Editorial Comment: Stage set for historic Unity Day festivities

BULAWAYO will this weekend witness a defining moment in the history of Zimbabwe when the late Vice President and veteran nationalist Dr Joshua Nkomo is posthumously honoured with the commissioning of three projects as part of this year’s Unity Day celebrations. His statue has been mounted at the intersection of Main Street and 8th Avenue and will be unveiled by President Mugabe on Sunday while Main Street will be renamed Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo Street in his honour.

The President will also officially open the Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo International Airport capping a momentous day to celebrate the life of an illustrious son of Zimbabwe and giant of the liberation of this country.

It has been a long and arduous journey peppered with false starts, delays and funding constraints but events on Sunday will erase all that as Zimbabweans finally honour Father Zimbabwe in a befitting manner. We tip our hats to all that have been involved in the planning of this event and call on people to turn up in their numbers to witness this grand occasion.

Already, the family of the iconic hero of this country on Monday conducted cultural rituals at VP Nkomo’s grave at the National Heroes Acre in Harare to inform ancestors about the work being done to honour their son. On Saturday, the family did a similar ritual at VP Nkomo’s rural home at St Joseph in Nkezi.

All is therefore set for the big day which will not only ensure that the legacy of the late VP is cherished forever but cement the unity that he bequeathed to this nation.

The occasion also comes five months after his party Zanu-PF was given a resounding fresh mandate by the people of Zimbabwe to govern and this will surely cap a fine year for the revolutionary party which has just successfully held its 14th Annual National People’s Conference.

It has not been an easy road for the planners of this event with Dr Nkomo’s statue being first erected in 2010 before being pulled down after Bulawayo residents and the Nkomo family complained that the dimensions of the initial pedestal did not capture the attributes of the late Father Zimbabwe in full.

We commend Government for heeding the concerns of the family and generality of the people of Bulawayo because it is important that all stakeholders are happy with the final product. In the same vein, the three-year delay could have been a blessing in disguise as it allowed for the completion of the JMN International Airport whose construction has been hamstrung by funding constraints.

Now that the projects have been completed simultaneously, Zimbabweans can properly honour one of their founding fathers. So the stage is set for one of the biggest Unity Day celebrations the country has ever seen and we are sure nothing will derail them.

We are however, concerned that while the whole of Zimbabwe is focused on honouring one of its illustrious sons, the opposition MDC-T — which superintends over the affairs of the city of Bulawayo — is mulling renaming Barbourfields Stadium after the late South African President Nelson Mandela as if to undermine the grand occasion to honour our late VP.

MDC-T provincial chairman Gorden Moyo was at the weekend quoted in sections of the private media saying his party had asked Bulawayo City Council to consider renaming Barbourfields Stadium after Cde Mandela who died on December 5 and was buried at his ancestral home in Qunu on Sunday.

Moyo said naming Barbourfields after Cde Mandela could make a lot of sense as it was an important landmark in the city. “We have asked our councillors to sit down and consider renaming Barbourfields Stadium the Nelson Mandela Stadium following the proper channels,” the former State Enterprises minister said.

“He was also awarded the Freedom of the City by the Bulawayo City Council in 1994, but never got to be honoured. The choice of Barbourfields Stadium was informed by the fact that it is at the heart of the city and is patronised by many people in Bulawayo.”

Moyo’s statement immediately drew a backlash from people on social networks who questioned the rationale behind the move. United Kingdom-based Academic Dr Brilliant Mhlanga wrote: “Someone should tell Gorden Moyo that if he wishes to name any other place in Bulawayo, in particular, BF Stadium after Nelson Madiba, he is free to re-name his wife, children and even his bedroom after Mandela.

Otherwise, it is insulting, and certainly stupid for people to wake up with their wild dreams suggesting that Bulawayo should re-name BF Stadium after Mandela when there are so many of our heroes and heroines, true sons and daughters of Matabeleland who have not yet even been accorded that status and respect in Zimbabwe”.

We couldn’t have put it better. Be that as it may, it is important to state that we have nothing but the utmost respect for the late Cde Mandela and feel he is a giant of the African continent. He deserves all the respect that he got. However, Zimbabwe has enough heroes of its own like Dr Nkomo who deserve to have important monuments and landmarks named after them.