mouths to explain ourselves. A language carries a way of thinking. It carries respect. It carries honour. It carries how a people sees the world," he said.

When a child is told not to speak in their native tongue, something more than words is lost. A whole way of naming the world is lost.

Mambo writes to return that naming to us. To say that our languages are not a problem to be fixed. They are a home to return to.

"Our food speaks for us in the same way. Food is never just food. It is memory. It is how a grandmother teaches without a textbook. It is how a community says: you belong here. To be ashamed of your food is to be ashamed of the hands that fed you," he added. "Bvute" asks us to sit down again, without apology and eat as ourselves. "Our culture is our heritage. The two cannot be separated. One is the root, the other is the tree," he said.

Mambo puts it in his own words: "Iri ibhuku rinorovedzera hoko pachinyakare, hunhu, tsika nemagariro edu sokuti ndiro bvute redu sevanhu vatema." This is a book that trains the mind on ubuntu, our customs and our way of life, because that is our shadow as BLACK PEOPLE. That is the centre of the book. Not nostalgia. Not a return to a past that never existed. A return to a self that never left. A shadow that never left. The book carries a Foreword written by Mr. Philip Mataranyika, Joshua Marara Maponga and Dr. Solomon Guramatunhu.

Three voices, from three different worlds, standing behind one poet. Their presence says what Mambo is saying in poetry: this is not only a literary matter. It is a matter of identity, of business, of faith, of family, of nation.

A poet can say in one line what a meeting cannot say in a day. Mambo has built his name doing that. With "Bvute", he uses poetry to hold a mirror up to us, not to shame us, but to show us who we have always been.

To be proud of who we are is not a slogan. It is a daily practice. It is speaking your language without shrinking. It is naming your child with pride. It is eating your food without explanation. It is carrying your totem, your history, your hunhu, in public, without asking for permission.

Your shadow will be with you tomorrow morning. It will be with you in every room you enter.

Guramatunhu's work uses poetry to raise questions that ordinary conversations sometimes struggle to confront. Rather than presenting African identity as something that needs defending, Bvute invites readers to recognise its value and embrace it. Ultimately, being proud of who we are must go beyond slogans.

It means speaking our languages without shrinking, giving our children names with pride, enjoying our traditional food without feeling compelled to explain ourselves, and carrying our history, totems and hunhu into the wider world with confidence.

Our shadows remain with us wherever we go.

The question Bvute leaves behind is simple, will we learn to walk proudly with ours, or will we continue running away from who we are?

Mambo Guramatunhu Bvute