The Sunday Mail
BEFORE the end of 1961, the Southern Rhodesia government had enough of the National Democratic Party (NDP) and decided to outlaw it the same way it banned the Southern Rhodesia African National Congress (SRANC).
That such a harsh measure would be taken against the NDP was clear on three occasions; the first of which was when a massive demonstration was organised in Salisbury for NDP members to march to the official residence of the Prime Minister to present him with a demand for the release of Chikerema, Nyandoro and the others held in the Mafungabusi area of Gokwe.
A large number of black people turned up for the demonstration to the extent that one would have thought every black person around the country had joined the event. When the massive group got to the Magaba part of what was then called Harare location, it encountered an armed contingent of the British South Africa Police (BSAP), armed to the teeth, and in a convoy of armoured vehicles full of growling Alsatian dogs.
The demonstrators were told they could not go beyond Magaba – Methodist church.
Had George Silundika not courageously persuaded the huge crowd to turn back and go to Highfield, one shudders to imagine what could have happened; a bloody massacre could have possibly certainly occurred.
The second incident was the rejection of the Southern Rhodesian 1961 Constitution by the NDP, a decision that was utterly unacceptable to the Southern Rhodesia administration.
How could Joshua Nkomo and his horde of uneducated black people demand to take over the Government of Southern Rhodesia overnight, and change the country’s name to Zimbabwe?
The white settlers wondered and could not believe what was happening before their very eyes.
Talking about uneducated black people reminds us about the historic occasion when Robert Mugabe was first publicly introduced to the people of Zimbabwe on the day of the massive demonstrations, but after the people had turned back to Magaba and gathered at Gwanzura Stadium in Highfield.
Mark Nziramasanga, a patriot from Zvimba communal lands, Mugabe’s home area, presented Mugabe to the people. Nziramasanga said that Mugabe was unique in that he had two university degrees as opposed to one degree (a Bachelor of Economics degree) held by then Southern Rhodesia Prime Minister Sir Edgar Whitehead.
That alone erased the claims that the oppressed masses were not educated enough to rule themselves. Meanwhile, Joshua Nkomo had taken the Southern Rhodesia issue to the United Nations, in a move that virtually put the British government on trial before the world’s highest public forum. The third accusation against the NDP was its “Zhi” riots which caused the destruction of property and loss of human life, in addition to insecurity in the country’s urban centres.
The proscription of the NDP was followed by the formation of the Zimbabwe African People’s Union (Zapu) on December 17, 1961. By that time it was clear that the Federation would be dissolved sooner than later and that Northern Rhodesia and Nyasaland would become independent states.
A rather unexpected development had occurred in the British Commonwealth; South Africa had in 1961 pulled out of the club of former British colonies because it’s unacceptable racially discriminatory policies, practices and laws were a violation of the Commonwealth’s non-racial, socio-cultural values. South Africa’s decision to pull out of the Commonwealth was to put the Southern Rhodesia regime of Ian Smith in very good stead in 1965 when it made a unilateral declaration of independence (UDI). The South African government supported Smith’s UDI militarily and economically. In fact had it been for South Africa’s encouragement, Smith could not have declared independence unilaterally.
When Zapu was formed, a resolution was made that if the party was outlawed; it would defy the ban and operate underground. Zapu intensified sabotage activities especially in the commercial farming areas where large tracts of land went up in smoke. So serious was the situation that in the middle of 1962, the Southern Rhodesia Ministry of Information organised an aerial tour of the country to show journalists and chiefs the massive damage done to the farms, all white-owned.
The author of this narration represented African Newspapers, publishers at that time of the Central African Daily News, on that tour.
While sabotage escalated within the country, Joshua Nkomo piled diplomatic pressure abroad, particularly at the United Nations where the British government maintained that it could not intervene in what it termed Southern Rhodesia’s internal affairs because that country was self-governing.
That was false as it was to be proved by a UN Committee on Colonialism that went to London following a proposal made by Guinea, Indonesia, Iraq, Mali, Morocco, the Philippines, Yugoslavia and the United Arab Republic (Egypt).
The UN committee went to London at the end of March 1962 to investigate whether or not Southern Rhodesia had attained a full measure of self-government to justify Britain’s stance.
The Commonwealth relations secretary was R.A Butler who had taken over from Duncan Sandys on March 19, 1962.
The Colonialism Committee concluded that Southern Rhodesia was, in fact, a British colony whose constitution and foreign relations were London’s responsibilities. That conclusion was received with much acclamation and joy throughout the country and was described by the Zapu vice president, Dr Parirenyatwa, as a very important moral victory for the black people of Zimbabwe.
Zimbabwe is a name given to the country during the NDP days. It is a corruption of Dzimba dzemabgwe, houses of stones.
The decision was a major success for Joshua Nkomo in that when he presented the Southern Rhodesia issue to the UN for the first time in 1960, his opponents at home and abroad said he was whistling against a storm.
