Are community gardens grander than grandiose?
"Otjombinde community garden blossoms" was the screaming headline of an article in a recent edition of one of the local English dailies.
Kae Matundu-Tjiparuro “Otjombinde community garden blossoms” was the screaming headline of an article in a recent edition of one of the local English dailies. Interestingly, the article was the second lead in that publication, a testimony to its importance, or pseudo-importance, if you will. Ordinarily, an article like this rarely finds its way into the mainstream media as a leading story.
But of what use is a garden in the rural constituency of Otjombinde, worse still in the Omaheke Region which is traditionally a livestock-rearing and production area? Yours Truly Ideologically cannot help but think loudly, for lack of an understanding of what interest such an article holds for the Otjombinde community itself. The same question applies to the usefulness of a garden, except for the purely obvious: that it is not a permanent solution but merely a stopgap measure to the endemic problem of unemployment, particularly among the youth.
