Sony Tansi - The Shameful State

“No, anyone but you, Jescani.”

“That’s right, Mr. President. Anyone but me. You and I gave birth to the nation. I am with you.”

National Letanso appears holding onto a piece of wrapping paper dripping in sauce, stinking of butter and onion, covered in scribble done with an eyeliner pencil, and Mr. President I’m handing you a collective statement of resignation from the guards who’ve decided to leave the country to the children of their children. He pulls up his zipper so that his twelve mistresses can pass before him with their kids tightly wrapped on their backs, Glézani leading the way, her face flushed with anger, drooling, haggard, as if she hadn’t brushed her hair in years, hands shaking with contempt, a resolute look in the eye, she couldn’t stop the tears from running:

“Why are you crying, Glézani, my love?”

“Mr. President, here is our resignation. Here it is.” Soaked with snot, all chewed up by the rats that have infested the palace, she hands it over to him with the same hand she washes her genitals with. “Can’t you use the other hand?” No question of changing hands. This says what it says. And just like that, he was handed one resignation after the other all day long, and National Jérica came and threw a letter right in my face, but don’t worry, I will take revenge. Do as you please, I’m the one in a position of strength. If fifteen thousand guys have to be shot so that another fifteen thousand can live, so be it! “And you of all people, Jérica, that I picked up on a street corner. Alas, on this earth, no one owns anyone. You would have died of hunger and scabies out there in the bush.” Toutansio hands him the resignation from the mayor’s office. And Savouansi Luigi Portes comes in with the resignation that’s preventing us from getting electric power tonight. And yet, that’s also right when Carvanso came in with a handful of infantrymen who’d joined forces with Vauban’s men.

“Colonel, we’ve remained loyal to you and together we will subdue the traitors.”

“Ok.”

We’ve retaken control over the radio station Ok we’ve retaken the prison Ok we’ve retaken the armament store Ok we’ve retaken the June 11th camp.

“God is with us.”

We’ve retaken Gatansi Bridge we’ve retaken the train station and the capitol building.

He places his hand over his heart. Slowly moves it toward his herniated balls that are arousing his fleshy pole. But it’s time to go and see my people, and we saw him head over to District 45, guided by the sound of drums. He goes to bang their daughters to celebrate the triumph of his hernia over the forces of evil. He brands the fiancée of our poor old brother Yohassi Loma with his sour juices. And as he passes, the people ask:

“Mr. President, I haven’t eaten for three days.”

“Ah, Vauban, give him three hundred coustrani.”

“Mr. President, I want to purchase a plot of land.”

“Vauban, give the guy seven thousand coustrani.”

“Colonel, my wife left me.”

“Vauban, find him another wife.”

“Colonel, when it rains I have water running into my home.”

“Ok, I’ll send someone over to lay asphalt.”

“Colonel, the infantrymen raped my daughter.”

“Alas, there’s nothing I can do about that: infantrymen the world over are there to fuck. Tell her to wash herself and forget about it. That’s the only solution.”

“But Mr. President, she wants to commit suicide.”

“What? Just because of that?! Tell her to wash herself old man, and to use warm water if she prefers.”

“But she only got married yesterday and then they raped her. A poor guy like me. Where am I going to find the money to pay back her dowry?”

“Vauban, settle this issue.”

No no and no: I’m not like that ex-your bastard Sarnio Lampourta who drank muelocco all day long, and had to smoke cannabis before he had the courage to speak to the people. I’m not like Houtanansa who built stadiums as if the people could eat his mother’s balls, I’m not like Dartanio Maniania who left behind a country with neither head nor balls and that you went and made a hero of the people, who managed to rack up a foreign debt of some ninety-nine billion, but you still made him a god-damn hero of the nation just for hurling his shitty juices in your wives’ entrails, how shameful; I’m not like Caranto Muhete who gave all the members of his clan positions in the army so that he could hold on to the power to kill, I’m Lopez of the people and there aren’t a lot of ways of being president, there’s one way for God’s sake one way and he pointed to his zipper. We cheered loudly. And I swear on my hernia that I would never kill someone just for being reasonable and you can take my word for that, reason is sacred; and I’m talking about the reason of reason not that of folly, go figure my brothers and dear fellow countrymen, go figure how someone like Hugo de Lafundia that we appointed child of the nation, mourned for a whole month, even buried him three times over to prove to his mother’s dumbasses who asked for the return of his remains that we had buried him, yes, in this country of mayhem upon mayhem in which you can’t even be sure whether you’ll be buried; we buried him with all his military stripes and all his medals, we sang the national anthem and it was as enchanting as a real camp fire; now go figure why anyone would come and bother my hernia in the name of his death: well let me tell you, he hanged himself right when my hernia was about to find out that he was the one who killed the woman of my heart. And he shed real tears over this girl I had loved but that the “Flemish” pecked at. Brother Carvanso wiped away the drool and snot running from his face.

“Mr. President, be especially careful with the Amerindian press.”

All this is as sad as crab stock. As sad as a dick infected with bilharzia. He replaces the customary minute of silence with a minute of his hernia, because one must cry in remembrance of lost loved ones, instead of having a good laugh in private, instead of keeping quiet like some dunce. Ah, that national moment for crying, when cheeks glisten in the midday sun, let us give the juices from our eyes the same respect that we give the national juices with which we impregnate our sisters. And the eyes redden, the snot starts to run. The nation has to tighten its heart and soul. We cheered loudly. Long live National Mom’s Lopez. He shows us once again how he forgives those who massacred my aunt. He steps down from the podium and walks off rubbing his eyes. He clears his large nostrils noisily, flicks his snot on Colonel Carvanso, I’m sorry my brother, he passes his hands over his eyes then strokes his hernia and wagging tongues would have it that his heart had dropped into his pants. He walked back to the palace. Kissed Mom. Look at this bunch of grovelers but I’m not going to fall for it: if my hernia dropped dead you’d have a good laugh over me just like you did over National Salamanso, and I know it was you lot who just yesterday were licking his hernia. It’s written in your eyes, it’s written on your foreheads, it’s written in your blood: around here, no one likes leaders. He spent the rest of the day in bed crying over his dead aunt. Vauban and Mom bent over backwards to try and cheer him up.

“I loved her you know.”

“Yes, Mr. President.”

“So don’t waste your breath trying to comfort me.”

And so he cried over his dead aunt in the way that people here cry over their dead aunts. Unless you’re Satan, you can’t even hurl your own piss without it coming back to splash you in the face. But I love them. But it’s not always funny: sometimes they kill my people to thank me. Too bad for them: the fire next time.

“Lafonsia came to tell me that he had a dream that I would die on Monday.”