Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo of Zimbabwe Politics, Power, and Memory

AFRICAN HISTORIES AND MODERNITIES
JOSHUA MQABUKO NKOMO

OF ZIMBABWE
Politics, Power, and Memory
Edited by
Sabelo J. Ndlovu-Gatsheni
African Histories and Modernities
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University of Texas at Austin
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Virginia Tech
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Editor
Joshua Mqabuko
Nkomo of Zimbabwe
Politics, Power, and Memory
Editor
Archie Mafeje Research Institute
University of South Africa
Pretoria, South Africa
African Histories and Modernities

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Foreword
“This book is not a biography of Nkomo”, Ndlovu-Gatsheni pre-emp-

tively states in his introduction to this book. It is an interpretive study
that writes back into the Zimbabwe nation the voices and deflated pres-
ences of those excluded and marginalised by it. But ironically, the victims
of political exclusion have unexpectedly acquired a more secure legacy
and enduring taste for a resonant political afterlife than the perpetra-
tors of their forced disappearance and diminution in history and politics.
Astonished and infuriated, the perpetrators regard their undying victims
with “A cobra’s puzzled glance at the bitten life that would not die”, as
Dambudzo Marechera would have succinctly put it (Mindblast 1984: 64).
The “celebratory tone” evident in most of the chapters in this book is
justifiable: it comes from a place of woundedness overwhelmed by politi-
cal toxicity. It is a critical celebration of the figural resilience of Joshua
Nkomo and his survival; and a sharp, cringing awareness of the tainted
and haunted nature of state power in postcolonial Africa. It is as if any-
one who participated in the anti-colonial struggles and failed to enter
the halls of power in 1980 (in the case of Zimbabwe) failed therefore to
enter history; hence, the euphoric taunts aimed at Robert Mugabe and
the devastating critique of postcolonial power that is Nkomo’s biogra-
phy. Mugabe has a dauntingly solid and spectral presence both in the
critical ruminations presented in this book and in Nkomo’s political life.
Given such a challenge, it turns out that a book on Nkomo is not just a
book on Nkomo, but an exercise in exorcism as well as path-clearing.
v
vi Foreword
Essays in this book are trenchant in their criticism of what Ndlovu-

Gatsheni has inventively termed “commissar scholars” who peddle par-
tisan histories and narratives that deride and denigrate Joshua Nkomo
for the benefit of Robert Mugabe. These “commissars” have dedicated
their blindness to eviscerate the body of public memory and silence
the voices and perspectives represented by Joshua Nkomo in postcolo-
nial Zimbabwean history and politics. There is, again, a challenge here.
Essays in this book, as Ndlovu-Gatsheni warns, are in danger of overcor-
recting the imbalance of critical resources devoted by Robert Mugabe to
the interment of Nkomo in the Evil Forest.
There is a way in which counter-celebration morphs into counter-
onesidedness. Two wrongs do not make it right. However, procedurally
it makes sense: the positive identification of a survivor of historical and
political carnage must of necessity evoke feelings of awe which might
find egress in songful dance. This is what I see as happening in most of
the chapters in this book. Then follows the careful separation of the vic-
tim from the debris, and the surgical extraction of fragments of a hostile
history that would have penetrated his body, distorting and disabling it
for life. It is not possible to narrate the biography and history of Nkomo
without talking about how Mugabe inhabits and collides with that life
of struggle. The essays struggle to deftly eschew being ensnared by the
lures of a celebratory, rehabilitative counter-scholarship by striking a deli-
cate balance between repair work and reconstruction in the aftermaths
of Nkomo’s experience of the demolition work that Mugabe’s wrecking
ball had done to his stature and memory.
There are methodological and philosophical tensions registered across
the entire book, and these relate to the impulse to recreate an alternative
history while at the same time building from the shards what could be
considered the history and life of Nkomo. It is not an easy task. It is a
tempestuous space riven by the same hand that sundered Nkomo’s life; it
is the same hand that, after Nkomo’s death, dabbles in his canonization
and contested statuary. The beatification of Nkomo in musical galas and
political mantras (well-captured in these essays) orchestrated by Mugabe
post-2000 signalled the new state of capture of Nkomo’s life of struggle,
particularly to service the hero-hungry imaginations of his erstwhile ene-
mies and tormentors. Nkomo’s body is once again exactly where Robert
Mugabe has always wanted it to be. It is laid out in the pantheon that is
carefully and self-servingly curated by Robert Mugabe.
Foreword vii
The dizzying rotation of Nkomo’s life seems to indicate not only the
figural significance that he wields in Zimbabwean politics, but the self-
sacrifice that required the harsh or diplomatic silencing of the memo-
ries of the atrocities committed on Nkomo’s past in order to allow for
an altruistic but abused accommodation in the afterlife. This too is the
understated bitter experience of reconciliation and selflessness.
This kind of experience requires sensitive intellectual work that repo-
sitions and restructures rather than renovate and refurbish Nkomo’s
life. The final section of this book does this praiseworthy and necessary
work. It is to Prof. Sabelo Ndlovu-Gatsheni that we owe this largeness
of critical vision as well as an unflagging gaze into one of the most tor-
tured embodiments of Zimbabwean nation-building, Joshua Mqabuko
Nkomo. This book reinvents Nkomo not only as the folkloric “slippery
stone” that he was to colonisers, but positions him as the bedrock and
beacon of modern Zimbabwean nationhood. Therein lies the political
and critical gravitas of this book, as a work of memory and as a compre-
hension of the dynamics of African power.
University of the Witwatersrand Prof. Robert Muponde

Johannesburg, South Africa
Acknowledgements
This book will never have materialised without the cooperation and
commitment of the contributors to the project. I therefore take this

opportunity to thank all the contributors most sincerely. Like all aca-
demic work, the writing of this book meant compromising on family
responsibilities and I wish to express my thanks to my wife Pinky, my
children Vulindlela Kings, Thandolwenkosi Jaqueline, and Nobuntu
Anaya for tolerating my absence and understanding the importance of
this work. At Palgrave Macmillan, I wish to express my thanks to Prof.
Toyin Falola the Series Editor for African Histories and Modernities;
Megan Laddusaw (Commissioning Editor—History); and Christine
Pardue (Editorial Assistant—History). Finally, a word of thanks to the
anonymous reviewers—the review comments enabled improvement of
this book.
ix
Contents
1 Introduction: Writing Joshua Nkomo into History

and Narration of the Nation 1
Part I Imperialism, Nationalism, Liberation and Leadership
2 The Contributions of Joshua Nkomo to the Liberation

of Zimbabwe 49
Eliakim M. Sibanda
3 Joshua Nkomo and the Internationalization

of Zimbabwe’s Struggle for Liberation 73
Martin Rupiya
4 Joshua Nkomo and the Quest for Unity and Peace

in Zimbabwe 91
Kenneth Tafira
5 The Entrapment of Joshua Nkomo Within Global

Imperial Snares 115
Gorden Moyo
xi
xii Contents
6 Lancaster House Talks: Timing, Cold War

and Joshua Nkomo 149
Pathisa Nyathi
Part II Legacy, Diplomacy, Political Philosophy and

Fatherhood
7 Joshua Nkomo: Nationalist Diplomat, ‘Father

of the Nation’ or ‘Enemy of the State’ 173
Timothy Scarnecchia
8 Joshua Nkomo: The Trial of a Philosopher

of Liberation 193
William Jethro Mpofu
9 Unearthing the Legacy of ‘Father Zimbabwe’:

A Decolonial Imaginary 213
Blessed Ngwenya
10 Making Sense of Joshua Nkomo’s Political Behaviour:

A Sociogenic Approach 237
Morgan Ndlovu
11 Joshua Nkomo on Land: Exploring His Vision for Land

Reform and Land Use in Zimbabwe 253
Rudo Gaidzanwa
12 Joshua Nkomo on Transitional Justice in Zimbabwe 279

Everisto Benyera
Part III Nation-Building, Persecution, Autobiography

and Rehabilitation
13 Joshua Nkomo and Nelson Mandela: Ideas of Nation and

Liberation 299
Sabelo J. Ndlovu-Gatsheni and Busani Mpofu
14 Reconstructing the Self: Hauntology and Spectrality
in Nkomo’s Autobiography 323
Josiah Nyanda
15 Self-Writing and Subjection: Frederick Douglas

and Joshua Nkomo 341
Tendayi Sithole
16 Father Zimbabwe: Media, Memory and Joshua

Nkomo 373
Sylvester Dombo
17 The Immortalisation of Joshua Mqabuko Nyongolo

Nkomo 389
Henry Chiwaura
18 Whose Nkomo Is It Anyway? Joshua Nkomo’s Statue

and Commemorative Landscape 405
Thabisani Ndlovu
Further Reading 441
Index 447
xiii
Editor and Contributors
About the Editor

Sabelo J. Ndlovu-Gatsheni is founding head of the Archie Mafeje
Research Institute for Applied Social Policy (AMRI) and is currently
Director of Scholarship in the Change Management Unit (CMU) at
the University of South Africa. He holds a doctorate in historical stud-
ies from the University of Zimbabwe. He is the founder of Africa
Decolonial Research Network (ADERN), a member of Academy of
Science of South Africa (ASSAf), Research Associate at the Ferguson
Centre for African and Asian Studies at the Open University in the
United Kingdom and fellow of the African Studies Centre (ASC) in the
Netherlands. He has published extensively in the areas of history of the
Ndebele, African political thought, identity, nationalism, development,
ideology, and decolonial/postcolonial theory. His latest major publi-
cations include Mugabeism? History, Politics and Power in Zimbabwe
(Palgrave Macmillan 2015) and The Decolonial Mandela: Peace, Justice
and Politics of Life (Berghahn Books, 2016).
Contributors
Everisto Benyera is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Political
Sciences at the University of South Africa. He holds a doctorate in
African politics from the University of South Africa. His research and
publications are on transitional politics and transitional justice.
xv
xvi Editor and Contributors
Henry Chiwaura is a Lecturer in Archaeology, Museums and Heritage

