My African Freedom Day Reflection
No one understands the true value of freedom and the depths of suffering better than a prisoner or an ex-convict. A person in the free world who is struggling while enjoying their fundamental rights is still far better off than someone eating bread and butter behind bars.
Freedom is a blessing from Jehovah. It is a blessing that gives you the keys to the world and authority over your own path, even amidst pain. The true power of freedom lies in observing the law of Jehovah and the law of the land.
Incarceration is the price a prisoner pays for breaking the laws of the free world.
The orange uniform of shame that a prisoner in Zambia is forced to wear is not a fashion statement or a cultural trend. That uniform is a symbol of chains. It is a coded message that reads: "You are state property." A tool to be used at will by the government.
The sharp claws of the law, which a judge reads like holy text to the accused during sentencing, are not empty promises like the long speeches politicians deliver to the masses in the free world. They are absolute.
On the 15th of July, 2022, I lost my freedom to the state and entered the cursed lands of Mukobeko Medium Prison. A place believed to have been built on an old cemetery.
Handcuffed like a fallen baron, I crossed into the cursed land of the living dead. A journey toward a new beginning had just started. It was a journey that forced me to think beyond the unnatural life to which the law had subjected me. Instead of weeping over what I had lost, I accepted my fate. I began searching for something valuable within those cursed lands something I could bring back and share with the free world once I regained my liberty.
Like an entrepreneur entering a new market, I positioned myself strategically. I used my teaching and IT skills not just to survive, but to gain unlimited access to the library and computers. Eventually, I became the deputy headteacher within the prison. This appointment gave me the exact leverage I needed. By then, I no longer saw prison just as a cage; I saw it as a pool of rich, raw content that I could eventually share with the world through Netflix, Amazon Kindle, and Spotify.
This realization made me deepen my relationship with the pen and the page.
By the time my prison sentence ended on July 15, 2024, I was nothing like the man I was before the claws of the law stripped my freedom away. I emerged as an author and a lyricist ready, like Tupac, to share my story with the world through literature and music.
I had previously taken my creative talents for granted, but Jehovah taught me to respect them the hard way: by allowing me to experience the life of a prisoner.
Following the publication of my first book, "A Guide to Music Publishing and Promotion," my next project is scheduled for release this December. It is a memoir titled:
"The Cursed Lands of Zookaili"
A prison memoir by Rodgers Mangwela.
Happy African Freedom Day to you all, as we count down to the 30th of May, 2026.
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