Tribute to twin burial of national heroines

Donald Kamba Makoni Correspondent

The nation is being challenged to treat the lives of the two heroines as ample opportunity to refocus, and to reinvest in ideals of civility, industriousness, hospitality, and passion for the motherland.

Herbert Wiltshire Hamandishe Chitepo, a towering figure of the Second Chimurenga, popularly known as the Chairman of Dare reChimurenga, departed on March 18, 1975 in tragic circumstances, at 52, and in his prime.

After independence, Chitepo’s remains were exhumed, flown from Lusaka, Zambia, and reburied at the National Heroes Acre, Harare, Zimbabwe.

Least confessed is the fact that Chitepo was the most feared man by the colonial regime of Ian Smith, and seemingly contrasting versions of his death merely point to a character who lived and survived complexities that finally extinguished a flame that was stubbornly, and, scary bright.

While history will credit him with setting the tempo for the war that birthed Zimbabwe in 1980, he also immortalised the role of ideology, thus claiming the nerve centre or collective brain that present Zimbabwe still has to appreciate in full, hence the Chitepo School of Ideology.

Chitepo’s wife, Victoria Fikile Chitepo, died on April 8, 2016 at the ripe age of 89, and was buried on April 13, 2016.

Born Fikile Mahamba-Sithole, on March 18, 1927 to Alice and Enock Mshamba-Sithole, in Dundee, KwaZulu Natal, South Africa, she was favoured with parents that were well educated and politically conscious.

It takes two to agree, but it takes two souls to marry and agree to swim against a current infested with intrigues, feuds, and blood-letting.

Herbert, outstanding and first black lawyer in Zimbabwe, found perfect partner in Victoria, who being a teacher and geared for greater exploits, had the aptitude to satisfy complementary roles that indeed strengthened the two, and, solidified the struggle against the avarice upon which white brutality was mounted against indigenous black Zimbabweans.

Victoria’s sudden, and, unanticipated death in the midst of recent conflicting narratives that devoured her husband, could have destabilised a life well lived, especially in the absence of a report pointing to ill-health.

Vivian Mwashita entered the struggle at the vulnerable age of 17, died early at 58 due to afflictions imposed by hypertension and diabetes.

Born Vivian Mwashita at Rusape Hospital to Alban and Winnie Mwashita on September 26, 1958, she hailed from Zongoro in Chief Mutasa area, and did her secondary education in Harare.

Mwashita went through the rigours associated with the vulgarities of an unplanned but necessary war, with her training ending with instructing others, punctuated with a life she continued to claim in circumstances where some of her colleagues had been consumed by the enemy bombs in Mozambique.

That the two heroines died on the same day and were buried on the same day at the National Heroes Acre, serves to remind Zimbabweans that just as the bullet does not distinguish between parents and children, the war was fought by both parents and children who identified their enemy as callous, deadly, and racist.

Regard being given to Manicaland Province, as not only central, but also a corridor in the waging of the struggle for freedom, it is not out of place that history is merely writing its own story as faithfully as it knows best.

While coincidences exist, the part played by the two heroines who remained true to the ideals of the struggle to the end cannot be coincidental.

Manicaland Province did not do their part in liberating Zimbabwe as a matter of coincidence but out of the determination to go down fighting for independence.

People should, however, not read too much into burying two heroines from the same province who died on the same day and were buried on the same day at the same place.

Suffice to say that it is significant that the nation had to wait for 36 years to witness what appears to be stranger than fiction.

The above notwithstanding, Zimbabwe is credited with fighting the bitterest and most protracted war in Southern Africa.

Every portion of the land in Zimbabwe had its own heroic experiences involving youths and adults, across gender, battling it out to achieve independence.

The war effort was truly national, with people from every corner of Zimbabwe operating as one family that must defend its name, reputation, and heritage from exploitation, and plunder by white capital, in human and material terms.

It is hoped that Zimbabweans will reflect on this peculiar occurrence as a strong message that says the struggle for political independence must be supported with equal zeal that yields economic independence on the basis of unadulterated unity.

Little celebrated is the central role of totems in the making of the human family in African tradition.

Intermarriages bring two families together, in the process inculcating a sense of oneness.

The liberation war saw different totems battling the enemy, just as husband and wife stand united in raising a family.

While Chitepo the man was muera Soko by totem, the woman was Sithole, and yet both attained hero status of the highest order, together with Mwashita of the Humba brand.

If everybody at Heroes Acre were to be identified by totem, the peoples of Zimbabwe would realise, with absolute astonishment, that ethnicity, tribes, regions, religions are subservient to the higher order of inclusiveness upon which nationhood becomes recognisable as a function of unity.

Heroes and heroines are made out of different crucibles, noting that Mai Chitepo, who hailed from the elites and intellectuals was at par in matters of influence and effect with Mai Mwashita Muchicho of humble background but oriented in practical matters that touched people’s lives directly.

The complementarity of politics that informed the gun, as represented by the Chitepos, found favour in the execution of the war on the ground, as represented by Mai Mwashita Muchicho, and, significant others.

This trend continued after independence.

The nation is being challenged to treat the lives of the two heroines as ample opportunity to refocus, and to reinvest in ideals of civility, industriousness, hospitality, and passion for the motherland.

Indeed, subscription to beliefs, policies, practices and principles steeped in revered traditions, offers that rare window that allows for the growth and development of the nation in spiritual, cultural, socio-economic, political, technical, and legal terms.

Both comrades worked hard for the good of the nation, and deserved the highest honour.

Rest in peace dear comrades.