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Midlands Bureau Chief
PRESIDENT Mnangagwa has sent a condolence message to the Maketo family following the death of Air Commodore Pio Pasipamire Maketo who died in a road accident on Saturday last week
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In a statement, President Mnangagwa said the country has been robbed of an exceptional trainer and dedicated cadre of the Zimbabwe Defence Force following the death of Air Commodore Maketo.
The decorated AFZ general air officer and pilot, Air Commodore Maketo (55) was yesterday laid to rest at the Gweru Provincial Heroes Acre.President Mnangagwa who is Zanu PF First Secretary, confirmed Air Commodore Maketo as a Liberation War Hero.
Air Commodore Maketo who was Jason Ziyaphapha Moyo Base Commander, died in a road accident along the Harare-Bulawayo highway, 10km from Chegutu town.
President Mnangagwa said Air Commodore Maketo was an exceptional trainer and dedicated cadre of the Zimbabwe Defence Forces.
“The demise in a fatal traffic accident last Saturday of Air Commodore Pio Pasipamire Maketo has robbed our Air force of Zimbabwe of an exceptional trainer and dedicated cadre of our Zimbabwe Defence Forces,” he said.
Cut at the prime of his career, President Mnangagwa said, Air Commodore Maketo leaves behind a meritorious career which include several peace-making missions in the region and countless airmen and women he trained after qualifying as a flying instructor in the late 1980s.
“Amidst countless challenges placed in the way to frustrate our bid to Africanise the nascent Air Force of Zimbabwe soon after Independence, and the subsequent integration of hitherto warring armies into a new National Army, cadres like late Air Commodore Maketo had to be redeployed from the Zimbabwe National Army (ZNA), to the Air Force of Zimbabwe in order to transform that key arm of our Zimbabwe Defence Forces so it reflected the new, multiracial post- independence ethos of a free Zimbabwe,” he said.
President Mnangagwa said alongside his peers, Air Commodore Maketo hastened the realisation of this key cog in the broader vision of our ZDF.
He said before long, the late Air Commodore would be involved in the Mozambican Campaign meant to secure the country’s routes to the sea, and to support Mozambique, then under attack from apartheid-sponsored bandits.
Online Reporter