Studies at Great Zimbabwe University in Zimbabwe.
Sylvester Dombo is a Lecturer in the Department of History and
Development Studies at Great Zimbabwe University in Zimbabwe.
He holds a doctorate in history from the University of KwaZulu-Natal
in South Africa. His research interests include media, religion, politics,
nationalism, democracy, violence, land reform, and entertainment.
Rudo Gaidzanwa is a Professor in the Department of Sociology at the
University of Zimbabwe and a renowned feminist scholar. She is a former
Dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences at the University of Zimbabwe
and has published extensively on land, gender, and social policy.
Busani Mpofu is a Senior Researcher and Acting Head of Archie
Mafeje Research Institute for Applied Social Policy (AMRI). He holds
a doctorate from the University of Edinburgh in Scotland in the United
Kingdom. His research interests are in urban history and the agrarian
questions.
William Mpofu is a Researcher at the Wits Centre for Diversity
Studies at the University of the Witwatersrand and a member of African
Decolonial Research Network (ADERN). His doctoral studies focus on
Thabo Mbeki as a philosopher of liberation. His research interests are in
semiotics and philosophy of liberation.
Gorden Moyo is a Zimbabwean opposition politician and a former
cabinet minister. He holds a doctorate in leadership studies from the
National University of Science and Technology (NUST). His research
interests are in development, politics, and governance.
Thabisani Ndlovu is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Arts at
Walter Sisulu University in South Africa. He holds a doctorate in liter-
ary studies from the University of the Witwatersrand in South Africa.
His main areas of research include literary studies, human rights, human
diversity, race, nation, and restitution.
Morgan Ndlovu is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of
Development Studies at the University of South Africa and a founding
member of Africa Decolonial Research Network (ADERN). He holds a
doctorate in social anthropology from Monash University in Australia.
His main areas of research include Zulu cultural villages, identity, local
economic development, and coloniality of knowledge.
Editor and Contributors xvii
Blessed Ngwenya is a Lecturer in the Department of Communication

Science at the University of South Africa and a member of Africa
Decolonial Research Network (ADERN). He holds a doctorate in media
and communication from Oxford University. His research interests are in
political economy and decolonial approaches to media and communica-
tion.
Josiah Nyanda is a doctoral student at the University of the
Witwatersrand in South Africa. His main field of study is literary studies.
Pathisa Nyathi is a well-known Zimbabwean historian and cultural
activist. He has published extensively on Ndebele history and culture.
Most of his publications appear in indigenous Ndebele language.
Martin Rupiya is a Visiting Research Fellow at the Institute of African
Renaissance Studies (IARS) at the University of South Africa. He holds
a doctorate in military history from the University of Zimbabwe and has
published extensively on security sector reform and military history of
Africa.
Timothy Scarnecchia is Associate Professor of History at Kent
University in the USA. His research interests are in Zimbabwe particu-
larly nationalism and urban politics.
Eliakim M. Sibanda is an Associate Professor of History and chair of
the Department of History at the University of Winnipeg. He researches
and publishes on immigration, social movements, liberation movements,
biographies, and human rights. His major publication is The Zimbabwe
African People's Union, 1961–87: A Political History of Insurgency in
Southern Rhodesia (Africa World Press, 2004).
Tendayi Sithole is Associate Professor in the Department of Political
Sciences at the University of South Africa where he teaches African
politics. He holds a doctorate in African politics from the same uni-
versity. Sithole is a founding member of Africa Decolonial Research
Network (ADERN) and the executive council member of South African
Association of Political Studies (SAAPS). His research interests include
black radical thought, decolonial critical theory, Africana existential phe-
nomenology, public intellectuals, and literary studies. His major publica-
tion is Steve Biko: Decolonial Meditations (Lexington Books 2016).
Kenneth Tafira is a former Postdoctoral Fellow at the Archie Mafeje
Research Institute for Applied Social Policy (AMRI) at the University
xviii Editor and Contributors
of South Africa. He holds a doctorate in social anthropology from the

University of the Witwatersrand in South Africa. He has done exten-
sive research on black liberation thought and his recent major work is
Black Nationalist Thought in South Africa: The Persistence of an Idea of
Liberation (Palgrave Macmillan, 2016).
Abbreviations
ANC African National Congress

ANC-Z African National Council-Zimbabwe
AU African Union
BSAC British South Africa Company
CAF Central Africa Federation
CIA Central Intelligence Agency
DRC Democratic Republic of Congo
FRELIMO Front for the Liberation of Mozambique
LAA Land Apportionment Act
MDC Movement for Democratic Change
MPLA Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola
NAM Non-Aligned Movement
NDP National Democratic Party
OAU Organization of African Unity
OAULC Organization of African Unity Liberation Committee
PAC Pan-Africanist Congress
PF-ZAPU Patriotic Front-Zimbabwe African People’s Union
SADC Southern Africa Development Community
SRANC South Rhodesia African National Congress
SWAPO South West Africa People’s Organization
UANC United African National Council
UDI Unilateral Declaration of Independence
UK United Kingdom
UN United Nations
USSR Union of Soviet Socialist Republic
ZANLA Zimbabwe African National Liberation Army
xix
xx Abbreviations
ZANU Zimbabwe African National Union

ZANU-PF Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front
ZAPU Zimbabwe African People’s Union
ZIPA Zimbabwe People Army
ZIPRA Zimbabwe People’s Revolutionary Army
List of Figures
Fig. 17.1 Showing some of Nkomo’s representations

in Zimbabwe 400
xxi
CHAPTER 1
Introduction: Writing Joshua Nkomo

into History and Narration of the Nation
Introduction
Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo of Zimbabwe: Politics, Power, and Memory is
the first academic work on the life of struggle and legacy of Nkomo—a
Zimbabwean leading nationalist who is credited for being the founder
of Zimbabwean nationalism itself (‘Father Zimbabwe’). What is ironic
about the legacy of Nkomo as ‘Father Zimbabwe’ is that he is one of
those African nationalists who actively led in the anti-colonial liberation
struggle from the beginning up to the end of colonialism, but did not
win elections in 1980 to become the first black leader of independent
Zimbabwe. Rather than enjoying the status of a founder of an independ-
ent African state, Nkomo endured political persecution by the ruling
Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF) from
1982 to 1987, including assassination attempts.
This introduction draws partly from my earlier work on Nkomo (Ndlovu-

Gatsheni 2007; Ndlovu-Gatsheni 2009; Ndlovu-Gatsheni and Willems 2010).
S.J. Ndlovu-Gatsheni (*) 
University of South Africa, Pretoria, South Africa
© The Author(s) 2017 1

S.J. Ndlovu-Gatsheni (ed.), Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo of Zimbabwe,
African Histories and Modernities, DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-60555-5_1
2 S.J. Ndlovu-Gatsheni
Thus, his life of struggle and legacy is a political tale of trial and trib-
ulations under both the white minority regime and the black majority
government. The political persecution of his person, his supporters, his
political party (Patriotic Front-Zimbabwe African People’s Union-PF-
ZAPU), and his military wing (the Zimbabwe People’s Revolutionary
Army-ZIPRA) only ended in 1987 when he politically surrendered as an
opposition leader and joined ZANU-PF under what became known as
the Unity Accord of 22 December 1987. This Unity Accord was signed
after ZANU-PF had set the Fifth Brigade (a North Korean-trained mili-
tary outfit) on Nkomo, his party, military wing and supporters, which
resulted in the death of over 20,000 people in Matabeleland and the
Midlands Regions.
What compounded the trials and tribulations of Nkomo, his party,
his military wing and his supporters was that the international com-
munity never raised its voice against the persecutions to the extent that
Hazel Cameron (2017: 2), concluding that the British in particular
‘were consistent in their efforts to minimise the magnitude of the Fifth
Brigade atrocities’ as part of pursuit of ‘realpolitik’. The British silence
in particular is attributed to three factors. The first is that the British
had important economic and strategic interests in Southern Africa, and
Robert Mugabe was their ‘point man’. The second is that for the British
Zimbabwe under Mugabe offered a good example of a successful transi-
tion that could be used to persuade apartheid South Africa. Finally, to
the British, Zimbabwe under Mugabe offered a useful bulwark against
Soviet influence (Cameron 2017: 3).
All this makes political sense because PF-ZAPU and ZIPRA had been
sponsored by the Soviet Union during the anti-colonial struggle. Three
chapters in this book by Martin Rupiah, Pathisa Nyathi and Godern
Moyo deal with the entrapment of Nkomo in ‘Cold War coloniality’ and
‘imperalism of decolonization’ in which some political formations had to
be propped up and others destroyed depending on their value in ‘global
realpolitik’. Nkomo, ZAPU and ZIPRA became a priority for physical
elimination following the shooting down of two Rhodesian plans by
ZIPRA in 1978. Aeneas Chigwedere in his booklet entitled The Hunt
for Joshua Nkomo (2003) emphasises that after 1978, the assassination
of Nkomo became a priority for the white Rhodesia regime and its white
international allies. That Nkomo had to be hunted down for assassina-
tion by a black government in the same manner the Rhodesians wanted
to assassinate him reveals complicity of forces. Mugabe’s persecution of
1 INTRODUCTION: WRITING JOSHUA NKOMO INTO HISTORY … 3
Nkomo was covered by Americans and the British who had since the
Lancaster House Conference revealed their anointment of Mugabe as
their preferred black leader of Zimbabwe (See chapters by Pathisa Nyathi
and Gorden Moyo in this volume).
This book is not a biography of Nkomo. It is an interpretive study
that focuses on different aspects of Nkomo’s life of struggle, legacy as
well as trial and tribulations of a veteran nationalist leader whose politi-
cal existence and history successfully resisted deliberate erasure because
of the strengths of his liberation credentials. This book is part of the
emerging literature that writes back into the nation those who have been
excluded and at the same time subverting the official historical narratives
that privilege the hagiographies of those who ascended to power at the
end of direct colonialism in 1980.
The historical record seems to reveal that those like Joshua Mqabuko
Nkomo who did not succeed to win independence elections and who
never ascended to the seat of power, posthumously retain positive aspects
of their legacy than those who succeed in being presidents. Despite per-
secution by those in charge of the state, Nkomo’s legacy is more secure
than that of President Robert Gabriel Mugabe who has been in power
since 1980. Mugabe’s legacy is hugely damaged. He is associated with
ethnic divisions, collapse of the economy, human rights violations and
deviation from democracy. Mugabe will likely be remembered as the
undertaker of the nation. So far the many books that have been writ-
ten on Mugabe are condemnatory rather than celebratory (see Ndlovu-
Gatsheni 2015). Even for Nkomo, his decision to dissolve PF-ZAPU due
to persecution of his supporters and himself, his joining of ZANU-PF
through the Unity Accord of 1987 and his acceptance of the position
of Vice-President of Zimbabwe, nearly dented his legacy very badly.
But that Nkomo never became the top political dog saved his legacy
and is remembered fondly. This is why the tone of this book is overly
celebratory.
The same is true of nationalist leaders, such as Herbert Chitepo, Josiah
Tongongara, Jason Ziyaphapha Moyo in Zimbabwe; Steve Bantu Biko,
Robert Mangaliso Sobukwe, Oliver Reginald Tambo in South Africa;
Almilcar Cabral in Guinea Bissau; Patrice Lumumba in the Democratic
Republic of Congo (DRC); and Eduardo Modlane in Mozambique, to
name a few who died in the course of the anti-colonial struggle or imme-
diately after the attainment of independence, are remembered fondly as
heroes and are even elevated to sainthood. But for those who ascended
to power at the end of colonialism are rarely remembered fondly. They

