The Sunday Mail
Our reporter Norman Muchemwa (NM) continues to chronicle the political life of Cde Christopher Mawomberere (CM). This week the former freedom fighter narrates his military training and deployment to the war front.
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NM: After the attack at Nyadzonia, did you manage to regroup and what was your immediate action?
CM: We regrouped and started walking until we reached a tarred road. We didn’t even know where we were going, we just kept walking. We ended up at a place yainzi Masengere where the comrades, who had come for reinforcements, managed to gather people.
Takararama mazuva maviri tichikanga maputi tonwa mvura nekuti pakanga pasina chikafu.
NM: As someone yet to receive military training and facing such a heinous attack at Nyadzonia, didn’t you think of returning home?
CM: I never thought of going back home after the incident. Actually, the attack emboldened me and I became more eager to receive military training. I wanted revenge for my fellow comrades who had lost their lives.
During that time, pane mweya wehondo waibata vanhu and there was no thought of going back home. There is, however, a possibility that some comrades abandoned the struggle after the attack, because it was very bad and the scenes in the aftermath were horrific.
But returning home was also a risk.
You would put yourself and family in serious danger from both the Rhodesians and liberation fighters who would both want to know what you were up to. We then left Masengere to construct a new base named Doroi.
This base came into existence as a result of the Nyadzonia attack that had dispersed a lot of people. When we arrived at Doroi, we started staying in abandoned pigsties that belonged to a former Portuguese farmer who had left after Mozambique attained independence.
We started constructing barracks and transforming the place to be suitable for human habitation. Comrades Chihambakwe, Tsuro and Tenheka are some of the senior leaders who came to this base. This was in September 1976 and the number of people coming to the war, from home, was increasing. They were either coming in as refugees or for military training.
During one of the days, some Frelimo comrades informed us that our leaders were coming to address us following the attack at Nyadzonia.
Vanhu vakabvunza kuti vakuru varikuuya ndivanani, nekuti at that time it was not clear who was the leader.
The death of Herbert Chitepo, the previous year and reports that Ndabaningi Sithole had abandoned the war as well as the release, from detention, of other nationalists had created power struggles or a vacuum. Most comrades, from the little knowledge I had then, were no longer supporting Ndabaningi Sithole.
But the Frelimo soldiers said the leaders coming to see us included Sithole, James Chikerema and Abel Muzorewa.
NM: What was the reaction of the comrades to the mention of those names?
CM: There was a lot of disgruntlement from the comrades.
They even shouted that these were not their leaders. The reason for the disgruntlement was that we had trained comrades among us who had come to help build Doroi.
They were privy to the goings-on in the leadership circles of Zanu and Zanla.
The late former president Robert Mugabe had become the people’s favourite after his release from detention, but he was not yet the official leader of Zanu. As a result of our uproar, Frelimo fighters threatened us with unspecified action if we went ahead not to recognise Sithole and his team.
Sithole and his team were to arrive the following day. We all assembled and after they introduced themselves, they were quick to console us on the Nyadzonia attack.
But the atmosphere was tense. The comrades were showing clear signs of disinterest in these leaders such as outbursts of insolent comments. The leaders then encouraged us to forge ahead with the struggle before announcing their departure.
That is when the comrades began asking questions amongst themselves suggesting that they thought the leaders had come to join the struggle full time. Their departure left comrades raging with anger.
I believe such events sealed Sithole’s fate as the majority of comrades, trained and untrained, lost confidence in his leadership style. The comrades wanted someone to lead whilst in their midst, not from some luxurious office in Salisbury.
What angered most comrades was that these leaders were returning to Rhodesia.
NM: We understand just after the visit by Sithole and his team, there was a team that was selected for training in Tanzania. You had not been trained, were you part of this group?
CM: When Sithole and his team returned to Rhodesia, it was the same time Cde Rex Nhongo, who was a member of the Zanla High Command, came to tell us that they had secured more places for training and they were selecting teams.
