Chronicle Editor
Freedom Mupanedemo/ Patrick Chitumba, Midlands Bureau
WHAT started as an impromptu tour of Gweru by President Mnangagwa yesterday to assess residents’ compliance with the 21-day lockdown turned into a nostalgic journey for him as he reminisced on the days of the liberation struggle.
The feeling of liberation war nostalgia was sparked as President Mnangagwa passed through iconic institutions like Monomotapa Hall, in Mutapa suburb where Zanu held its first congress in 1964.
On a personal level, it is after that congress that President Mnangagwa and his colleagues popularly known as the Crocodile Gang embarked on number of sabotage missions including the bombing of a goods train in Masvingo in a bold act of defiance against the oppressive Rhodesian regime.
The armed struggle waged against the colonial masters resulted in Zimbabwe’s Independence on April 18, 1980 whose 40th anniversary would be commemorated on Saturday.
In an interview after the Gweru tour, President Mnangagwa said he had a soft spot for the city and what it stands for before and after the liberation struggle revealing that while it is 56 years after the congress was held, he still remembers the events of the first Zanu Congress like it was just yesterday.
The congress was held at Gwelo, later renamed Gweru, from May 21 to 24, 1964, and by then the party was becoming a visible political entity. That is when the late Cde Ndabaningi Sithole was elected president and former President, the late Cde Robert Mugabe appointed to be secretary general. Zanu was banned later that year by Ian Smith’s government.
“The thought of the events which transpired on May 24, 1964 feels like it’s just yesterday but it has been many years, it has been over 50years.
“We first went to Mambo, and we passed through Mtapa Hall in Mutapa and we saw the Monomotapa Halls (popularly known as Mtapa hall). On 24 May 1964, we had just arrived from China from training and we were able to be slipped in to attend the first congress of Zanu at that hall,” recalled President Mnangagwa.
“I remember that this is where Ndabaningi Sithole was elected president, Leopold Takawira vice president, Hebert Chitepo national chairperson, Mugabe secretary general and Maurice Nyagumbo national organising secretary, deputised by (the late Vice President Simon) Muzenda. Enos Nkala was elected treasurer, Simpson Mtambanengwe secretary for international relations, I think deputised by Trynos Makombe and so on and so on.”
The President said they also passed through Mambo Secondary School where Cde Mugabe taught in 1954.
“There is a lot of history associated with Gweru. Mugabe also taught at Mambo Secondary school and we passed by the school. There is also the first black mayor of Gweru Patrick Kombayi in this city. So, it has a lot of memories,” said President Mnangagwa.
With the country celebrating 40 years of independence on Saturday, President Mnangagwa said the tour of Gweru had brought him a lot of memories.
“Yes, I am feeling a lot of nostalgia, but now it’s history that I have to go back to again. It’s a lot of years, over 50 years we were here in Gweru and I can still remember events as they unfolded. Today we are an independent country. At that time, it was Rhodesia and we were busy planning how to remove Ian Smith’s government and those were the initial stages of our armed struggle when we were recruiting young people for military training,” he said.
Mutapa Hall virtually looks the same as it did way back in 1964 just a rectangular building which African residents of the township of the same name used as a venue to watch bioscopes at weekends.
Since the facility is where Zanu was founded back then, is where monumental decisions that shaped Zimbabwe’s history were made, it could be essential that it be made a national monument.
The humble Mutapa Hall symbolised not only all that was wrong with the colonial set up, but also the fighting spirit that was to shape the liberation war.
Meanwhile, President Mnangagwa reiterated that empty streets that greeted him when he toured Mkoba, Senga, Mambo and Ascot suburbs in Gweru yesterday demonstrated high compliance by citizens with Government’s directive for them to stay home and prevent the spread of coronavirus.
He said even his Government ministers who are in the no-essential group were observing the lockdown days.
The President added that he will make unannounced visits across the country during the lockdown days.
“I’m not announcing my visits like I do during the national clean-up days which are a public knowledge. Even my Ministers are also complying with the directive to stay home. They are not with me or following me. I just wake up and decide where to go and only a few people will know about my visits,” he said.
Online Reporter