soon became enemies of the people they claimed to have liberated from
colonial oppression. This is partly because the very anti-colonial national-
ism that had brought people together was rarely reinvented successfully
into post-colonial patriotism. Rather anti-colonial, nationalism quickly
mutated into authoritarian nation-statism.
Even Nelson Mandela of South Africa, who spent 27 years in prison
and had attained an iconic and sainthood during the anti-apartheid
struggle, taking over power as the first black president of South Africa
dented his iconic and sainthood status. Even though Mandela left
power voluntarily, after serving only one 5-year presidential term, that
short 5-year stint as president enabled the rise of negative judgements
of his legacy, with some of those born after apartheid even accusing him
of being a traitor and sell-out who left the crown in the hands of white
minority settlers (see Ndlovu-Gatsheni 2016). For those like Mugabe of
Zimbabwe and Eduardo Dos Santos of Angola, who have been in power
since 1980 and 1979, respectively, they have attained the negative char-
acterisation as typical dictators clinging to power without the popular
support (see Ndlovu-Gatsheni 2015).
Nkomo was a leading nationalist who led the Zimbabwe African
People’s Union (ZAPU) and commanded the Zimbabwe People’s
Revolutionary Army (ZIPRA) during the anti-colonial liberation strug-
gle. But at the end of the anti-colonial liberation struggle in 1980,
Nkomo did not win the independence elections. What followed was
persecution of Nkomo, his party, his military force and his support-
ers. In fact, an entire Brigade—the North Korean-trained Fifth Brigade
was set on him, his party, his forces and his supporters from 1983 to
1987 (CCJP and LRF Report 1997). Concerted efforts were made to
rubbish Nkomo’s liberation credentials. He became characterised as the
‘Father of Dissidents’ as part of contesting his claim to the title ‘Father
Zimbabwe’. Mugabe likened Nkomo to a snake in his house whose head
had to be crushed. Mugabe was claiming Zimbabwe as his house. He
was claiming the title ‘Father Zimbabwe’ by presenting himself as the
head of the Zimbabwe household. Nkomo became an inconvenience
inside Mugabe’s house. The persecution only ended in December 1987,
when Nkomo signed the Unity Accord which allowed ZANU-PF led by
Mugabe to swallow PF-ZAPU (Ncube 1989).
The people of Matabeleland and the Midlands regions stood stoi-
cally behind Nkomo and PF-ZAPU during the years of persecution as
they had done during the anti-colonial liberation struggle. But soon
after joining the ZANU-PF dominated government as a Vice-President
of the country, Nkomo began to be criticised as a coward and a sell-
out who failed to protect his supporters from persecution. It would
seem what remained of his positive legacy was only served by the fact
that he never became the president of the country. Thus, the failing
of the economy, human rights violations and lack of democracy were
never directly levelled at Nkomo. Some even thought that if Nkomo
had become the first black leader of Zimbabwe, the country could not
have been plunged into economic and political crisis. Nkomo is remem-
bered as a true nationalist in fact as a supra-nationalist who could have
been more successful in building pan-ethnic unity and launched a more
successful nation-building project compared to Mugabe who ended up
building Zezuru hegemony rather than pan-ethnic unity. That Nkomo
was persecuted by a political group that plunged the country into eco-
nomic and political chaos has generated public sympathy for him and this
is reflected in the rather celebratory tone of the essays contained in this
volume. Nkomo is largely featuring as a good leader and a statesman that
was persecuted. This celebratory tone reached a crescendo when Nkomo
died in July 1999. His death invoked deep sympathies across the nation.
Posthumous reflections on Nkomo’s life of struggle and legacy began to
‘write’ him back into the history of the nation. Even those like Mugabe
who spearheaded the persecution of Nkomo ended up acknowledging
that Nkomo was actually the ‘Father of the Nation’.
At another level, Nkomo’s history, life of struggle and legacy reflected
the broader vicissitudes of what Homi K. Bhabha (1990) described as
‘narrating the nation’ as a site of struggles. Those nationalist politicians
like Nkomo who pioneered, actively participated and led the anti-colonial
struggles but failed to win independence elections were immediately dis-
qualified from speaking in the name of the nation. The sense of nation-
ness was quickly appropriated and monopolised by those who successfully
won elections. Rosa Luxemburg also reflected on the tensions and con-
testations attendant to the ‘narration of the nation’ when she wrote that:
The ‘nation’ should have the ‘right’ to self-determination. But who is that
‘nation’ and who has the authority and the ‘right’ to speak for the ‘nation’
and express its will? […]. Does there exist one political party which would
not claim that it alone, among all others, truly expresses the will of the
‘nation’ whereas all other parties give only perveted and false expressions
of the national will. (Luxemburg 1976: 141)
Those politicians that lost independence elections however hard they

had fought for the national liberation, began to be stripped-off of their
nationalist and liberation credentials and heroism. Indeed, soon after
attainment of political independence by Zimbabwe in 1980, Mugabe
and ZANU-PF assumed the identity of the only authentic revolution-
ary party and Nkomo’s PF-ZAPU was de-legitimised. The contestation
over authentic liberation identity began as far back as 1963 when ZANU
was born as a splinter political formation from ZAPU that was led by
Nkomo. When ZANU-PF won elections in 1980 and took over the
state, it used state power to try and annihilate PF-ZAPU and Nkomo.
Nkomo’s history, life of struggle and legacy also highlighted how he
was entangled in the imperatives of ‘Africanism, nationalism and ethnic-
ity’ (Young 2012: 291). The concept of ‘triple helix of identity’ coined
by Crawford Young (2012: 291) expresses how the ethos of territorial
nationalism conflicted with those of pan-Africanism and the realities of
ethnicity tended to undercut the very processes of the imagination and
invention of the common territorial nation. Young (2012: 293) convinc-
ingly argued that the ‘triple helix of identity has played a critical role in
defining the political itineraries of African state’. Nkomo hailed from
the minority Ndebele-speaking people inhabiting Matabeleland and
Midlands regions. Perhaps aware of his identity of a nationalist leader
hailing from a minority group, Nkomo became a leading advocate for
a pan-ethnic Zimbabwe. He actively played a role in the very invention
of the idea of Zimbabwe as a unitary state. His party, ZAPU, was the
first significant political formation to use the name ‘Zimbabwe’. Thus,
Nkomo’s history, life of struggle and legacy of Nkomo were deeply
entangled in the itineraries of the ‘triple helix of identity’. Those who
competed with him for leadership were mainly from the majority Shona-
speaking people. Ethnicity in Zimbabwe like in the rest of the continent
is practiced by everyone and denied by all.
Nkomo’s autobiography reveals how his claim to be ‘Father
Zimbabwe’ is derived from quantification of his political work. Nkomo
led almost all the big nationalist political formations from the Southern
Rhodesia African National Congress (SRANC) in the late 1950s to the
Zimbabwe African People’s Union (ZAPU) and commanded the well-
trained, resourced and Soviet-backed Zimbabwe People’s Revolutionary
Army (ZIPRA). He spent 11 years in prison and over a decade in exile.
Losing elections to Mugabe in 1980 did not sit well with Nkomo. He
lamented the loss in these revealing words:
Is this how the people of Zimbabwe thank me for all the suffering and
sacrifices I made from 1957 to this year in order to liberate this country?
Is this how they think they should thank me? (qouted in Msipa 2015: 94)
But his wife Mama Mafuyane who was in Germany at the time of the
announcement of election results had a different response. When
Nkomo phoned her to deliver the news of his party’s defeat in the elec-
tions, Mafuyane began by congratulating Nkomo saying ‘Amhlophe’ in
IsiNdebele before he could even explain:
Oh, I am so happy that we have won. I have already packed, and if there
was transport to bring me to Zimbabwe tonight I would have come but I
have to wait until tomorrow. Oh, I can’t wait. (quoted in Msipa 2015: 95)
Cephas Msipa a long-time ally of Nkomo who was there when Nkomo
phoned Mafuyane wrote that Nkomo was initially ‘flabbergasted’ by
Mafiyane’s jubilation in the face of a PF-ZAPU loss and a ZANU-PF vic-
tory. Mafuyane had to explain the basis of her happiness:
I understand Smith lost and the Patriotic Front won. Were we not fighting
for majority rule? I am congratulating you for majority rule. That’s what
we got. Didn’t we get that? (quoted in Msipa 2015: 95)
In Msipa (2015: 95)’s reading of Nkomo’s body language, phoning

