LIVE UPDATES | Remembering Father Zimbabwe: 26 Years On

Today marks exactly 26 years since the passing of a national hero, veteran nationalist, and liberation icon, the late Vice President Dr Joshua Mqabuko Nyongolo Nkomo — affectionately known as Father Zimbabwe, Umafukufuku, Chibwechitedza, and Umdala Wethu.

As Zimbabwe reflects on the enduring legacy of a man who helped shape the nation’s destiny, the Chronicle is bringing you live updates from commemorations taking place across Bulawayo and beyond.

From tributes by family, politicians, and business leaders, to commemorative events such as the Joshua Nkomo Restoration Trust’s programme at Matsheumhlope Museum, we will keep you informed in real time.

Stay with us as we honour the life, values and vision of a humble giant — a man who preached unity, servant leadership and selfless nation building.

Hundreds gather at the Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo Musuem in Bulawayo to commemorate Father Zimbabwe’s life and legacy.

To commemorate Dr Nkomo’s life today, the Joshua Nkomo Restoration Project Trust, together with The Joshua Nkomo Foundation are hosting a commemoration event at the Matsheumhlope Museum in Bulawayo to mark the 26th anniversary of his death.

Already, hundreds of people have gathered at the venue and wait for proceedings to commence.

According to programmes director of the Joshua Nkomo Trust Mr Tyson Chipikwa, the event will feature an arts exhibition, a lecture from executive director of the Joshua Nkomo Restoration Trust Mr Kwanele Hlabangana and speeches from a family representative, the chair of the Joshua Nkomo Restoration Project Trust and a representative from the Ministry of Primary and Secondary Education.

The event aims to instill Dr Nkomo’s values of equality and non-tribalism in the younger generation, with Mr Chipikwa emphasising the importance of “catching them young.”

Schools from across the Bulawayo metropolitan area are participating in the event, providing them with an opportunity to learn about Dr Nkomo’s legacy and showcase their talents.

Schoolchildren from a number of schools around Bulawayo are part of a crowd that is at the Matsheumhlophe Museum to commemorate the 26th anniversary of the passing away of the late Vice President Joshua Nkomo.

The school children were taken on a tour of the museum by Dr Nkomo’s daughter Thandi Nkomo-Ebrahim at, who gave them a history of Dr

Nkomo’s life.

Let’s look back at Dr Nkomo’s life with pride: President Mnangagwa

PRESIDENT Mnangagwa has called on Zimbabweans to look back at the life of the late Vice President Dr Joshua Nkomo with pride.

Dr Nkomo passed away on 1 July 1999.

“Today, twenty-six years later, Zimbabwe can look back with pride to the life of a liberator, an astute politician, and a champion of Pan-Africanism.

“A true son of the soil, Dr Nkomo was passionate about the land as the major reason for which the Armed Struggle had been waged.

President Mnangagwa said, however, in a cruel twist of fate, Dr Nkomo did not live to witness the Land Reform Programme which commenced a year after his demise.

“However, his clarion call for unity of purpose continued to inspire an entire nation to reclaim its heritage.

“The successful reclamation has inspired young farmers to break production records in agriculture subsectors such as dairy, tobacco, and horticulture. These and other success stories resonate well with the mantra, Nyika Inovakwa Nevene Vayo” he said.

President Mnangagwa said Dr Nkomo devoted an entire life to raising national consciousness among his oppressed countrymen and women.

“His close associates during the formative years of nationalist movements, among them the late Benjamin Burombo, Masotsha Ndlovu, George Nyandoro, Michael Mawema, Morton Malianga and the late President Cde. R.G. Mugabe worked with the towering personality of Dr. Nkomo in forming the National Democratic Party with the sole objective of liberating our nation from the shackles of colonial subjugation and oppression.

“The wheels of the revolution never stopped thereafter, until the birth of our beloved motherland Zimbabwe in 1980,”

Dr Nkomo endured imprisonment in notorious camps such as Gonakudzingwa, but the colonial efforts failed to break his spirit, said President Mnangagwa.

“As our great Motherland looks forward to commemorating our heroes and heroines during the coming month of August, we say, May the dear soul of the late Father Zimbabwe, “Chibwe Chitedza”, “Umdala Wethu”, Dr Joshua Mqabuko Nyongolo Nkomo, rest in eternal peace.

Long live our Unity, Peace and Freedom! Long live Zimbabwe,”

Late Vice-President Dr Joshua Nkomo was a mythical figure to his children as they hardly saw him when they grew up because it was dangerous to be around Father Zimbabwe since the colonial government was baying for his blood.

The late Father Zimbabwe was a man of the people. He was an ever present colossus in the liberation struggle that inspired thousands of sons and daughters of the soil to stand up for their rights against extreme cruelty by the settler regime.

His was the voice that empathised, sympathised and propelled freedom fighters to go beyond their limits to bring independence to the country.

In short, he was there for every Zimbabwean, except his family. This was revealed by his first born, Thandiwe, as she reflected on his life and his limited interaction with his family. Dr Nkomo and his wife the late national heroine, Johanna Fuyane, had four children, Thandiwe, Thuthani Earnest (late), Sibangilizwe Michael and Sehlule Louise.

The late Vice-President, died on July 1, 1999 and his family and all Zimbabweans continue to celebrate his life 22 years after he breathed his last. Thandiwe gave insight into the man who had immense love for his family but was prevented by circumstance from expressing it.