In fact, so important was that UN Colonialism Committee’s decision on the Southern Rhodesia status vis-a-vis Britain that the then United Kingdom’s UN chief representative decided to resign from his highly esteemed post.
He did so in protest against his government’s policy on Southern Rhodesia which was based on sheer deceit rather than on defensible legality.
The UK representative at the UN could not defend his country at the UN with honour. Back home, it had become quite clear to the top Zapu leadership that the Federation was headed for the rocks and that the Southern Rhodesian regime would also demand independence under a white minority settler regime.
To get black majority rule would require a concerted revolutionary armed struggle. Nkomo had recognised this fact as early as 1959 and had asked the Ghanaian government to give the SRANC military training facilities.
Ghana had agreed and the SRANC sent six people to train in that country. The six were Mark Nziramasanga, Sikhwili Kohli Moyo, Edward Mzwayi Bhebhe, a Mudavanhu, and two other comrades.
It was for their official pass-out that Jason Ziyapapa Moyo went to Ghana towards the end of 1959 and he first heard about Robert Mugabe who was a lecturer at Ghana’s Tokaradi Teachers College.
He went to talk to him about joining the revolutionary nationalist organisation back home. Cde Mugabe wanted an assurance that those in leadership were really serious about liberating the country as he did not want to join an organisation that would fizzle out sooner or later or one that would settle for half-measurers rather than for the country’s complete independence.
Cde Jason Ziyapapa Moyo assured him and Cde Mugabe decided to return home and be part of the national leadership.
Necessary steps were thereafter put in motion after Cde Moyo’s return home and Zimbabwe’s man of destiny came back to become part of the country’s revolutionary struggle.
He became literally Joshua Nkomo’s right hand man until 1963 when he irrevocably aligned himself with those who formed the Zimbabwe African National Union (Zanu) on August 8, 1963.
We have gone a year ahead of where we should be in this narration that is August 1962 when Zapu actively sabotaging white owned commercial farms, government-owned infrastructure and municipal properties.
Zapu was also engaged in military recruitment with a view to launching a guerilla warfare at an appropriate time.
Among those who were training abroad were David Mpongo, Philemon Makonese, Charles Chikerema and a couple of others who had been sent to China for that purpose. Zapu vice president Dr Parirenyatwa was on such a recruitment mission when he was assassinated by the Southern Rhodesian regime’s Special Branch. He had left Salisbury for Nkayi via Bulawayo in the morning in August 1962 and was driven by a Zapu cadre, Danger Ngozi Zengeni Sibanda.
They were followed by a Special Branch vehicle all the way up to Gwelo (Gweru), having stopped at Gatooma (Kadoma), QueQue (Kwekwe) and in Gwelo.
The radiator of their car had developed a leak, so they had to refill the radiator after every little while.
They stopped briefly in Gwelo and consulted a Zapu Midlands official, William Takavarasha on some party issues.
They left Gwelo late afternoon and noticed that the special Branch vehicle was no longer trailing them. They stopped at Shangani to refill the radiator. By then, it was early evening.
After leaving Shangani and travelling for about eight kilometres or so, a massive explosion occurred on the left-hand side of the road and, Sibanda would narrate to the author of this article later that he lost consciousness. He came too much later and heard somebody say: “This one is alive but the doctor is dead”.
Sibanda opened his eyes and realised he was on a bed at Mpilo Hospital and was surrounded by nurses and doctors, dressed in white, with his head bandaged and placed in a side ward.
The following afternoon he was visited by a policeman whom he had never met before. Later that evening, Cde J.Z Moyo ordered him to be discharged immediately. He was placed under tight Zapu security for a day or two before Cde J.Z Moyo and one or two Zapu youths took him by train to Salisbury where he later narrated this story to the this writer in the presence of the then Zapu publicity and information secretary, Cde Mugabe, at Vanguard House, Railway Avenue.
The official police statement on the tragedy was that Dr Parirenyatwa and his driver were involved in an accident with a goods train at what was by then a railway-road level crossing some kilometres west of the Shangani Shopping Centre.
However, what was most likely to have happened was that the Rhodesian Special Branch assassins used a type of acoustic mine or other massive explosive device which was triggered off either by remote control or by the sound of Dr Parirenyatwa’s car.
After the explosion, the assassins then either towed or drove the vehicle with Dr Parirenyatwa and Sibanda inside and left it on the railway-road level crossing where it was later hit and pushed by a goods train for about a hundred or so metres.
Dr Parirenyatwa’s death was a shattering blow to Zapu. However, it showed that the Southern Rhodesian regime would fight tooth and nail to remain in power and that for the African majority to regain their country; they had to go the whole hog.
◆ Saul Gwakuba Ndlovu is a retired Bulawayo-based journalist. He can be contacted on cell 0734 328 136 or through email. [email protected]
n To be continued