Mafuyane produced the needed political therapy. ‘He [Nkomo] was
suddenly a different Nkomo. He had relaxed immediately’. Nkomo’s
PF-ZAPU had only gained 20 seats compared to ZANU-PF’s 57 seats.
A political formation that had splint from ZAPU in 1963 had suddenly
become senior and all its members were political juniors to Nkomo
and were now in charge of the state. How do we explain this political
eclipsing of ZAPU and Nkomo. In the first place, what escaped ZAPU,
ZIPRA and Nkomo was the fact that where ZANLA (Zimbabwe
African National Army) the military wing of ZANU operated inside
Rhodesia one of its main tasks was not primarily military engagement
of the Rhodesia forces. Its main task was to mobilise people and to
destroy ZAPU structures. In the second place, ZANLA had the advan-
tage of operating from Mozambique, which enabled them to cover the
most populous regions of Manicaland and Mashonaland. The results of
1980, elections indicated that the vote followed the bullet—when one’s
military forces were dominant during the liberation struggle—the party

was guaranteed of winning elections. In the third place, the history of
post-colonial Africa has revealed over and over that elections in Africa are
nothing other than an ethnic census. The leaders hailing from the major-
ity ethnic groups have a higher chance of winning elections than those
hailing from minority groups.
Fundamentally, even those who publicly express themselves as nation-
alists they privately practice ethnicity in their mobilisation of support.
ZANU-PF was never an exception. PF-ZAPU was also not an exception.
PF-ZAPU’s weakness was how to mobilise outside of Matabeleland and
the Midlands regions where ZIPRA had operated mainly. ZANU-PF
and ZANLA made Mashonaland and the Manicaland no-go areas for
PF-ZAPU and Nkomo to campaign. Throughout the liberation strug-
gle, ZANLA had ‘conquered’, ‘captured’ and ‘occupied’ Mashonaland,
Manicaland and Masvingo on behalf of ZANU-PF.
Nkomo who had been affectionately known as ‘Chibwechitedza’ in
the 1960s as well as ‘Umdala Wethu’ and ‘Father Zimbabwe’ among his
supporters found himself having to defend himself from a new political
identity of ‘Father of Dissidents’ and a ‘snake’ inside Mugabe’s house.
This was the beginning of writing Nkomo, PF-ZAPU and ZIPRA out
of the nation and its narration. This writing of ZAPU, ZIPRA and
Nkomo out of the nation began with confiscation of ZAPU archives by
the ZANU-PF government in 1982 under the pretext of a ‘discovery’
of arms caches in PF-ZAPU-owned farms (more on the arms cache saga
later).
What this book demonstrates is that any writing and narration of
Zimbabwe’s modern history from the very conception of the idea of
Zimbabwe in the 1960s right up to it concretisation in 1980 will remain
incomplete without Nkomo’s story, without ZAPU’s story and without
ZIPRA’s story. Nkomo’s given names tell a rich history and underscore
his centrality in the history of the liberation struggle. ‘Chibwechitedza’
is a Shona word which refers to softness and slipperiness of a stone
which make it had to hold in one’s hands. With reference to Nkomo, it
conveyed two meanings. The first meaning is linked to Nkomo’s birth
which was predicted by a ‘voice’/‘izwi’ from the sacred Matopos Hills
where indigenous black Zimbabweans went to seek guidance and predic-
tions from Ngwali/Mwari (Indigenous God). The legend is that when
Nkomo’s parent had difficulties in conceiving a child they went to the
sacred Njelele Shrine in the Matopos Hills to seek blessings and they
were promised that a son would be born who will lead the people in the
struggle for liberation. This linked Nkomo to the Matopos rocks and
mountains.
The second meaning derived from how during the liberation strug-
gle Nkomo would frequently slip through security snares as well as
avoid imprisonment. What is interesting to note, while Nkomo’s sup-
porters celebrated how Nkomo avoided being captured and detained
by Rhodesian state until 1964, those who had split from ZAPU to form
ZANU used that very fact to denigrate Nkomo as a coward who always
avoided being arrested. ‘Umdala Wethu’ is a Ndebele honnorific and
affectionate term which highlighted the fatherly figure of Nkomo. In the
first place, it highlighted Nkomo as a ‘patriarch’ of the Zimbabwe anti-
colonial struggle. In the second place, it was a recognition of Nkomo’s
huge and towering physique and conveyed a sense of magnanimous
nationalist ‘patriarch’. The father-figure politics and its logics in African
post-colonial history are explored by Michael G. Schatzberg (2001: 1):
It argues that political legitimacy in this corner of the globe rests on the
tacit normative idea that government stands in the same relationship to
its citizens that a father does to his children. In turn, this normative idea
ultimately derives from a pervasive, yet largely unarticulated, conceptual
understanding of the distribution of rights and responsibilities within a
highly idealized family. Moral matrices are present in all societies, and they
change across both time and space.
When Mugabe described Nkomo as a snake inside his house, he was

also claiming a father-figure identity. Schatzberg used the example of the
notorious dictator Mobutu Sese Seko to demonstrate how the logics of
father-figures worked in politics to justify authoritarianism and dictator-
ship. By for Nkomo unlike for Mobutu, for instance, the ‘father figure’
name spoke to his warmth rather than notoriety and dictatorship. The
title ‘Father Zimbabwe’ had a political meaning, and it was a recogni-
tion of the pioneering role that Nkomo played in laying the foundation
of Zimbabwe nationalism and playing a leading role in the anti-colonial
struggle until Zimbabwe was born as a free country in 1980. It became a
highly contested title soon after Nkomo had lost elections.
But by as early as 1983, Nkomo found himself not only humili-
ated through sacking from cabinet by Mugabe but his very life had to
be protected from danger. Between 1983 and 1986, Nkomo endured

another exile in the United Kingdom, this time running away from a
black government that was after his life just like the colonial regime of
Ian Douglas Smith. Nkomo had spent 13 years in exile in Zambia pros-
ecuting the anti-colonial struggle, and he never imagined another exile
from an independent Zimbabwe. It was while in exile in Britain that
Nkomo had to defend his nationalist credentials and his title ‘Father
Zimbabwe’ from ZANU-PF and Mugabe who were poised to rubbish it.
He did a spirited defence in his autobiography. The opening paragraphs
are very revealing of how Nkomo defendend his liberatory credentials:
From my earliest youth I thirsted for freedom. When I became a man, I

understood that I could not be free while my country and its people were
subjrected to a government in which they had no say. In middle life I
fought for national independence, and I was sixty-three years old when, in
1980, Zimbabwe emerged as the last of Britain’s African colonies to win
nationhood. Yet even then the cause of freedom for the people had not
prevailed. We had won our national right to independence, but our human
rights were still suppressed.
This is not a history—one day, if I am spared, I may contribute to the writ-

ing of one with a happy ending, but this story has no end. Instead it is the
personal record of a life that has played a part in history, and it is also the
work of an active politician who wishes to see things change for the bet-
ter in the lives of the ordinary people of his country. I have been called
‘Father Zimbabwe.’ Whether I deserve that title is not for me to say. But
by a dozen years in prison and half as many in exile I believe I have earned
the right to speak up for freedom while it is still endangered—this time not
by far-off colonial rulers, nor by a settler population who will, I hope now
play their full part as citizens of a new nation, but by my former colleagues
in the liberation struggle. (Nkomo 1984: xiii)
What this book reveals are the shifting invocations of nationalism

underpinning the changing political identities of Nkomo as one of the
leading Zimbabwean nationalist leaders. Changing representations of
Nkomo cut across the colonial and post-colonial history of Zimbabwe.
Nkomo’s death on the 1st of July 1999 became an important occa-
sion for new elite reflections on the entire narration of the nation as
Nkomo posthumously received the much-contested title of ‘Father
Zimbabwe’.
Theoretical/Conceptual Interventions
This writing of Nkomo into history and the narration of the nation
simultaneously unfolds as an extended historical analysis and commen-
tary on the emergence of nationalism within which Nkomo’s political
career emerged. What emerges poignantly are various and different rep-
resentations of Nkomo as part of the unfolding of the complex processes
of the making and unmaking of political identities. Political identities
were always open to deconstruction and reconstruction as political elites
competed for political dominance through the strategy of negative label-
ling and political delegitimation of competitors. The number of chapters
that detail how Nkomo became a subject of cultural celebration after his
death through galas revealed the importance of taking into account what
has been termed the ‘cultural turn’ in the humanities and social sciences
which inaugurated the ‘new historicism’ (Vesser 1989; Fox-Genovese
1989) as a theoretical orientation. New historicism is revisionist and
deconstructivist. Under new historicism some long-standing meta-narra-
tives and official histories are called into question as part of puncturing
hegemonic and statist historiographies.
What is also innovative about this books is that it contains other chap-
ters that reflect the impact of emerging ‘decolonial turn’ critical of the
limits of anti-colonial nationalism and which enable a refreshing read-
ing of the political philosophy of Nkomo. What is disappointing about
those chapters that deployed decoloniality as a lens of understanding
the life and legacy of Nkomo is that they failed to transcend the celebra-
tory orientation. One expected the decoloniality perspective to enable a
critical engagement with the limits of anti-colonial politics within which
Nkomo’s political life is located. What is useful though is that the chap-
ters by William Mpofu, Morgan Ndlovu, Tendayi Sithole and Blessed
Ngwenya delve deeper into Nkomo’s philosophy of liberation and reveal
how his ideas of liberation were shaped by knowable political, cultural,
epistemological and political environments. Gorden Moyo and Pathisa
Nyathi open the canvas to deal with how Nkomo, ZAPU and ZIPRA
were ensnared in global coloniality including Cold War coloniality as
well as ‘imperialism of decolonization’—in which the colonialists were
actively involved in the clandestine politics of selection of which national-
ist politician was to take over after the end of juridical colonialism even
before elections are held. This is very revealing of how neo-colonies
are invented. Lancaster House Conference was a site of ‘imperialism of
decolonization’ with the aim of producing a neo-colony presided over by

