Chronicle Editor
Dr Mandla Nyathi
PROFESSOR Callistus Ndlovu who sadly passed away in South Africa on 13 February 2019 was a colossal figure in many ways. He was huge when standing upright and had an intimidating headmaster-like straight face, yet underneath lay an infectious sense of humour and a balanced smile, all rarely displayed.
Endowed with a big intellect, he was comfortable discussing any topic on the social sciences: philosophy, politics, anthropology, economics and the list goes on. Prof Ndlovu was never shy to share his thoughts.
His confidence shown in at times aggressive personal opinions betrayed the insightful reasoning he had, cutting across from historicity to contemporary discourses on social studies.
Many people will probably remember him for his political contribution in the history of Zimbabwe post-independence rather than his meticulous contributions to teaching, international diplomacy and business policy. His death and interment at the National Heroes Acre joins a list of a rare niche of nationalists that includes Jaison Ziyaphapha Moyo, George Silundika and Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo, whose political footprints in Zimbabwe in general, and Matabeleland in particular, will forever have an indelible mark in the annals of the history of this country.
If we measured national development success by the number of nationalists each province produced during the struggle, then Southwest of Zimbabwe districts, Bulilima, Mangwe where Prof Ndlovu came from and the nearby Kezi, where these late luminaries came from, would be among the top contenders.
Little economic development, today, makes it obvious to show of the birthplace of these political greats.
Born Callistus Dingiswayo Ndlovu, those close to him called him CD and those closest were at ease calling him Callistus, he has left a political void as big as the huge figure he was. Irrespective of whether the political void is because you loved his political thoughts or you loathed his ideals, he will forever remain a figure that could spark political controversy. His success, in many adventures he tried, dwarfed his humble beginnings in life.
He grew up herding cattle like any other boys of his generation. Those that knew him at that part of his development spoke highly of his quick fist when he had to defend himself against bullies in the dry mopane grazing lands. Throughout his life, he never forgot the usefulness of a clenched fist, particularly when crossed beyond reason on matters closest to his heart. In fact, a clenched fist was to become part of his political identity for a long time after he left PF-Zapu led by another political colossal, Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo, in 1984, to join Zanu-PF led by then Prime Minister Robert Gabriel Mugabe. Though Prof Ndlovu was a private person on personal issues, he was forever grateful of the sacrifices that his late mother made to his education. He had that rare attachment you read about in the books of Social Work.
He spoke openly and proudly about how money from imbrassia belina (amacimbi) had contributed to his early education. In his early school years, teachers quickly recognised his sharp mind and in most cases had no choice but to give him school work a grade or two above his peers. That experience was to define his later life experiences, as he became, to some, a man ahead of his time.
Following a successful lower and tertiary education, CD was to become an influential teacher and mentor. His love for polished English was evident in most discussions he had in his illustrious career in teaching, politics and management. He was fond of English mannerism, soft spoken and subtle in criticising those above his political weight, and yet he maintained that bullish American exactitude to facts and frank talking. He would not feel an iota of embarrassment when correcting fellow professionals of less perfection in the English language. He would do it the same way a ruthless head teacher would do to an incompetent teacher in a staffroom setting. His intellectual footprints are evident in his former students.
When once challenged about his intellectual output, he remarked, “If you read works by PT and listen to him make an argument . . . you will think of better questions than that.” PT Nyathi, former MDC top official is one of the students who CD taught, and despite passage of time he never forgot the experience he had teaching the Nyathi brothers, Paul and his older brother.
Embedded in CD Ndlovu’s DNA was political instinct. As he would later admit, some life-changing decisions he made were out of political instinct rather than application of well thought political principles learned at a university. A constant battle between his political instincts and political science reasoning, often supported by moral courts of public opinion, made Prof Ndlovu in some cases an unconventional political actor. One such case was in January 1979 when asked to write a commemorative article for the PF-Zapu News Bulletin on the life of the late PF-Zapu deputy leader, JZ Moyo, who the white minority forces of Rhodesia had assassinated two years earlier.
His opinion evidenced in that Volume 2 Number 1 was brutal and cut both bone and flesh. For the first time in the official PF-Zapu mouthpiece, the unwritten oath “thou shall not discuss tribalism” was broken. Critical of James Chikerema’s previous attempts to allegedly destroy PF-Zapu while praising the contributions of JZ, CD remarked, “The trouble is that very few people were capable of analysing his conflict with Zapu outside the framework of ethnicity (tribalism).”
His open critical view of Chikerema and his alleged tribal tactics did ruffle feathers within the top hierarchy of his party, PF-Zapu. Some members of the influential leadership executive began to make whispers about his rebellious views and sought ways to sanction him. Did that faze him? No, not at all, as more was to come. To his disappointment, though, people from his home province (Matabeleland South) felt more unease about raising issues of tribal ethnicity as a source of conflict among the nationalists at the time than did contemporaries from other provinces.
Immediately after independence, like most returnees at the time, Prof Ndlovu had his occupational footprints here and there. He, in his own words, felt privileged to have served both in the lower house (Parliament) and upper house (the Senate) between 1982 and 1990. When an opportunity to serve in Prime Minister Mugabe’s Government came, he grabbed it with both hands. He proved a competent minister in Public Construction Works, Mines and Industry and Commerce. Despite the qualification and competence, Prof Ndlovu was never to represent his constituency in either of the houses of Parliament after 1990.
