The Sunday Mail
Alick Nkhata knows what it means to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.
On October 19, 1978 Ian Smith launched a twin attack on Freedom Camp, 25km outside Lusaka and, Mkushi Camp, a girls-only training facility. At about the same time, Zambia was conducting local government elections and Alick Nkhata was driving in Luano district as a poll officer.
His mistake? He was driving a Land Rover, which was mistaken by the attacking Rhodesian soldiers for a Zipra vehicle. He was some 5km from Mkushi, and the Rhodesian aerial assault made him an easy target.
Alick Nkhata was burnt beyond recognition. In memory of their father, the Nkhatha family – led by Daisy Nkhata – built a primary school near the spot where he was killed.
Though the school is yet to be officially handed over to the Zambian government, enrolment has already begun and 51 pupils, from nursery to Grade 4, are attending lessons.
Construction of the three-classroom block started last year in September and by June the school was ready for its first intake. According to Ignatious Chityaka, the caretaker of the school, the Zambian government will provide desks and teachers but the school will be for the community.
“This is a good gesture by the Nkhatha family that they have decided to honour their father and that our community has benefited. Imagine our children used to walk 10 kilometres to the Tuyu, where the nearest school was.
“Our appeal now is to the Zimbabwean government, since Mkushi was a girls-only camp, they can build a clinic or better still a hospital here, in memory of the girls. Our community would be very grateful for that. We assisted Zimbabwe to win its independence and the local community sacrificed a lot. Maybe it will be a small way of thanking us for what we did to help,” added Chityaka.
His sentiments were echoed by Cde Rosemary Mathe-Maphala, a survivor of the Mkushi bombing, who was part of a 22-member Zimbabwe group on the annual pilgrimage to the camp, which they have done religiously for over a decade now in Heroes’ month.
“Mkushi is one of the best looked-after shrines, for all the shrines we have here in Zambia and Mozambique. “But maybe if something is built in honour of the girls lying there, just in their memory. We have been talking about building memorial structures for a long time but I think it is time something is done.”
Whilst the Zimbabwean authorities are thinking about thinking about whether to build something or not, the Nkhatha family has decided that their father’s dying should not be in vain.
Alick Nkhata was a musician, broadcaster and politician. He was once stationed in Salisbury (now Harare) who was extradited to Lusaka, then Northern Rhodesia, for his “politically-wrong” music.
After being labelled a prohibited immigrant by Smith, Nkhata continued with his music and politics in Zambia, where he met his fate during that October 19 1978 attack.
