“Being a policeman in Zimbabwe did not bring with it the respect and adoration that one might expect. Indeed, many of my own close friends turned their backs on me as they could not understand why I had joined, and viewed me as a turn-coat, working for Mugabe - a white man selling his soul to a black government.

Not so – not even close!

I am not, and have never been a politician or politically minded. The first time I voted in my life was in the United Kingdom in 2001! I was 38!

I did just over four years in the Zimbabwe Republic Police, and whilst I miss being a policeman, I believe that the policeman in me is never very far away. I think like a policeman, work like a policeman and have a policeman’s inbuilt ability to be civic minded. My father used to say I had a policeman’s inquisitive mind, with the ability to hide behind a question mark!

A few days before I started writing this book in earnest, I was standing outside my mother’s house and a female “hobby bobby” – a part time voluntary police member in the UK - was walking past. She stopped and called me over. I was intrigued.

She said to me, “You’ve either been a soldier or a policeman – or in some sort of military service.” When I asked her how she knew, she said, “It’s in the way you stand.”

from “Without Honour” by Robb WJ Ellis