The Sunday Mail
IN our last instalment, Cde Sando Kano recounted how he, along with his comrades, were ambushed and captured by Rhodesian forces. This week, he narrates to our Senior Reporter, TENDAI CHARA, in detail the ill-treatment and torture they suffered following their capture. Read on as Cde Sando tells us how, after being viciously beaten with barbed wire, the Rhodesian forces cunningly tried to turn the three captured freedom fighters into sell-outs.
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Q: We ended our previous discussion where you had been captured by the Rhodesian forces together with Cdes Tichatonga and Chisi Chenyu. If you can carry on from where you left off.
A: Like I said before, after running out of ammunition, I then decided to surrender.
I removed two of the three jean trousers that I was wearing. I also had a few belongings in a small bag that I kept.
We had small bags that we called Sagudhu where we kept shoes, toothbrushes, bullets, grenades, food and clothes. In my case as a commander, I also kept report books in the bag.
Some of us also kept marijuana in these bags. During the liberation struggle, we often smoked marijuana although this was prohibited.
Marijuana gave us courage and I remember General Tongogara saying that if marijuana can help us liberate the country, then there was no reason for freedom fighters to shun it. I dismantled my gun and put some of my possessions in the bag before throwing them into a cave.
I then slowly descended the hill with arms raised. Ironically, for the past week or so, I had been dreaming of my capture and to me, the dream was now playing out in real life.
A white Rhodesian soldier with a Nato gun ordered me to lie down and I complied.
A chimbwido was called to identify us and that marked the beginning of my nightmare.
Q: Nightmare? What do you mean?
A: After calling out my name, the Rhodesian soldiers were completely baffled.
They were not expecting to capture me because I was one of the most wanted fighters in this zone and the Rhodesians knew what I was capable of doing. I was well-known in this zone partly because of how I operated the Mortar 60.
The Mortar 60 makes a deafening sound which can be heard from, say five to 10 kilometres away. Credit was, however, often given to me even if I was not the one operating the heavy artillery during the time.
In a nutshell, the Rhodesian soldiers knew about my exploits. Some of the captured freedom fighters would, during interrogation, tell the enemy who I was and what I was capable of doing.
Like I said previously, guerrillas that were trained in East Africa had a reputation of being good fighters. I was later shocked to discover that the Rhodesian soldiers even had pictures of me that had been taken at the front without me noticing.
They even knew when I was deployed and the areas in which I was operating.
Q: Tell us more about what you said was a daytime nightmare
A: When I was captured, my hands were tied using a rope. When the Rhodesians realised who I was, they put me in six hand cuffs and leg irons immediately.
Together with my fellow captured comrades, Tichatonga and Chauya Chinesu, we were promptly airlifted to the Rhodesians’ notorious Ngundu military base.
Q: Tell us more about the Ngundu base.
A: The Ngundu camp was both an interrogation and extermination base.
Very few captured fighters and members of the povo managed to come out of this camp alive. The base was also used by the Rhodesian army to deploy their soldiers to Chiredzi, Mberengwa and Beitbridge among other areas.
The majority of the Rhodesian soldiers that were at Ngundu were mercenaries from Holland, South Africa and Britain.
Q: What happened at Ngundu?
A: As soon as the helicopter landed, we were whisked away to the torture chambers.
For close to an hour, we were kicked in the face and severely beaten. We were subjected to beatings similar to how common criminals are beaten up by mobs at Mbare Musika.
We were then injected with a drug that up to now I do not know its purpose.
For three consecutive days we were tortured and interrogated. The Rhodesians demanded information on how we operated and the identity of our colleagues.
Under interrogation, we revealed to the Rhodesians some information but there are secrets that we never revealed. Although I knew where our arms caches were, I never divulged such information even though I was starring death in the face.
Q: Why do you think the Rhodesians did not kill you there and then since you were on their most wanted list?
A: They wanted information. They wanted to use us. Vaida kushandisa nguruve nemafuta ayo.
They had realised that we had so much valuable information and they wanted to use us for their own benefit.
Q: What happened next?
A: After days of interrogation, a carrot was dangled in our face. The Rhodesians told us that if we help them capture our fellow comrades, we would be rewarded handsomely.
We were promised money and jobs, with one soldier going to the extent of promising to pay lobola for us if we work with him.
As part of their desperate attempts to make us work for them, the Rhodesians told us that we were risking our lives for nothing and asked us what we were benefiting from staying in the bush and scrounging for food.
We were taken on several missions whose objective was to make us capture fellow freedom fighters.
Q: Tell us about these missions.
A: On the sixth day we were taken to Mberengwa from where we had been captured with the intention of making us track and kill freedom fighters. I vividly remember one incident in which I was searching for guerrilla fighters and we came to a place where I had planted a landmine before I was captured.
My heart was beating very fast as we approached the area.
Luckily the army truck that I was in was not blown off. The one truck that was behind us was blown to pieces resulting in the death of 25 Rhodesian soldiers.
We made very powerful bombs mixing water, petrol, dynamite and TnT.
During the missions, we would interact with mujibhas and chimbwindos telling them that we had been captured and that our colleagues must rescue us.
We would write notes to the freedom fighters alerting them of the enemy’s intention to attack them. We had access to the mujibhas and chimbwidos.
Unbeknown to the Rhodesians, we were in contact with the freedom fighters and we could warn them of attacks that the Rhodesians would be planning. We were caught between a rock and a hard place.
Both the Rhodesians and the guerrillas could not trust us. On the ninth day of our capture, we were told that if we failed to capture our fellow guerrillas that day, then we were going to be killed.
I remember the Rhodesian soldiers taking us to a captured freedom fighter who was not divulging secrets. They said the captive, who was badly beaten and in leg irons, would surely die if he failed to divulge information.
We never saw that comrade again. I am sure he was killed.
Q: So, it was now your turn to die, that is if you failed to capture your fellow comrades that day?
A: Yes, and the Rhodesians meant it.
This deadline gave me the resolve to escape. So we went on a mission in the Chingoma area.
There was one section operating in this area, under the command of Cde Mazarura Muhondo, who was leading a section of seven fighters. Cde Santos Muranda was also part of the group.
When we arrived, we mixed and mingled with the povo as usual.
I then wrote a note and gave it to a nine–year-old boy for him to deliver to Cde Mazarura, whom we asked to come and rescue us. Around midnight, Cde Mazarura and his group came for us.
After establishing our positions, Cde Mazarura fired at the Rhodesian soldiers, killing a white soldier with his first shot.
We took cover and the Rhodesian soldiers instructed me to fire in the direction of the liberation fighters. I turned the gun against the Rhodesians instead.
They had made the grave mistake of thinking that I was now a sell-out.
I made good my escape, running towards the Marasha base in Ngungumbani village.
In our next instalment, Cde Sando Kano recounts how he re-united with his comrades after his daring escape from captivity. He will also recount how he was selected to go to Yugoslavia for further military training before being redeployed, for the last time, to the war front.