a trusted black face that will not destroy the neo-colonial structure.
Thus, a combination of conventional historical narrativity, ‘new his-
toricism’ and decolonial perspectives anchors this book theoretically
and conceptually. This hybrid approach enabled the deconstruction
and reconstruction of the history of Zimbabwe particularly the partisan
and ethnic narrations of the nation and questioning of ZANU-PF half
‘truths’ (O’Tuathail 1996; Sutherland 2005; Gunn 2006). While new
historicists have concentrated on rewriting and reinterpreting recorded
histories as part of their protest against hegemonic, unitary and objec-
tive histories, it has afforded the contributors to dethrone most of what
was erected ZANU-PF aligned commissar scholars complicity in silenc-
ing the role played by Nkomo, PF-ZAPU and ZIPRA in the liberation
of Zimbabwe. It also enables reasoned responses to such latter-day schol-
ars like Maurice Toanezvi Vambe (2009) who are failing to critique offi-
cial partisan histories and consequently continue to attempt not only to
downplay the persecutions of such leaders Nkomo but to rubbish the
value of self-writing in a context in which the ruling party ZANU-PF
has been ‘ruling’ through a very skewed invented historiography that
imposes party hagiography on the nation and society as national history.
The contributions predicated on new historicism in their deconstruc-
tive and constructive style have successfully exposed instrumentalities of
power and ideological motivations in the writing of the history of the
nation. While self-writing in the form of autobiographies have inherent
weaknesses of always projecting the heroics and positive aspects of the
subject being written into history, it remains one of the most useful ways
of subverting official partisan histories masquerading as histories of the
nation. Through close reading of autobiographies, we access the other
side of history of those written out of the nation.
Through the story of Nkomo what is attempted is to retell another
history—one that advocates for justice, inclusivity, plurality and social
change. What it puts to the public is what Michel Foucault (1980)
termed ‘subjugated knowledges’ as well as marginalised, excluded and
dissenting voices. Thus, taken together the chapters in this book were
expected to inaugurate a paradigm shift from what history was or
what it should be according ZANU-PF to an emphasis on how history
worked, how it was produced and how it was deployed in particular ways
for particular purposes (Trouillot 1995). The celebratory tone, how-
ever, foreclosed any critique of Nkomo as leader and his conceptions of
nationalism. But what is not lost is the idea that histories were produced
with an immediate goal in mind: ‘they are partisan histories, narratives
about the past designed to help win arguments and political struggles’
(Friedman and Kenney 2005: 1). This led Michael de Certeau (1988:
36) to argue that ‘history endlessly finds the present in its object and
the past in its practice’. It is within this context that history assumed the
character of representations, regimes of truth and perspectival lenses than
rigid objectivity and singular narratives.
What is also highlighted in this book is how autobiography is lens of see-
ing through the making of history, identities and even imaginations of the
nation as well as political contestations for power. While the surge of aca-
demic interest in biography and autobiography grew out of postmodernism
which questioned teleologies of nation and elevated the focus on individual
agency in history, in the Zimbabwean case, this genre is part of continua-
tion of what Masipula Sithole (1999) characterised as ‘struggles-within-the
struggle’. While Nkomo’s autobiography remains one of the richest sources
on his life and legacy, just like all others it is a fighting text of an aggrieved
politician that had lost elections and was enduring political persecution.
While an autobiography is a useful entry point into issues of self-represen-
tation, individual self-portrayal and resistance to some external represen-
tations, it remains a polemic in which the true self is suppressed and the
imagined one is privileged (Vambe and Channels 2009). In Zimbabwe,
major nationalist political actors have used autobiographies to continue the
competition for power, making them more of sites of power rivalries that
must be used with care.
Historiographical Interventions
Post-colonial Zimbabwean historiography unfolded through installation
of ‘praise-texts’ by David Martin and Phyllis Johnson (1981) that set
the stage for the official ZANU-centric history of the liberation strug-
gle. Martin and Johnson became the earliest willing ‘commissar’ intel-
lectuals of ZANU-PF and Mugabe who helped to produce a one-sided
official nationalism as they served nationalist power instead of criti-
quing it (Robins 1996). These ‘commissar’ intellectuals became ‘will-
ing scribes of a celebratory African nationalist history that profoundly
shaped official accounts of Zimbabwe’s liberation struggle’ (Robins
1996: 76). In this mould of history, one also found the early work
of Terence Ranger (1985) and David Lan (1985) that romantically
valorised what they termed ‘peasant consciousness’ and installed the

ideas of the automatic popular revolution spearhead by ZANU-PF,
ZANLA and Mugabe. Inadvertently, they became complicity in sideling
and silencing of Nkomo, ZAPU and ZIPRA contributions. The people
of Matabeleland and the Midlands regions were excluded from the cel-
ebrated ‘peasant consciousness’ framework. The work of Ngwabi Bhebe
(1999) an active participant in the anti-colonial liberation struggle from
the ZAPU side attempted to strike a balance by bringing the history of
ZAPU, Nkomo and ZIPRA into the existing heroic narratives of nation-
alism liberation struggle. Bhebe’s contribution was a simple historical
task of ‘adding’ ZAPU, ZIPRA and Nkomo into a spoiled official narra-
tive. This made these work easily appropriable by the ZANU-PF regime
for its hegemonic and regime legitimating purposes.
The works of Ibbo Mandaza which were predicated on political econ-
omy analysis became the earliest literature to highlight the entrapment of
the state in coloniality and the dangers of the rise of a bureaucratic bour-
geoisie that was inherently parasitic to the state. It was Mandaza who
described the post-colonial state as a ‘schizophrenic’ political formation
that violated the people’s rights and security while claiming to advance
people’s interests. While this work predicated on political economy spoke
to ‘state-making’ and ‘nation-building’, it never reflected specifically on
what was happening in Matabeleland and the Midlands regions where
the Fifth Brigade was committing atrocities and PF-ZAPU, ZIPRA and
Nkomo were being persecuted in the broad-day light. One remains curi-
ous to know how the events that were unfolding in Matabeleland and
the Midlands regions were interpreted from a political economy perspec-
tive which continues to privilege class analysis at the expense of ethnicity
and race.
In short, the majority of the works produced within the post-colonial
euphoric period assumed the format of ‘praise texts’ that accepted the
victor’s version of history and ignored the activities of such national-
ists as Bishop Abel Muzorewa, Reverend Sithole, James Chikerema and
others who were active in the nationalist struggle throughout the 1970s
but failed to come into power in 1980. It was mainly in the 2000s that
state sponsorship of a narrow and fetishised history of the liberation
war provoked robust deconstructions of this master-narrative (cf. Bull-
Christiansen 2004; Ranger 2004; White 2003; Moore 2005).
Interestingly, Ranger participated in both construction and decon-
struction of nationalism and the armed liberation struggle when he
began to explore how the rise of hegemonic Marxist-Leninist-Maoist

nationalist politics of the 1970s erased and eradicated the evolution of
pluralistic political traditions of the pre-1960s period (Robins 1996:
80). In 2003, Ranger mounted one of the most robust deconstructions
of nationalism that was initiated by Norma Kriger in 1992 and blamed
it for a host of post-colonial problems ranging from authoritarianism,
personality cult, commandism, violence and militarism. A burgeoning
‘revisionist’ approach to nationalist history saw Louise White (2003)
interrogating various and differing accounts or perspectives on the mur-
der of Herbert Chitepo who was the chairman of ZANU in exile until
1975. White was not interested in the historical truths and fallacies of
Zimbabwean historiography but instead she aimed to show ‘how narra-
tives about the past are produced and reproduced and how power is pro-
duced and reproduced by these narratives’ (White 2003: 2). She sought
to highlight the purposes for which different narratives were used and
how these perspectives were competing for ‘truth’.
The climax of revisionist historiography is the current tearing apart
of all of the old certainties in Brian Raftopoulos and Alois Mlambo’s
Becoming Zimbabwe (2009) and Sabelo J. Ndlovu-Gatsheni’s Do
‘Zimbabweans’ Exist? (2009). The common thread is that of democra-
tising historical knowledge and liberating it from dominant and hegem-
onic nationalist historiographies of the 1960s and 1970s that provided
raw material that enabled monopolisation of national histories by a sin-
gle political party and few political elites who claim to have ‘died’ for
all Zimbabweans (Ndlovu-Gatsheni 2009). Therefore, the analysis of the
changing representations of nationalism as manifested in the life, times,
death and after-life of Joshua Nkomo is built on the burgeoning revi-
sionist historiography.
This burgeoning revisionist historiography is further boosted by the
publication of new autobiographies that are very critical of ZANU-PF-
centric and Mugabe-centric history of the liberation struggle. It was not
Nkomo alone who felt sidelined and who developed the urge to correct
history. Judith Todd a daughter of Sir Garfield Todd who together with
his father supported the liberation struggle and suffered detention and
other forms of dehumanisation wrote Through the Darkness: A Life in
Zimbabwe (2008) which reveals the post-colonial cruelties of ZANU-PF
under Mugabe and told the story of the country’s silenced people such
as the ZIPRA commander General Lookout Masuku who died in deten-
tion without committing any crime. Wilfred Mhanda who actively led
and participated in ZIPA (Zimbabwe People’s Army who actively led

and participated in that combined units from ZIPRA and ZANLA)
was very critical of nationalist disunity and ideological shallowness pro-
vided the most critical comprehensive history of Mugabe and his defects
as leader in his memoir entitled Dzino: Memories of a Freedom Fighter
(2011). The memoirs and autobiographies open some hidden and closed
boxes of Zimbabwe’s political history and reveal the need for alternative
history.
The Political Making of Nkomo

Nkomo was one of the early educated elites who used their education
in the service of nationalism. His nationalist baptism of fire is trace-
able to the time of his studies in South Africa where he met such fig-
ures as Nelson Mandela and Sir Seretse Khama who eventually became
leaders of independent South Africa and Botswana, respectively. When
he returned to Bulawayo in 1948, he became an active participant first
in trade union politics at the Rhodesian Railways where he worked as
a welfare officer. He later on became active in the ‘making’ of nation-
alism. The process involved careful reconstructions and mediations of
ethnic, regional and national identities for the nationalist cause. Making
nationalism was a very delicate task in the environment of the 1940s
where ethnically based associations such as the Matabele Home Society,
the Kalanga Cultural Society, the Monomotapa Offspring Society, the
Mashonaland Cultural Society and many others dominated. Enocent
Msindo (2004: 218), in his discussion of ethnicity, and specifically the
Ndebele-Kalanga relations, concluded that ‘[l]ocal identities were thus
stronger than regional, let alone territorial identities’ during this period
(see also Ndlovu-Gatsheni and Willems 2010).
However, Nkomo found a way in which to balance and synthesise
these different cultures and identities into a broader territorial national-
ism. He successfully drew from African traditional resources, mobilising
graves of kings, monuments, religious shrines and pre-colonial history
in order to reconstruct and manufacture an inclusive form of nation-
alism. Ranger (1999: 211) described Nkomo as a ‘great synthesiser’
who synthesised Kalanga, Ndebele and Shona identities into national
ones. He worked hard towards syncretising various histories and spoke
proudly and positively about pre-colonial political and religious figures
such as Chaminuka, Mzilikazi, Lobengula, Mambo and Monomotapa