A distant look comes into her eyes as she recalls one of the the first encounters that showed that being around her father was dangerous.

She says Dr Nkomo made one of his rare visits to their Pelandaba home in Bulawayo when she was 10 years old and the authorities teargassed the house, in a typical display of colonial brutality and wanton disregard of the safety of native children and women.

“None of us remember him being a father in the house because really, it was too dangerous to be around him. So, to protect the family, he would not live with us in the house. He would sometimes stop by the house. But one time when he did so at Pelandaba we were teargassed and we were sick and we had to live elsewhere. And I was only 10 years old,” said Thandiwe.

The struggle for liberation lasted for close to 30 years and in those years, Thandiwe and her siblings grew up with only an image of their father, whom she says was a “mythical” being.

The children grew up on a steady diet of larger than life stories of their late father.

Their mother, MaFuyane, assumed the role of their father and made sure his memory never faded from their minds.

“What we knew is what our mother told us about him, where she would say that the work he was doing was not a profession, but it was a calling; a much higher responsibility than being a father and we accepted it.

“We had this positive image but we didn’t really know him, he was a mystical figure to us because everyone was calling him Father of the Nation. And we didn’t understand how he was a father to everyone. When you are a child, you kind of make up your own fantasies of what you want to make of it. All we knew was that he was always in a plane to an extent that when any plane flew past, we would say, ‘bye bye Baba!’,” Thandiwe recalls with nostalgia.

Another memory of her father was when Dr Nkomo was incarcerated at Gonakudzingwa in 1964 when she was still 10 years old.

Thandiwe says she remembers vividly that the only communication with her father was when he would ask for their school work whenever their mother would visit him in prison.

“Where we came to know him was mostly when he was at Gonakudzingwa. He would ask us to send our homework; all our school work. We would do it and my mother would give him, maybe it would be marked by the teacher, he would look at it, even mark it, make his comments and send it back.

“He always told us that he wanted us to be educated because he would say, ‘what we are doing now is to free the country, when the country is free it will be your turn to come in and develop it’.”

The idea of empowering young people to lead in the future was a central theme in Dr Nkomo’s quest for Zimbabwe’s independence.

Thandiwe continued: “He put so much value in education, to the extent that after independence I graduated in New York and I did International Affairs and I was working for the UN. After independence, before Gukurahundi, he said, ‘No no Thandi you people cannot do that, we need you, all educated young people, that is why we sent you there’. So that’s the kind of belief that he had in this country.”

After independence, Dr Nkomo, according to Thandiwe, was a person who loved to be surrounded by people.

“One thing even after independence, my father just attracted a lot of people, shouting his name, Nkomo, Nkomo! Whenever the car would stop and there were people around, he would address them,” she said.

She revealed a side of the liberation icon that most people overlook. The bittersweet struggle of a revolutionary with a higher calling, who has to juggle between family and country.

Nkomo’s life.

Schoolchildren celebrate the life of Dr Joshua Nkomo

PUPILS from seven Bulawayo schools are gathered at the Matsheumhlophe Museum to celebrate the life of the late Vice President Dr Joshua Nkomo.

The educational institutions are JT Mthimkhulu Primary, Light House College, Sizani High, Zenit College, Foundation College, Beacon of Hope and Riverdale Academy.

Dr Nkomo passed away on 1 July 1999.

The school children were given an opportunity to see the life of Dr Nkomo by touring his former home turned into a museum that houses a trove of pictures, artifacts, gifts that his family received from former presidents and royal families among other dignitaries.

The school children also got a sneak peek into the personal lives of the late icon by viewing personal spaces like his bedroom, study and kitchen that was so dearly loved by his wife Mama Mafuyana.

Tour guides also took time to explain the life of Dr Nkomo through the lens of photographs, family portraits and old newspaper articles that chronicled his life from the liberation struggle to an independent Zimbabwe.

Of particular interest for the school children is a bullet proof Mercedes Benz that Dr Nkomo was gifted with for official business at the height of the liberation struggle.

15 year old Siyanda Sibanda of Methodist High School in Makokoba recites a poem at the Joshua Mqabuko Museum in Matsheumhlophe suburb on Tuesday afternoon.

 

WATCH: Even on his death bed, Dr Nkomo preached unity: Daughter

EVEN on his death bed, the late Vice President Dr Joshua Nkomo preached the gospel of unity among Zimbabweans for the nation to prosper, said his eldest daughter Mrs Thandiwe Nkomo Ebrahim.

Dr Nkomo died on 1 July 1999.

Mrs Nkomo Ebrahim was speaking at the 26 anniversary of the passing away of the iconic struggle stalwart at the Joshua Nkomo Museum on Tuesday.

“He called mother on his death bed, held her hand and said ‘Mafunaya, make sure that the people of Zimbabwe stay united, for unity is the only thing that make Zimbabwe a prosperous nation,” she said.

Mrs Nkomo Ebrahim said her father’s journey to unite the country before embarking on a spirited fight against colonialism when he worked for the Rhodesian railways.

“He would move around the country while working for the Rhodesian Railways to preach for the gospel of unity because he understood that a fragmented nation would not win the struggle against white suppression,” she said.

“Today we see roads, a statue and an airport named after Dr Nkomo and that is a result of a lot of work that goes on behind the scenes between the Nkomo and government officials,”