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Herald Reporter
War veteran and former diplomat to the United Nations Mr Elisha Magosha was buried yesterday.
He was 59.
Mr Magosha, who was with the country’s mission to New York from 1994 to 2004, died in New York on April 15 due to respiratory distress.
He was involved in a serious road accident in January this year in which he sustained internal injuries.
He was buried at his rural home in Rukweza, Nyazura after it took six weeks to repatriate his body due to challenges posed by the Covid-19 pandemic.
Mrs Magosha, who could not accompany her husband’s body due to travel restrictions, yesterday expressed gratitude to First Lady Auxillia Mnangagwa, who facilitated the repatriation.
“It was really difficult to bring the body to Zimbabwe. Initially we failed to find a parlour that handles international repatriation of bodies and when we found one we could not find flights back home and we had to take a two-hour drive from New York to Milwaukee, New Jersey to get a flight,” she said.
“We got assistance from our Senator here and back home we were having difficulties getting permission to repatriate my husband’s body until a friend helped me to get in touch with the First Lady Amai Mnangagwa, who showed us unconditional love.
“I do not know how to describe what she has done for us. She was exceptional. She is the best.”
Mr Magosha was born in Nyazura on September 30, 1960 and attended Nyazura Mission before he left the country to join the liberation struggle in 1975.
He was trained in Chimoio and operated in Manicaland Province.
He was part of a group that destroyed broadcasting infrastructure in Mutare, but was shot in the leg after one of his sister’s children identified him, and an informer who heard the child as she was reporting the issue to her parents, sold him out to the Rhodesian forces.
He was carried back to Mozambique by his comrades and received minor treatment due to limited health expertise.
After independence, he came back to Zimbabwe and worked as a finance officer at the then Zanu PF headquarters at 88 Manica Road where he met and married his wife Esther, who was then working as the late First Lady Sally Mugabe’s personal assistant.
After the death of the then First Lady they were both posted to the UN during which Mr Magosha studied for a bachelor and Master’s degrees in financial accounting and had his leg successfully operated on.
They were recalled in 2006, but later returned to New York since Mr Magosha still required medical attention.
Mr Magosha was employed as an executive accountant on Wall Street while his wife took a teaching job.
He is survived by his wife and three children Raymond, Sharon, Chantelle.
Peter Tanyanyiwa
Online Reporter