down all at once. It consumed their lives for years – the supposed time of their lives, their early twenties – and in the end, it swallowed one whole.
One day in October of 2023, the city garlanded with blooming jacarandas, a great light flashed over Lusaka. In restaurants, waiting rooms, bars, market stalls, at Spar, at the bank, on minibuses, even in a handful of schoolrooms – all of these peopled places lit up with bluewhite brightness, as if daytime lightning had come in the window. But this flash came from inside, not outside. Everyone who had a Bead contributed to it. It cast upon their palms a place and a time and the mysterious letters: SOTP.
People were used by now to receiving government notifications through their Beads – about taxes, electric bills, elections, and, recently, the compulsory Virus vaccination appointments. But those messages had arrived individually, citizen by citizen, not all at once like this SOTP one. After everyone had recovered from the wonder of the simultaneity, some people went online and found a bare-bones website (theSOTP) with an RSVP form. The event, whatever it was – a rally? a giveaway? a concert? – would take place in a week, on Independence Day, in Kalingalinga.
Lusaka was perplexed.
‘S! O! T! P! WADAZIMEEN TO YOU AND ME?!?!’ sang around the schoolyards.
The Mast published a full-page ad: WHO IS THE SOTP?
Radio Phoenix brought in experts – a linguistics lecturer from UNZA, a rising hip-hop artist named KnockKnock, a government official and a Christian minister – to talk with DJ Jay Dee.
‘So, me I think it means Surrender Oil Thankyou Please,’ said KnockKnock.
‘What oil? We are not Nigerians. Me, I think it stands for Seek Out The Praiseworthy!’
Callers into the show had equally outlandish theories. Maybe this was doomsday talk like Y2K or Twenty Twenty. Maybe it was about The Change. Maybe it was a coup, like back in ’97.
‘Do you remember those dangerous happenings? It was also around Independence Day.’
‘Yes, but four days after,’ the older government official corrected. ‘Twenty-eighth of October.’
‘Ah-ah?’ KnockKnock exclaimed. ‘The coup was operating on African time?!’
Laughter.
‘But you people, that was not even a proper coup. Three men conquering a radio station—’
‘If that was a coup, even our show today can be a coup,’ said DJ Jay Dee.
Laughter.
‘Alright, that’s all we have today. Thanks, listeners. We’ll see you at the S to the O to the T to the P. Whatever that ends up being!’
* * *
Naila felt full to the brim. It was like getting likes or hearts or adds online – a flood of community feeling blinking towards her, albeit empty of content. Joseph was furious. The day of the radio show, he picked her up from work. He started ranting as soon as she got in the car.
‘How the hell are we supposed to get a political platform together in a week, Niles?’
She flipped down the passenger-side visor and flipped up the mirror.
‘Why the fuck did Tabs send out that message without consulting us about the date?’
Naila pulled her hair up into a bun and applied her Bruise lipstick.
‘I told her to send it,’ she said. ‘We can’t keep frikkin kawaya-wayaring. Are we going?’
He opened his mouth, closed it again. He drove them to New Kasama in silence. Jacob welcomed them at the broken front door with open arms, a big grin and an open bottle of whisky. They settled into their usual rooftop roles – Naila raising, Joseph dampening and Jacob ironising their spirits as they planned. They decided the best place to set up a stage was under the billboard at the CRDZ intersection. They could paint their message on it. But what should it say?
‘Freedom,’ said Joseph.
‘Freedom is a capitalist illusion,’ said Naila. ‘It should say equality.’
‘You people, it must say revolution!’ said Jacob.
And then the guys were off arguing again. Naila settled back, stroking her palm to scroll through RSVPs – 379 people had already said they were coming. The comments section was full of jokes about what the letters stood for and whether there would be freebies. Free like Digit-All Beads and AFRINET Wi-Fi had been free. Addicted to aid, indeed. Naila smiled to herself. It was her vision in action – an infiltration of the capitalist circuits. Everyone was happily doing what they always did, joining in with their clicks. The SOTP had the masses. Now it was time for the swerve.
* * *
The day of the rally dawned sullen with heat. After lunch, Naila put on her