Where other people saw misfortune, CD saw an opportunity. It proved so for him as failure to occupy public space did not deter him from venturing into private practice, where he also left some indelible intellectual contribution to the management practice. He was particularly fond of the philosophy of transformative leadership.
It was perhaps part of his political instinct that in 1984 he decided to part ways with PF-Zapu. That decision proved not so popular with his Matabeleland constituencies, including his birthplace of Bulilimangwe and it would lead to vilifications of all sorts. Such vitriolic attacks did not move CD and neither did they change what he believed to be right. His cardinal sin was, in the courts of public opinion and political morality, to oppose what JM Nkomo stood for at the time. His audacity to challenge Father Zimbabwe’s authority was unthinkable to many people from Matabeleland during that time.
When the Zanu-PF mandarins justified the low representation of people from Matabeleland in the Cabinet and other influential positions, CD’s name appeared among possible contenders qualified to add to the numbers in Cabinet. However, a condition that he should apologise first to the then Vice-President JM Nkomo, for ditching PF-Zapu in 1984, it appears, became a permanent obstacle to his return to the front benches of Zanu-PF politics.
When the late Nust Vice-Chancellor, Prof Phinias Makhurane, offered to mediate and apologise on his behalf, CD would not have it. He had taken a conscious decision and had reflected on that decision, and felt no regret in it. In his defence, on having left PF-Zapu, Prof Ndlovu said only history would tell whether he had made an error of judgement or not.
Asked what his contemporaries had said about him leaving PF-Zapu, Prof Ndlovu was frank, “. . . they all seemed to have a common prophesy that I had made a grave error of political judgment and jeopardised my political career to which I would never rise again.” Barely three years after leaving PF-Zapu his PF-Zapu contemporaries joined Zanu-PF en masse.
For many years, CD would argue with conviction that the issue of him joining Zanu-PF in 1984 and his contemporaries joining in 1987 were a mere distinction without a difference. In his death and burial, and possibly beyond, that distinction without a difference will forever continue as a dividing log in the public opinion mourning and celebrating the late Zanu-PF Provincial Chairman for Bulawayo.
With no immediate frontline space in which to lead in the reconfigured Zanu-PF, post 1987 Unity Accord between PF-Zapu and Zanu-PF, CD showed character as he waited patiently for the history to provide an opportunity. It seemed to go forever with some quick analysts beginning to believe that prophesy of jeopardised political career with no prospects of rising again had come to fruition. Almost resigned to fate that he would not return to frontline benches, Prof Ndlovu spent most of his valuable time farming and managing at Zipam for a good part of the post-90s period.
During the tenure of Prof Jonathan Moyo in the Ministry of Higher and Tertiary Education, Prof Ndlovu got an appointment to chair the Gwanda State University Steering Committee. It was during this time that he began to use, actively, his professorial honour. Events where he did not need his colossal figure or even his huge intellect popped up in the Zanu-PF playfield. Votes of no confidence on certain members of the Zanu-PF in Bulawayo created instability and in came an opportunity for Prof Ndlovu to come in as a stabiliser: first on an acting basis and later as a substantive provincial chairman, a position he held to his death.
Prof Ndlovu remained a true son of the soil of Kalanga heritage in Zimbabwe all his life. Unlike some pseudo academics who visit Western capitals for two-week courses, in some cases abridged learning programmes, and only to return to motherland with fake American English accents and values, CD proudly remained Kalanga despite years in the “heart of Western civilisation” world of politics, diplomacy and teaching.
His sense of humour was not always predictable. One time driving to his rural village of Sanzukwi in Mangwe, he came across a police roadblock just after Figtree. The junior officers asked for his driving licence to which he asked if they knew who he was. He told the officers that his name was Callistus Ndlovu. Professing ignorance, the officers insisted they could not locate who he was in their memories, and would not let him go. With a straight face towards the excitably officer he said, “. . . yah if you get home ask your mother who Callistus Ndlovu is.” He then drove off. That was the Professor’s other side.
Driving back to Bulawayo, on the same spot, the following day, a new team of police officers stopped him again. They asked for his driver’s licence. He explained that he had inadvertently left it at home. The officers asked him to leave behind something of value so he could come back to produce the licence.
Shocked by the demand of the junior officer, he asked for the intervention of a senior officer on site. The senior officer confirmed the practice to which Prof Ndlovu calmly responded, “. . . I don’t do puna ndikubudze.” That was the man Prof Ndlovu, comfortable in English as he was in his Kalanga language.
He drove off leaving the officers with wide-open mouths.
As people mourn and celebrate the life of Callistus Dingiswayo Ndlovu today, few will remember all his many hats, strong political beliefs and ethos of good educational frameworks in advancing knowledge and understanding of society. Unlike some people survived by close relatives only, the entire political fraternity of Zimbabwe survives CD, in addition to his wife and family. The road to Plumtree will never be the same again.
– Dr Nyathi is a Zimbabwean academic based in the United Kingdom.
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