He told us that 3 000 comrades were to be selected from Doroi and 2 000 from Chibawawa. From the group that was selected from Doroi, over 200 were female.
I was selected among that group to go for military training. It was at the end of October 1976. Our group went to Tanzania.
The first group of 700 comrades went by ship and we followed in the next group that went by air. The plane took us in batches of 93 recruits until we were all in Tanzania.
On arrival in Tanzania, we went to the former headquarters of Frelimo at Nachingwea Military Academy where we were then dispatched to other training facilities. I was selected in a team that was to be trained at Mapinduzi under Nyadzonia Camp, which was named after the victims of Nyadzonia in Mozambique.
There were various training camps there — Farm Three, Four and Five — and girls were trained at a different place. The training started at the end of October 1976 until August 1977.
We trained for 10 months compared to other groups that trained for six months.
Our instructors were Tanzanians and Chinese, but we also had our own leaders likes Cde Hamunyari, who was the senior instructor, Cde Rambakupetwa and Cde Majanga among others. Our group was code-named Songambele, Swahili for endai mberi or forge ahead.
We received regular training, guerrilla warfare, individual tactics specialising in various weapons, handling and assembling them, among other military skills.
The reason why we took long in training was because we covered both guerrilla and regular training. I think we came out of the training a full package. We also had lessons in mass mobilisation and various war strategies.
NM: Take us through your journey from training in Tanzania to deployment to the war front?
CM: On our return we were supposed to go to Mozambique via sea. But our commanders were informed that the enemy was planning to attack us at sea and the plan changed.
We were then transported by a commercial plane in groups of 150 to Mozambique to a place named Kilimani at Nasiyaya or Mukubha Base. From Kilimani we flew to Beira in a small plane that carried 28 people at a time.
That is the time we separated with many people we had trained with because they were being selected randomly for various operations and assignments. We spent the night in Beira before we moved to a base named Dhondo that was for Frelimo soldiers.
While at this base, we were grouped the following morning for deployment to the war front. Our group was under Cde Gungwa Reropa who led us to the war front.
That was now around end of September, 1977. Cde Gungwa Reropa gathered us. We were a group of 150 comrades. He briefed us on our mission in Rhodesia, Wedza area.
We left the base and stopped at another one painzi paMumango.
There we were to get guns and ammunition.
While paMumango, we met Cde Rex Nhongo. He was the one dispatching the guns and ammunition. We were lined up and he would just randomly pick a gun and throw it to a comrade.
If you managed to catch the gun, Cde Nhongo would tell you to proceed and load the magazines and get other ammunition to carry to the war front. Those that failed to catch the gun vaibva vanzi: “Nekumusha ndozvauchanoitwa, uchanokundikana.” They would be removed from those going to the war front.
After loading our guns and taking the necessary ammunition, our group was taken in two trucks to the border area at a base that was under Cde Kufahatitye, this was just a transit base that was overseeing the crossing of comrades to the front.
NM: How did you finally cross into Zimbabwe and who were some of the comrades in your group?
CM: From that base that was under the command of Cde Kufahatitye, we crossed to the war front around Nyamukwarara area.
In our group I still remember Cdes Siyaduma Chimurenga, LMG Chimurenga, Dingani Muhondo. The comrades I have mentioned are still alive and they are here in Manicaland.
Before crossing into the country, we were given roles and I was put in charge of organising food and other logistics for the comrades,
I was then assigned with a group of other comrades to slaughter a cow for our relish so that we would embark on our journey energised and dry some for future use.
Soon after our evening meal we were then assembled to a parade. I had a small rifle and Cde Kufahatitye, after being impressed by my organising skills during that short period, took away my small rifle and gave me an AK47. After that, he then addressed us and jokingly said: “Comrades, you are now leaving this place and in a few hours you will cross into the motherland makuenda kunofa,” he then laughed.
He made all sorts of jokes to relax our minds at the same time motivating us. We then embarked on our long journey and crossed into the country just before midnight around Nyamukwarara area in Honde Valley.
To be continued next week . . .
