Bruce Ndlovu, Sunday Life Reporter
MTHULISI “KingKG” Ndlovu is not just like any ordinary 24-year-old.
While his age mates are out there seeking cheap thrills, getting intoxicated on things both legal and illegal, he instead is a man chasing a different kind of high.
Words are his addiction and ever since he picked up the pen, first as a hobby and eventually as a profession, he has been a man with a plan. A plan is what he has always had, ever since he wrote and published a Ndebele poetry anthology, edited by the illustrious Pathisa Nyathi, when he was only still doing his A-levels at Amhlophe High School.
“I started writing when I was 16 or 17, when I was in high school. At the time it was nothing more than just a hobby. However, from that point onwards I started getting a lot of encouragement from people that wanted to see me realise my full potential. I got encouraged to take this seriously and contemplate taking it as a career. I started developing a strong passion for writing and I got my motivation from those people offering wise counsel,” he said.
The encouragement he got from peers led to one of the finest achievements when in 2017 Ndlovu published Ubuntu Nqabanqo, an 18-page epic Ndebele that is cited as the longest published poem in Ndebele.
“I then wrote my first book, edited by one of my mentors Pathisa Nyathi, when I was in high school doing my A-levels. The book was Nqabanqo which is an epic poem that took me a week to write. The poem itself is about ubuntu as a philosophy,” he said.
Fast forward three years later, the former Fairview Primary School student is now on the cusp of more glory, as one of the books which he is a major contributor in, Inkondlo Ezinhlobonhlobo became a Zimsec approved set book this year.
“It was from that point on that there was an advert flighted that was asking for submission of Ndebele books to the Zimbabwe Publishing House. At the time I didn’t know that they wanted books to be submitted for possible use as set books by schools in the country. So, I only found out later that all my pieces qualified and became the vast majority of the anthology known as Inkondlo Ezinhlobonhlobo which from this year to 2023 will be a set book used in schools around the country. This feels me with pride as a young writer because I’m passing on knowledge to younger students of the language,” he said.
While some in his age bracket shun the Ndebele language, the Plumtree-born and bred Ndlovu said he had a great love not just for his mother tongue but for most indigenous languages as well.
“I’m driven by my pride in the Ndebele language. I love the language itself and I believe that through my art I’m doing the best I can for the preservation of the language in its purest form. I also write in Shona if I feel like that’s the language that can best express what I think or feel in that particular time. I’m just in love with language and what I can achieve with it so even if it’s not Ndebele I’m at home. I also dabble in Kalanga writing because I grew up in Plumtree where a lot of it is spoken,” he said.
Ndlovu has since written an English epic poem, Ubuntu: The Raw Truth Unravelling, a piece that he said was the longest poetical musings around the subject of ubuntu.
In a world ravaged by discrimination of all sorts, Ndlovu believes that language provides the surest route towards healing
“I envision a world where we don’t judge each other because of the colour of our skin or we don’t judge each from the language that anyone speaks. These are the minor issues that are preventing us from speaking with one voice. If we could get over these things then we could all speak with one voice and I’m convinced that even the economic challenges that we face in Zimbabwe could be overcome if we did that,” he said.