Garikai Mazara
For any parent, it was nightmarish to have a child abandoning school and leaving home to join the liberation struggle in the 1970s.

It was not only the thought of the possibility of the child not coming back home, but finding convincing answers to the former Rhodesian security force — police, army and auxiliaries — known for a ruthless stance against  families that failed to account for their sons and daughters.
If Rhodesian forces visited any black family, it was not to act as couriers of incense, gold and anointing oil, but to subject victims to beatings and gunshots.

So it must have been with a lot of trepidation that Rameck Hwingwiri and Monica Tavashure waved goodbye to, not only one son, but four boys who had decided to take up the gun to fight the Rhodesian forces.
Listening to the brothers narrate their story, a story that would make any movie maker drool endlessly, one cannot help but admire the sense of patriotism that ran through the Mabhodho household, as one brother after the other took turns to leave behind their parents to take up the fight to liberate the country.

The Sunday Mail In-Depth managed to track down the four brothers in Mashonaland Central Province, talked to two — Simon and Timothy — as the other two — Cephas and Berrison — had travelled for business at Negomo and Chihwe respectively
In Hollywood, the story of the Niland brothers inspired the film Saving Private Ryan, directed by Steven Spielberg and featuring Tom Hanks and Matt Damon, in which a commando is dispatched into Normandy, France, as the Second World War reached its climax, to save the last-surviving of four brothers.

The film gained critical acclaim for its brutal look at war.
Though there was no such mission to save any of the four, speaking to each of the Mabhodho brothers one gets a sense of déjà vu, like watching a war movie.
Their tales are full of drama and comedy, but unlike most war dramas, theirs has a bitter-sweet ending, as they all have lived another day to tell their stories.

And today, they are all successful farmers, thanks again to yet another war they waged, the war to reform the racially skewed land ownership pattern.
So when Cephas left the family homestead in 1975 to cross the border into Mozambique, little did he know that his move was to trigger a trek of half the family, to the north, to free Zimbabwe.

“Those were difficult times,” narrated Simon last week at his A1 farm in Guruve.
“There was little or no choice but join my brother Cephas in Mozambique. The Rhodesian forces would visit each day to harass the whole family because my brother had left.
“Staying would have meant everyday harassment. But it was not only the harassment that I was running away from, because those days, there was a fever running across the country,

“There was also that feeling of wanting to be part of the struggle, to liberate the country. You didn’t need any encouragement because the oppression was everywhere and for everyone to feel it.”
For Timothy, the youngest of the brothers to leave the country, at 14 in 1978, it was because the war had taken its toll on the whole system, and education had collapsed.

“By 1978 there was virtually no school opened in Rushinga and because of the constant harassment that we got from the Rhodesian army, we spent most of our time with the comrades. I was of big build and would help out with some work for the comrades, especially if a battle situation arose.

“As the contacts became more often, it was decided that those who were helping the comrades at the front and had not received proper military training should do so, so that the struggle could gain more ground. So we were dispatched to Tembwe, Mozambique, for training.”

As for Cephas, his joining the liberation war was because of an encounter he had with the comrades, who instantly impressed upon the 19-year-old about the virtues of fighting for the country.

As Simon narrated, the days in Mozambique were no picnic: “It was no easy ride going and being in the struggle. We walked for several days to reach Tete, then Tembwe, where we were given orientation.

“Because of the massive recruitment exercise that was ongoing back home, you find some of the camps had many challenges, like disease and food shortages, so recruits were sent to training camps as quickly as possible.

“I remember arriving at Tembwe, on March 18, 1977, which was celebrated as Chitepo Day, the day that Herbert Chitepo died in 1975, and the air around the camp was euphoric.

“I remember we were under Cdes Bowas, George Kashiri and Teurai Ropa (now Vice-President Joyce Mujuru) as they were members of the general staff. I was then sent to Base Two training camp, under Cdes Makasha and Edwin Munyaradzi.
“In August, I was sent to Tanzania for further training and then came into Zimbabwe to fight in the Manica Province.”

As much as the long and arduous struggle was full of blood and tears, there were some moments that provided comic relief,
tragicomedy if you like.

“We were sent to operate in the Gaza province,” recounted Timothy. “That was the time when the Zanla and Zipra forces were operating as one, under the Zimbabwe People’s Army (ZIPA) banner.

“We had taken shelter for the night in the Gonarezhou National Park, and around day-break a rhino was disturbed in its sleep and came charging towards us.
“Because of the language barriers between the two groups, Zanlas were on one side and Zipras on the other. So when the rhino came charging at us, in near-darkness,

someone thought it was an attack and fired.
“Unfortunately a comrade at the other end, the Zipra end, was shot and killed and the Zipra forces returned fire, thinking that the Zanlas had attacked them. That battle took most of the morning and when the guns stopped, that was the end of our company and we went our separate ways.”

For Simon, the most unforgettable experience came when they were crossing into the country and were attacked after two of their colleagues had gone to a nearby village to seek acquaintances, since the two came from around that village.

It was after the two took long to come back that the group of comrades went in search of their colleagues killed in cold blood.
“We buried them in knee-deep graves, because we had to dig the graves with bayonets and you can imagine how deep one can dig with a gun. It was around dusk that we buried and I am not sure if those bodies were reburied,” recalled Simon.

But that was to be the least of their worries.
“When we retired for the night, we were ambushed and that fight took almost the whole night and, when morning came, there were burnt bodies all over. That sight has been enduring and every time I think about my days in the war, that is the image that comes most, it was not an easy sight.”

For all the dirty and bloody moments they went through, they were only to be re-united in 1979, after going through the different assembly points.
“I can remember the day I saw my parents and brothers, there can never be a family reunion as touching as that. We were all happy to be one family once again.”

The Mabhodho brothers, whose parents are now late, were born in a family of eight, of which all the seven brothers are surviving and enjoying the fruits of land reform in Guruve, whilst their only sister stays in Harare.