(Munhumutapa)—all of whom he presented as respectable African lead-
ers who founded nations. He made efforts to transform the grave of
Mzilikazi at Entumbane into a national monument (Ranger 1999: 211).
Nkomo’s first visit to the United Kingdom in 1952 made him realise
how the British valued their past through preservation of the graves of
their past kings at Westminster Abbey (Nkomo 1984). When he came
back, he intensified his mobilisation of traditional religion in the formu-
lation of nationalism, including making a pilgrimage to the Dula Mwari
(Mwari is Shona and Mwali is the Kalanga) Shrine in 1958. He later
took the whole executive of the National Democratic Party (NDP) to
Matopos in order to seek ritual guidance so as to plan the struggle for
liberation (Nkomo 1984). From 1958 onwards, Nkomo modelled him-
self simultaneously as a cultural nationalist and a moderniser, as some-
one who worshiped at a shrine in Matopos with the peasants, as someone
who transcended ethnic identities and who saw nationalist value in
Kalanga, Ndebele and Shona historical relics and symbols.
The years 1957–1963 were a ‘golden age’ for Nkomo as a nationalist
leader as he was elected into the pinnacle of Southern Rhodesia African
National Congress (SRANC), the NDP and the Zimbabwe African
People Union (ZAPU), all of which enjoyed mass support in spite of the
increasing colonial political repression (Ndlovu-Gatsheni and Willems
2010). It was during this period that he was showered with praises and
given nicknames such as Chibwechitedza (slippery stone) which sym-
bolised the way in which he had managed to evade colonial repression.
During this period, Nkomo also enjoyed popular support from both
Mashonaland and Matabeleland and his leadership was endorsed by such
Shona leaders and veterans of the First Chimurenga (1896–1897) as
Nyamasoka Chinamora (uncle to Chief Chinamora) who in 1962 offered
him a ritual war-axe, sword and knobkerrie, urging him to fight to the
bitter end (Daily News, 30 July 1962).
But during this same period, nationalist actors began to secretly com-
pete for traditional ritual blessing as personal ambitions propelled them
to challenge Nkomo. Nkomo’s visit to the Matopos shrines provoked
some nationalists like Simon Muzenda and others from Mashonaland to
make a similar pilgrimage to Great Zimbabwe during which they offered
beer to ancestral spirits in 1962 (Fontein 2006: 106). But traditional
leaders continued to recognise Nkomo as a leader to the extent that
Chief Sigombe Mathema of Enqameni in Wenlock also ‘presented asse-

gais, a knobkerrie, a shield, a feather head-gear and armbands of feathers
to Mr. Nkomo and said these things were very essential for him to have
in his warrior fight for political rights’ (Home News, 9 August 1962).
However, these representations of Nkomo as a unifying, national
leader of both Mashonaland and Matabeleland were short-lived. In
1963, a split in ZAPU resulted in the formation of a new breakaway
party, the Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU) which was domi-
nated by Shona-speaking politicians. The split within ZAPU resulted in
open competition for leadership of the imagined Zimbabwe. Nkomo
exuded and cultivated a myth of him as the divinely ordained leader with
a ritual blessing to lead all black people into independence. It only took
the courage of the intellectuals who broke away from ZAPU to begin
to de-ritualise and de-mythologise Nkomo, exposing some of his weak-
nesses as a leader (Battle Cry: Official Organ of ZANU 1963: 10).
The 1963 split inaugurated a period in which Nkomo was increasingly
represented by ZANU as an inconsistent and indecisive politician who
offered weak leadership. Besides accusations of being a coward, Nkomo
was represented as not willing to embrace confrontational politics
(Shamuyarira 1966: 173–177). ZANU intellectuals conveniently avoided
the issue of tribe and power as a cause of the split and argued that it was
because of ideological differences that they moved away from ZAPU.
They represented ZANU as a party that was more dedicated, more rev-
olutionary and more prepared to confront the white repressive regime.
Nkomo (1984: 109–119), on the other hand, singled out tribalism as
the main cause of the 1963 split in his autobiography.
In order to maintain and justify their separate identity, ZANU and
ZANLA consistently had to ‘other’ leaders such as Nkomo and move-
ments like ZAPU as less revolutionary, less committed to the armed strug-
gle and as inconsistent. The existence of ‘Others’ is crucial in defining the
‘Self’ and in locating one’s own place in the world.1 It was partly to main-
tain a certain identity that active nationalist politicians engaged in labelling
others as stooges, sell-outs, dissidents and counter-revolutionaries. ZAPU
had its own way of identifying ZANU as a new-comer in the national-
ist struggle and as a tribally based party not committed to national unity
(Ndlovu-Gatsheni 2007; Ndlovu-Gatsheni 2008: 58–60).
Up until independence in 1980, Nkomo continued to be cast by
those in ZANU as a weak and prevaricating politician. Despite the
fact that ZANU and ZAPU negotiated at the 1979 Lancaster House
Conference as a united Patriotic Front (PF), their long-standing antago-

nism did not vanish. The PF had been formed in 1976 mainly as a coun-
ter to the moves by Ian Smith and moderate ‘internal’ nationalists led by
Bishop Muzorewa and Reverend Sithole towards a negotiated internal
settlement which excluded ZAPU and ZANU. PF was also a response
to the Organization of African Unity (OAU) through its Liberation
Committee and the Frontline States’ pressure for Zimbabwean liberation
forces and movements to unite.
Regardless of ZANU-ZAPU cooperation in the negotiations, Nkomo
continued to be seen as a compromiser by ZANU as is highlighted by
Edgar Tekere (2007: 113)—a long-time ZANU Secretary General—
who said Nkomo was a heavy political burden to bear in the PF and a
great compromiser at Lancaster House Conference. In her recent mem-
oires, ZANU activist Fay Chung (2006: 61) also argued that Nkomo
was often criticised for relying heavily on white advisors such as Terence
Ranger, John Reed, Leo Baron and Peter MacKay and ignoring his
black colleagues. But Msipa (2015: 33) a prominent PF-ZAPU mem-
ber explained the basis of the criticism of Nkomo’s leadership this way:
‘Naturally people were now impatient with the failure to attain majority
rule, and Nkomo became the scapegoat’.
Nkomo as ‘Father of Dissidents’

ZAPU and ZANU participated in the elections of 1980s as separate
political entities with the former adopting the Patriotic Front-ZAPU
(PF-ZAPU) and the later ZANU-Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF) (Shaw
1986; Laakso 1999; Cliffe et al. 1980; Sithole 1986; Kriger 2005). In
his election campaign, Nkomo represented himself as ‘Father Zimbabwe’
in order to remind the electorate of his pioneering role in the nation-
alist struggle and to project his seniority in nationalist politics. Nkomo
also emphasised that PF should be considered as ‘one liberation move-
ment with two parties’. ZANU-PF politicians, on the other hand, saw
this in a different light and considered the cooperation as a marriage
of convenience that had served a specific purpose (Moto Magazine 19
April 1980). However, due partly to ZANU-PF violence and the reality
of politicised and ethnicised identities, Nkomo’s campaign did not suc-
ceed to appeal to the electorate beyond the provinces of Matabeleland
and the Midlands where his army had mainly operated and liberated the
people. Although many expected Nkomo to win the 1980 elections,
it was ultimately Mugabe who obtained the majority of votes. This could
be explained by the fact that ZANU’s armed wing (ZANLA) had cov-
ered more ground during their military operations (including the densely
populated areas of Mashonaland, Manicaland and Masvingo), whereas
ZAPU’s armed wing (ZIPRA), mainly operated in the thinly populated
areas of Matabeleland, the Midlands and smaller parts of Mashonaland
(Rich 1982). ZANLA’s operations included a deliberate destruction of
ZAPU political structures created in the 1960s throughout Mashonaland.
But exigencies of nation-building forced ZANU-PF to pursue a pol-
icy of national unity after the party’s election victory in February 1980
in order to unite black people through a government of national unity
(GNU). Even though Nkomo and PF-ZAPU were initially devastated
by the fact of losing elections to ZANU-PF, they immediately expressed
their support for the new government and the idea of a GNU. Nkomo
personally told his supporters that ZANU-PF’s victory in the elections
was a victory of the PF over settler colonialism. Nkomo urged its sup-
porters to see themselves as part of ‘one tribe called MaZimbabwe’
(Msindo 2004: 265). However, despite these efforts, the GNU did
not last beyond 2 years and ZANU-PF increasingly began to exclude
PF-ZAPU from the nation-building process (The Chronicle, 30 June
1980). Msindo (2004: 265) has argued that ‘Nkomo’s efforts to unite
the nation at this point were met with non-cooperation from the govern-
ment, perhaps because of official suspicion of his aims and also because
of bitter relations between ZAPU and ZANU’. He added that ‘ZANU
would not allow Nkomo, an opponent, to be a living hero and to be in
front of nation building’ (Msindo 2004: 265).
The new government saw nation-building as the exclusive terrain of
ZANU-PF. This attitude was further elaborated by Kriger who argued
that ZANU-PF aimed at building a ‘party-nation’ and a ‘party-state’
which excluded all other actors and histories except those belonging to
ZANU and ZANLA. This was demonstrated in the continued use of
specific party slogans, party symbols, party songs and regalia at national
ceremonies such as Independence Day and Heroes Day (Kriger 2003:
75). As Msindo (2004: 265) has argued, ‘[t]he nation was defined along
ZANU-PF’s philosophy of unity which meant one-partyism as opposed
to multi-party democracy; and Shona tribal dominance as opposed to
nationalism’. While PF-ZAPU was still part of the GNU, ZANU-PF
increasingly framed the party, its leadership and its former military wing
(ZIPRA) as ‘dissidents’. Because of PF-ZAPU’s loss in the elections and
its refusal to disband and be swallowed by ZANU-PF, Nkomo, his party,

