admin“HIS life bore the scars of the trauma of that struggle, indeed carried torture marks inflicted from the countless arrests, detentions, restrictions and imprisonment that took him practically to all centres of racist incarceration and which lasted until only a few months before our Independence,” Cde Robert Mugabe said at the burial of veteran nationalist Cde Robert Mubaiwa Marere.
Post Correspondent
A revolutionary cadre and former Deputy Minister of Public Construction and National Housing, Cde Marere passed away on September 7, 2003.
He was aged 84.
He was born on 18 October 1919 in Buhera. Cde Marere attended Madende, Gwebu and Makumbe mission schools for his primary education.
After completing Standard One he was enrolled at Domboshawa Training School where he successfully completed Standard Six, a highly significant level of education that time.
Cde Marere then took up a two-year industrial course in building and carpentry leading to his qualification as an artisan.
As a professional artisan, he joined the African Artisan Association in 1953. AAA was a trade union body that agitated for the rights of African artisans and journeyman and this propelled Cde Marere into politics.
Not long afterwards in 1957 he joined the Youth League – that harbinger of Zimbabwe’s political movements that vehemently opposed racist subjugation in all spheres of life. The Youth League sharpened Cde Marere into a formidable and revolutionary cadre and he was a ready member of the Southern Rhodesian African National Congress on its formation on September 12, 1957.
Political activism in white-ruled Rhodesia inescapably entailed incarceration and Cde Marere was arrested, leading to his detention in a series of prisons starting with Khami Prison in 1959 following the banning of SRANC and other congresses in the Federation, and then at Selukwe and Marandellas. Notwithstanding the inhibiting environment of the prison cells, Cde Marere successfully undertook studies in bookkeeping.
Upon his release from detention in 1960, Cde Marere was elected chairman of the Highfield branch of the newly formed National Democratic Party which was successor to the prescribed SRANC. NDP suffered the same fate of its predecessor and was banned in 1961.
Cde Marere was to endure further arrests and detentions as the successive racist regimes sought to quench the revolutionary fire that was blazing across the country. With the banning of ZANU in 1964, Cde Marere was detained at Wha Wha Prison to be released briefly in 1965 only to be locked up again at Salisbury Prison the same year.
He was part of the delegation led by Cde Robert Mugabe that was involved in settlement talks with the British and Rhodesian governments in Geneva, 1976. After the collapse of the talks, Cde Marere was tasked with the responsibility of mobilising and organising the people of Zimbabwe around a pro-Patriotic Front grouping called the People’s Movement that was launched in 1977.
Among other things, he was involved in recruiting young Zimbabweans for the struggle.
Often, he had to use his own vehicle and resources to fulfil this important mandate.
At independence in 1980, Cde Marere became a legislator for the ruling party in Mashonaland East province. In 1982, he was appointed Deputy Minister of Housing responsible for rural housing. Two years later in 1984 he became Deputy Minister of Public Construction and National Housing.
Cde Marere believed in decent accommodation for all and importantly in comfortable shelter for children and farm workers.
His familiarisation visit to Cuba inspired him to produce building brigades as a strategy of speeding up housing for all while creating jobs for the unemployed.
Cde Marere was a consistent revolutionary who worked with great commitment and selflessness. In his book, With the People, the late Cde Nyagumbo records how Cde Marere used to come to the aid of the party.
“Mr Marere and his grocery shop played an important part in our survival.
“He used to supply us with mealie-meal and kippers for supper and breakfast and this supply covered all party officials, the youths and supporters,” recounted Cde Nyagumbo.
Expressing his condolence to the Marere family, Cde Mugabe described him as a man whose experience derived from deep involvement, consistent national activism right from the formative years of the nationalist movement.
He added that his life bore the scars of the trauma of that struggle.
Online Reporter