Online Reporter
George Maponga-Masvingo Bureau
The swashbuckling maize crop that is at flowering stage and the verdant groundnuts underneath create a lush tapestry that catches the eye from a distance, leaving visitors to this tiny hamlet in Gutu’s Nyamandi communal lands in no doubt of an assured bumper harvest.
From the lush crop emerges Charles Mugwamba and his juvenile daughter, Malia, and it’s apparent father and daughter have been admiring their promising crop in Mushayi Village after good rains revived hopes of a good harvest in the entire Gutu District like most parts of the country.
What is however, striking is that while Malia is walking on her two legs, her father is evidently “walking” using both his hands and feet. Mugwamba was born with a disability and either uses both hands and feet to move or a wheelchair.
This time he is “walking” on fours because he is inside his teeming field busy admiring his crops that include maize, groundnuts and watermelons.
Born on March 6, 31 years ago, Mugwamba credits his father for inculcating in him the virtues of high work ethic from a tender age. It’s a trait that he never took for granted and he honed it to make him one of the most successful farmers in Mushayi Village today. Mugwamba says, just as he was very bright at school where he went using a wheelbarrow at Masunda Primary School in the area for his Grade 1 to Grade 7, he believes in the power of hard work using his own energy.
The father of one says he expects a harvest of more than four tonnes of maize, one tonne of groundnuts and a bumper watermelon yield from his modest plot in the Nyamandi rural heartland. He says for him a disability has never been a sign of inability and this has always inspired him to use his energy to look after himself and his family.
“I was born with a disability and I am the second child in a family of three. I attended Masunda Primary School here in Gutu and I was pushed in a wheelbarrow to go to school at the insistence of my maternal grandmother Mbuya Machipisa who noticed that I was very intelligent,” says Mugwamba.
“I also did my Form 1 to 6 at Nyamandi High School and at Ordinary Level I managed five passes including Maths, English and Science though I did not do well at Advanced Level.’’
Mugwamba says after finishing school he started using his own hands to work for himself and realised that he could make the most out of his strong passion for farming.
“I realised that the only way out for me was to embark on farming since my physical condition limited my ability to do other things to look after myself. My breakthrough came when I got married in 2022 because at least I had someone capable of assisting me in my farming activities,” he says.
Mugwamba was also thrown a lifeline by President Mnangagwa who gifted him with a state of the art wheelchair resulting in him replacing the inconvenient crutches that he was using before the donation.
“The President noticed that I was using crutches to walk at the Disability Expo that was held in Gweru and gifted me with a brand new wheelchair which changed my life because now I can move far more easily and efficiently which also enables me to undertake my farming activities more comfortably than before.”
According to Mugwamba, he is so passionate about farming that he feels that his small plot at Mushayi Village is limiting him from attaining his full potential.
He feels that authorities should also prioritise many other people with disabilities in national empowerment projects. Mugwamba was in 2023 elected provincial chairperson for People with Disabilities for ED (PWDED).
“We totally subscribe to President Mnangagwa’s vision to make Zimbabwe an upper middle income society by 2030 and we strongly believe the target is achievable if we all put our shoulders on the wheel and as people with disabilities, we feel we should not be overlooked in national empowerment projects because we can also harness our God-given talents and skills to contribute to national economic development.’’
For Mugwamba, his dream remains to own his own fully mechanised farm that he hopes to use to fight against food insecurity and help Zimbabwe restore its yester-year breadbasket status.
Currently, he says he will continue to till the sandy soils in Mushayi Village trying to the best of his ability to produce enough for his immediate and extended families, taking pride in that he has not allowed his disability to inhibit him from pursuing self reliance.
