Breaking News: UN bans Please Call Me SMSes

Please Call Me messages to become a thing of the past

Breaking news: World leaders at a UN Convention have passed a resolution to fast track  new laws in their countries, banning the free Please Call Me sms service that many of their cellphone network providers offer. The new laws will compel network providers to remove this service from their systems and in its place implement a Please Call Me - It's an Emergency sms system. 

Under the new system, subscribers will only be able to send free messages asking the recipients to call them back only if it is an emergency. Should it be found that there has been an abuse of this service and there is no emergency, offenders will face punitive measures that range from hefty fines, lengthy prison terms and life bans on cellphone usage.

Briefing journalists on what motivated this unexpected resolution, some of the UN General Assembly leaders pointed out that an undesirable breed of Please Call Me fanatics had developed and these needed to be culled before their mutation spread and became a worldwide plague. People with sufficient credit to call their friends and colleagues or with sufficient money to buy it, were resorting to Please Call Me's to avoid spending money. The unfortunate recipients of these call me requests were calling back only to discover that they were being taken advantage of. It has been declared a gross violation of human rights to prompt people to spend their airtime credit to call you, yet you are the one who needs their assistance and should therefore be the one calling them. 

The alternative Please Call Me - Its an Emergency system, will ensure that only genuine and important Call Me requests are sent. Analysts see the proposed punitive measures as a sufficient deterrent to ward off offenders. As news spreads of these new worldwide developments, cellphone users have been reported to be at either the high echelons of jubilation or the lowest depths of disgust, depending on whether they are victims or offenders.

For further information on the implementation of these laws in your country, contact your communications department or mobile network provider.

Lipstick shopping demystifies Mugabe's aura

So my president has been shopping for some lipstick? How absolutely cute, not to mention sweet! Who ever thought we would ever see the softer, feminine side of our beloved Bob Mugabe? It must be true that underneath every tough exterior, there is always a supressed softie, itching to come out!


Anyone who has seen the siren blasting presidential motorcade (nicknamed Bob and the Wailers) whisking down the highways of Harare, will testify as the almost surreal image that the Zimbabwean president portrays. The sight of Zim 1, his Mercedes S600 Pullman limo speeding at breakneck speed, encircled by a convoy of motorbikes, armoured cars, trucks and ambulances, almost convinces one that he is untouchable and invincible. On top of that, media footage of him eloquently denouncing his foes, giving George Bush and others the middle finger makes him appear as the quissentential tough cookie.


It is therefore quite ironic that despite having stringent security measures, Mugabe recently found himself trapped in a New York drugstore, at the mercy of a lone protesting customer. Even more ironic is that all this happened in the USA, a country where he is not welcome and can only enter if he is visiting the UN. Add also to that, the fact that a man ranked high on the merciless world dictators' list was lipstick shopping and you have the ingredients of an unexpected thriller, its plot rich in twists and turns.


We as men tend to underestimate the power of woman. We avoid buying clothing and cosmetics for our loved ones because nine and a half times out of ten, we buy the wrong thing or can never seem to shop in the right place that has in stock what we were instructed to buy. For a man who will think nothing of brushing aside a supreme court order, a SADC tribunal desicion, or a United Nations resolution, it becomes interesting to see Mugabe going all out to personally make the lipstick purchase. Unless of course that was a clever decoy and there were more serious purchases made at the drug store (such as life saving drugs), I have to take my hat off to Grace Mugabe or whichever lady is responsible for this unexpected retail adventure!