One benighted afternoon we found a madman atop the rock in the centre of our land, and he was pointing a gun on us.
“I tried to climb on this rock three times and now I am here!” screamed the madman, prancing hither and thither.
“How do we get this knave down from that height?” queried one of us down below.
“Hate speech!” cried the madman. He took aim at the man who made the utterance, and the poor fellow was dead in short seconds.
Shouts of horror swept through the landscape.
“Hail me as your president or I will shoot again!” The madman was in his elements, caressing his baleful gun.
“A raving madman cannot a president make!” shouted another deviant fellow in our midst.
The madman unleashed another crack shot, and death followed suit.
“Am I the president or am I not?” The madman was not joking.
“You are!” we all hollered as one.
“Actually it is my duty to decree myself president,” said the madman, pulling a white gown over his military gear. “Hail me as a born-again Emperor of Democracy!”
“Born-again Emperor of Democracy!” we all shouted.
The gangling madman showed his teeth in a hearty smile. He was gap-toothed.
“Please come down and rule among us,” a voice in the square pleaded.
“Why should I come down among you plebeians of corruption?” the madman replied, frowning. “I prefer to rule from the rock.”
The madman unleashed a staccato of shots, killing five or so luckless fellows. He panned his gun wickedly across the mammoth crowd, and cries of dread swept through the square.
“I want to hear some pillow talk in the other room of this rock,” said the madman.
Something we had thought was merely an outgrowth of the rock suddenly came alive. Then coverall came off, revealing a woman. Her madness was extraordinary, putting her husband in the shade.
“Only a divine intervention can save us from this miscreant,” said another defiant fellow with us down below.
The madman pulled the trigger, terminating another handful of lives. He affected the pose of a cow herder.
Cemetery silence descended on us. We could only stare and wonder and wait.
“Now I have achieved everything on earth and upon the rock,” the madman said, feeling good. “Ruga the entire land for me!”
“What exactly do you want from us, Emperor of Democracy?” a voice screamed.
“What is that you said?” The madman was furious. “That is the voice of revolution!”
The madman insisted on fishing out the owner of the dissenting voice. The identified dissident stared back at the madman with a certitude that bore the stamp of familiarity.
“Off you go with your revolution now!” the madman cursed, shooting to death the poor fellow.
“I tried three times to get atop this rock” the madman said. “Therefore a third term is the change I promise!”
Confusion shot up as people ran helter-skelter. The madman kept shooting with glee.
The court poet ran to the foot of the rock and read out lines to the rat-a-tat beats of the madman’s gunshots:
The barbarian, Baba for short, swears by the rock:
“Make me the messiah lest the people perish!”
The roused kith and kin retort with scorn:
“The mad messiah becomes prisoner of the rock!”
The crackpot pulls a gun and wills his command:
“Ordain me the first citizen or I shoot!”
Summarily the sane subjects stoop and salute:
“Hail His Excellency, Dear General and Head of State!”
The gunman bestrides the rock droning a corny anthem:
“Exalt my democratic transition to life incumbency!”
So the saints of sanity sing the stock song:
“Come down to the people, Emperor of Democracy!”
Baba the barbarian on the rock takes wing crooning:
“Up I go jetting abroad skies for foreign investment!”