Editor, Refer to the article, “Abapfubuzi: What lies behind the lavish lifestyle?” (The New Times, August 15). This kind of habit should be discouraged. There should be a campaign to address this issue, otherwise we are in trouble as society. Just the other day, young girls and boys were found at some restaurant in town drinking alcohol and engaging in all sorts of bad habits, which is where they are picked by these old women and men. We as parents need to encourage our children to prioritise hard work. Frank, Rwanda ********************* Editor, Allow me to address Frank on the issue he raises about the Abapfubuzi. This may seem a new phenomenon here in Rwanda, but gigolos have existed in many societies to serve the needs of (mostly) older and neglected women for centuries. Most people seem not to understand that “sugar daddies” have their female counterparts, perhaps because women tend to be much more discreet about it. Frank’s suggestion is very much easier said than done. How do you convince a young person in today’s consumerist society to forego immediate gratification, no matter the incredible temptation and the pull of the “high life”, in order to sweat studying, then run the obstacle course of an uncertain labour market that is unlikely to give him what he believes his education and “hard work” entitle him to? At the end of the day, the pull of the “easy life” that can be won by offering his or her youthful body to the debauched service of a rich male or female patron will prove too irresistible. Yes, this fast-growing practice and similar social phenomena are a worry for the moral fabric of our society, culture and traditions. But they are common to any fast changing society in which the old moral moorings are being loosened by imported lifestyles and the wholesale subcontracting of child rearing by busy parents to third parties. Young people’s urge to satiate their consumerist desires today rather than engage in the slow and necessarily uncertain process of building themselves up materially, combined with a ready and similarly growing market of neglected older women and debauched old men with financial means in a more permissive social environment, will ensure that this phenomenon will surely grow. Hats off to anyone who can suggest an effective antidote to this societal malady! Mwene Kalinda, Rwanda