his supporters and ex-ZIPRA members were ‘othered’ as enemies of the
new republic.
Nkomo and PF-ZAPU did their best to cooperate in the post-colonial
nation-building project. They served in the Joint High Command (JHC)
which aimed to integrate ZANLA’s and ZIPRA’s military forces into a
single Zimbabwe National Army (ZNA) (Chitiyo and Rupiya 2005).
But Mugabe and his party were offended by Nkomo’s refusal to accept
the ceremonial post of being the first ceremonial president of Zimbabwe
with Mugabe as executive Prime Minister. Nkomo preferred a more
active post as Minister of Home Affairs. In political terms, Nkomo’s
acceptance of the ceremonial post would have meant that PF-ZAPU
had no leader as it was going to be difficult for him to head the nation
and to be the leader of opposition at the same time. Suspicions arose
that PF-ZAPU and Nkomo were not committed to nation-building and
still harboured ambitions to unseat ZANU-PF from power. ZANU-PF
increasingly began to reconstruct PF-ZAPU and Nkomo as enemies of
Zimbabwe.
The use of inflammatory political language which disparaged Nkomo,
PF-ZAPU and ZIPRA as ‘unheroic’ actors gradually resulted into a
major breakdown in the GNU. The initial marks of this crisis were iso-
lated cases of post-election lawlessness and misbehaviour of some armed
men who went out of Assembly Points (APs) with their guns and ammu-
nition (The Chronicle, 10 May 1980). The ZANU-PF government took
advantage of this situation and began to ‘other’ PF-ZAPU and ZIPRA as
dissidents bent on subverting the will of the people by fighting the legiti-
mate government of Zimbabwe.
Between 1980 and 1982, Nkomo and his party found themselves
hard-pressed to rebut accusations of disloyalty and to counter the label
of being dissidents. For example, the Minister of National Supplies,
Enos Nkala, labelled Nkomo as a ‘self-appointed Ndebele King’
(The Chronicle, 7 July 1980). During a rally at White City Stadium in
Bulawayo, he stated that PF-ZAPU and Nkomo were in government ‘by
the grace of ZANU’ and that they ‘contributed in their own small way,
and we have given them a share proportional to their contributions’. At
the same rally, Nkala reinforced his framing of Nkomo as a ‘tribal king’
likening him to Ojukwu of Biafra, Tshombe of Congo, Harry Nkumbula
of Zambia and Odinga Odinga of Kenya ‘who tried to appoint them-
selves as tribal leaders’ (The Chronicle, 7 July 1980).
It was partly these inflammatory speeches that caused panic among

some ex-ZIPRA forces within the ZNA and contributed to clashes
with ex-ZANLA forces in APs such as Entumbane (Moto Magazine
15 November 1980). After what has become known as the ‘First
Entumbane War’, Mugabe reacted by sacking Nkomo from the post of
Home Affairs Minister and made him a Minister-Without-Portfolio. This
further incensed ex-ZIPRA members and rank-and-file PF-ZAPU sup-
porters and culminated in the ‘Second Entumbane War’ which pitted
ex-ZANLA and ex-ZIPRA members in a heavy exchange of fire (White
2007).
A witch-hunt was launched against those ex-ZIPRA members who
had integrated themselves into the ZNA. The few ex-ZIPRA forces
that fled back to the bush did so involuntarily in order to escape the
threats and realities of persecution, just like their political leader-
ship which was increasingly demonised by ZANU-PF and forced out
of GNU (Alexander et al. 2000; Alexander 1998: 151–152). Kriger
(2003: 133–137) documented how the eradication of ex-ZIPRA forces
within the ZNA became frenzied during the post-Second Entumbane
War. Ex-ZIPRA members were increasingly framed as dissidents and,
as Msindo (2004: 264) pointed out the definition of a dissident was a
‘political, a product of the politics of power and the capacity to name.
Nkomo hated the term and preferred that the lawless men be labelled
bandits, which was less politically charged’. The GNU ultimately col-
lapsed when in 1982 ‘arms caches’ were ‘discovered’ in PF-ZAPU-
owned properties around Bulawayo (Ndlovu-Gatsheni 2003). But
Frederick Charles Mutanda (war name ‘Chillis’) a former senior ZIPRA
officer dismisses the allegation of arms caches:
I was one of those who remained in Zambia and involved in preparing

part of the ZPRA list and movement of these ordinances. Before 18th April
1980 ZPRA had presented its schedules of ordinance and as agreed, the
Rhodesia gave our commanders their list. The ZPRA list included battle
tanks, Armoured Personnel Carriers, artillery and other fighting equip-
ment. ZANLA did not present a single thing. The ZPRA ordnance and
armament matching the schedule eventually came into the country via
Victoria Falls. No decision or instruction was made as to how and where
the ZPRA ordnance w3as to be stored. The administration of integrating
the three armies, weapons and ordnances, including Assembly Points was
the responsibility of the Joint High Command, thus removing political
parties over military affairs. Arms which were then discovered at Ascot
and Hampton Farms […] were not caches at all but had been procedurally
declared and submitted to the Joint High Command. Allegations that Dr.
Nkomo and ZAPU after losing elections were conspiring to overthrow the
government in 1982, were false and mischievous. (Mutanda’s Foreword to
Nkomo 2010)
Following this so-called discovery, Nkomo was completely removed from

government and former military heads of ZIPRA, Dumiso Dabengwa
and Lookout Masuku were detained and accused of treason. Ironically,
the arms caches were ‘discovered’ barely a week after PF-ZAPU rejected
a forced unity with ZANU-PF which Mugabe desperately needed in
order to establish a one-party state (Shaw 1986). Mugabe’s desire to cre-
ate a one-party state became increasingly clear from his political state-
ments in which he imagined ‘one state with one society, one nation, one
party, one leader’ (Moto, August 1982). The Chronicle of 25 January
1982 quoted Mugabe asking ZAPU to join ZANU stating that ‘because
that is what united people should do. They should be one party, with
one government and one Prime Minister’.
This invented and choreographed ‘discovery’ of arms caches was used
to justify ZANU-PF’s increasing clampdown on Matabeleland. In order
to deal with the problem of ‘dissidents’, the government sent an elite
unit of North Korea-trained soldiers, known as the Fifth Brigade, into
Midlands and Matabeleland provinces where PF-ZAPU drew its major
support from. The government justified its intervention by referring to
the threat that ‘dissidents’ or ‘bandits’ posed to national security. The
military intervention resulted in major killings of civilians which brought
suspicion to the government’s plan to crush and flush out ‘dissidents’.
What became known as Gukurahundi (literally refers to the early spring
rains which separate the chaff from the wheat) resulted in the massacre
of an estimated 20,000 Ndebele-speaking people (cf. Alexander et al.
2000; CCJP and LRF 1997; Werbner 1991; Worby 1998; Ndlovu-
Gatsheni 2003). Although some dissidents were involved in acts of vio-
lence, human rights groups have estimated that 98% of the victims of the
violence were killed by government forces (CCJP and LRF 1997: 156–
157).
The Gukurahundi campaign was less concerned with military engage-
ment with the so-called dissidents but ultimately sought to de-legitimise
Nkomo and ZAPU which is also evidenced through ZANU-PF slogans
that were used at the time such as ‘Down with Joshua Nkomo’ and
‘Forward with Mugabe’ (CCJP and LRF 1997; and Ndlovu-Gatsheni
2003: 81–90). These slogans were followed by attempts to eliminate
Nkomo physically after Mugabe described him as a ‘snake’ in his house.
After the Fifth Brigade invaded Nkomo’s residence and killed his guards,
he was forced to escape into exile via Botswana to the United Kingdom
in 1983 (Nkomo 1984: 2). While in exile, ZANU-PF continued to por-
tray Nkomo negatively and he was often represented as a coward and
a politician who had failed the nation by leaving Zimbabwe. The direct
threats Nkomo received from the ruling party were silenced in these rep-
resentations. ZANU-PF mocked Nkomo’s escape by focusing on the fact
that he had left the country disguised as an old woman.
Nkomo’s Autobiography
In an attempt to counter ZANU-PF’s negative representations, Nkomo
started writing his autobiography while he was in exile in the United
Kingdom. His autobiography was eventually published in 1984. Whereas
ZANU-PF had constructed Nkomo as ‘Father of Dissidents’ and a threat
to Zimbabwe, in his autobiography Nkomo emphasised his contribution
to the liberation of Zimbabwe as a clear rebuttal to criticisms levelled
against him by his opponents. Nkomo emphasised his political seniority
in the nationalist struggle, and justified why he deserved the title ‘Father
Zimbabwe’. He described how he committed himself to liberating
Zimbabwe through enduring 10 years in detention and 13 years in exile
commanding ZIPRA and prosecuting the armed struggle. What emerges
from the autobiography are different positive self-representations that
include Nkomo as the authentic African leader; as the originator of the
liberation struggle and as a symbol of unity; as the committed national-
ist and pan-Africanist; and as the advocate of post-independence unity
(Ndlovu-Gatsheni and Willems 2010).
In order to articulate himself as someone who was able to speak on
behalf of the Zimbabwean nation and Africans in general, Nkomo
described himself as a ‘native son’ and provided details on his African
roots and his attraction ‘to the traditional religion of our people’
(Nkomo 1984: 12). Nkomo modelled and presented himself as a cultural
nationalist and a man of the people, who cherished traditional cultural
norms, leading Ranger to describe him as a ‘cultural nationalist’ (Ranger
1999). His pilgrimage to the Dula Mwali cult shrine in the Matopos
Hills in 1958 was to seek legitimacy. This shrine had been used by pre-
colonial leaders as a source of legitimacy and was consulted for divine
advice, particularly on military matters and war. Nkomo’s visit was to ask
Mwali (God) to assist them as nationalists in order to reclaim the coun-
try back from the colonialists and to get blessings for the prosecution of
the nationalist struggle.
Nkomo wrote that for 30 years he kept the ritual secret of what he
was told at Matopos shrine to the effect that ‘a long and costly strug-
gle’ was to be waged before the achievement of political independence in
1980 (Nkomo 1984: 14). To solidify his claim to be ‘Father Zimbabwe’,
Nkomo even sought ritual powers so as to mystify himself as the true
inheritor of a chain of power that was disturbed by colonial rule. Nkomo
portrays himself here as a keeper of national ritual secrets that other
nationalists were not aware of. Until his death, Nkomo associated him-
self with the Matopos shrines and carried a traditional short knobkerrie
wherever he went. These shrines were and are still revered by tradition-
alists who believed that Ngwali/Mwari (God) resided there (Ranger
1999). In times of crisis, they are visited for divine consultation. Nkomo
presented his struggle for independence as sanctioned by these shrines
and when he came back from exile in 1980, he went back to report on
the fruits of the struggle and to get further divine advice on the way
forward.
On the first pages of his autobiography, Nkomo represents himself as
someone who actively participated in all phases of the liberation struggle,
as an unwavering nationalist deeply committed to both independence
and national unity. Whereas ZANU-PF at the time did not recognise
Nkomo’s contribution towards the liberation struggle; Nkomo here
clearly spells out that he was legitimised to speak as someone who has
been important in the history of his country. Nkomo asserted that he
‘fathered’ the nation, stressing the ways in which he consistently strug-
gled for freedom, whether from the colonial regime or from fellow lib-
eration party ZANU-PF. Nkomo presents himself as someone who is
motivated by efforts to promote freedom.
In his autobiography, Nkomo does not only describe himself as a free-
dom fighter but as someone who to a large extent originated the lib-
eration struggle in Rhodesia. For example, he explains his involvement
in sourcing the first guns for the struggle from Egypt in 1962. The
weapons acquired by Nkomo comprised of 24 semi-automatic assault
rifles, with magazines, ammunition, plus some grenades. To him these
weapons marked the first ever step in the direction of an armed struggle.
Nkomo’s detailed description of the guns sought to counter ZANU-PF
claims that they inaugurated the armed struggle in Zimbabwe through
their frequent reference to the death of seven ZANLA guerrillas at Sinoia
in 1966 as the beginning of the armed struggle.
Elaborating on the 1963 split in ZAPU that gave birth to ZANU,
Nkomo explains this development on a purely tribal basis and by refer-
ring to the interference of Julius Nyerere who, as Nkomo argued, ‘had
a special problem with me personally’ (Nkomo 1984: xii). He squarely
blamed Washington Malianga and Leopold Takawira for influencing
younger politicians like Robert Mugabe to split the party (Nkomo 1984:
109–119). In other words, Nkomo projects himself as a symbol of unity
and portrays his opponents as tribalists who were just power hungry. In
the last sections of his autobiography, he detailed how he worked for
unity and how Robert Mugabe frustrated all the efforts. He bemoaned
the untimely death of General Josiah Magama Tongogara whom he saw
as firmly committed to unity like himself (Nkomo 1984: 210).
The popularly held view is that Tongogara was a victim of political
assassination by ZANU. Through Nkomo’s openly expressed admira-
tion of Tongogara, he implicitly constructs both Tongogara and him-
self as benevolent advocates of unity who ultimately end up as victims
of ZANU-PF violence. ZANU-PF is then represented as a party that
was not truly committed to unity but sought to destroy those who did
not toe the party line. By discrediting the dirty tricks within ZANU-PF,
Nkomo projected himself as a real statesman and a true nation-builder
who was—like Tongogara—also a victim of power hungry politicians.
This projection is evident in the following excerpts of his book:
To me the most important fact appeared to be that we had fought the war
on the same side, negotiated as one, and been victorious. It seemed a great
disservice to the people of Zimbabwe to launch their independent history
divided by party quarrels, not united by national feeling.’ (Nkomo 1984:
203)
He added that ‘the leaders of the party that won (by unquestionable
means, but let that pass for now) our first elections believed that I sym-
bolised the national unity that they rejected. So I became the focus of
their anger, perhaps of their envy’ (Nkomo 1984: 203). Nkomo was
aware that he had gained considerable recognition in the popular
consciousness of Zimbabweans and realised that ZANU-PF was doing

everything it could in order to crush this popularity. Ironically, it was
precisely Nkomo’s call for unity which ZANU-PF began to emphasise to
represent Nkomo in the changed political dispensation after his death in
2000.Throughout his book, Nkomo reminds his readers about the many
years he spent in detention. Countering ZANU-PF’s accusation that
he was a coward who always avoided arrest by spending time overseas,
Nkomo wrote the following:
I have often been criticised for being too fond of travel and for spending
too little of my time at home. But that was not how I would have chosen
to spend my life. It was the work I set myself, because I thought it was
essential if my country was to get her freedom. In that I am sure I was
right. (Nkomo 1984: 86)
Nkomo emphasised that the endless travels were part of his commit-
ment to the nationalist cause. During his trips abroad, he gave publicity
to the Rhodesian problem: ‘The cause I stood for needed friends who
were not automatically committed […]. And I needed to visit capitals
of those countries, to win the support not only of their diplomats but
of their decision-makers’ (Nkomo 1984: 86). He argued that it was him
who had to do the travelling because as he pointed out, by 1957 ‘I was
still the only ANC leader with a passport’ (Nkomo 1984: 75). Nkomo
presented a picture of a politician who was committed to both negotia-
tions and armed confrontation and who saw these as two complimentary
methods to achieve independence. This is demonstrated by the following
quote from his autobiography in which Nkomo (1984:163) described
his use of both methods:
Now, with full-scale war facing us, I had to learn to be a military com-
mander. I was immensely proud of my men; it was my task to see that they
got the backing they deserved. I carefully left the day-to-day command
of the men to our own senior officers. But I regularly visited the training
camps and bases to explain just what was going on, and to raise morale.
When negotiations broke down, I went to the soldiers and said I had done
what I could; it was up to them now. I emphasized that they were not
fighting to do me a favour, nor I them: we were in it together for our
country. I was doing my best to keep them supplied with material to fight
with, and to see it was fairly distributed. It was up to them to put those
supplies to good use.
While ZANU-PF represented Nkomo as a leader who preferred to

negotiate with the Rhodesian regime instead of more confrontational
approaches, he portrayed himself as supportive of both approaches. When
negotiations did not seem to work out, he considered the armed struggle
to be perfectly legitimised. Apart from being committed to the liberation
of Zimbabwe, Nkomo also projected himself as a supra-nationalist and a
pan-Africanist who brushed shoulders and worked together with other
luminaries of the broader African struggles for independence. His auto-
biography includes details of his acquaintances and the contemporaries he
met and worked with in the struggle against colonialism. The list includes
Kwame Nkrumah, Tom Mboya, Nelson Mandela, Sir Seretse Khama,
Holden Roberto, Kenneth Kaunda and many others.
By highlighting how he rubbed shoulders with these leaders, he
implicitly sought to legitimise his leadership of Zimbabwe just like other
continental leaders who had assumed power after the departure of colo-
nialists. So while ZANU-PF was keen to see Nkomo as a half-hearted
nationalist and bedfellow of the Rhodesians, he firmly rebutted these
images in his autobiography and emphasised his commitment to the lib-
eration of both Rhodesia and Africa in general.
After Nkomo returned from his first period of exile in January 1980,
he modelled himself as a real statesman as he began to talk of the war
that was over, the need to forget the past, to reconcile and to collectively
build the nation. Even after he lost the 1980 elections, he refused to be
the ‘Savimbi of Zimbabwe’, telling his angry ZIPRA forces the follow-
ing: ‘Our nation had gained its independence by years of sacrifice. Any
bickering now would inflame passions, divide the people and encourage
the enemies waiting on our borders to destabilise the country’ (Nkomo
1984: 211). In his account, Nkomo was careful to distinguish between
the new ZANU-PF government and ZANU-PF as a party. While he
criticised ZANU-PF as a party for trying to kill him, Nkomo (1984: 1)
remained committed to the newly independent government:
Robert Mugabe had decided to have me out of the way, and he evidently
did not care what method was used. But I hold the legitimate government
of Zimbabwe innocent of this atrocity. Mugabe was acting not as prime
minister, but as leader of his party, ZANU […]. As leader of ZANU he
acted outside the law: but the law and the constitution of Zimbabwe
remain in force, and I hold the ruling party, not the lawful government,
responsible for the attempt on my life.
By arguing that it was particularly ZANU-PF that challenged his posi-

tion, he also ultimately represented the party as uncommitted to pro-
mote unity and determined to get rid of the opposition ZAPU. Despite
ZANU-PF’s efforts to associate him with ‘dissidents’, he did not com-
promise his nationalist credentials. As he emphasised in his book, ‘[t]he
ruling party could not provoke me to disloyalty towards the nation I had
struggled to liberate’ (Nkomo 1984: 1). In the last chapter of the book,
Nkomo (1984: 252) expresses his firm commitment to the process of
building a Zimbabwean nation:
It is not too late to change all that, to muster the collective energy of our
people and build the new Zimbabwe we promised all those long years of
suffering and struggle. During my brief exile in 1983 I appealed in this
way to Prime Minister Robert Mugabe, calling as a start for a national
conference of all the country’s interest groups, under his chairmanship, to
begin the process of reconciliation. He did not answer then. Perhaps in
the interval between writing this book and its publication he will change
his mind and reply constructively. For my part, I shall continue working to
that end. Long Live Zimbabwe!
Nkomo’s autobiography is a robust rebuttal to the criticism levelled

against him throughout the history of liberation and beyond. Through
his book, Nkomo wrote himself back into the history of the liberation
struggle and appropriated to himself a heroic niche not only as deserving
of the title ‘Father Zimbabwe’ but also as the inaugurator of the armed
liberation struggle, the populariser of the Rhodesia problem across the
world and a statesman who desired to see his country not only independ-
ent but also united (Ndlovu-Gatsheni and Willems 2010).
Nkomo and the Unification of the Nation (1987–1999)

When Nkomo finally came back from exile in 1984, the unity negotia-
tions which had collapsed in 1982 resumed. A final agreement between
ZANU-PF and PF-ZAPU was reached on 22nd of December 1987
when both parties signed the Unity Accord (Chiwewe 1989). The
Accord paved the way for a ‘united’ ZANU-PF but the popular percep-
tion was that PF-ZAPU had effectively been swallowed by ZANU-PF
after heavy and consistent subjection to violence and harassment for over
7 years (Sithole 1988).
While in the early 1980s, Nkomo was portrayed as the ‘Father of

Dissidents’ by ZANU-PF, the newly united ZANU-PF party now repre-
sented him more positively as a selfless nation-builder and unifier who put
the nationalist interest above the party interest. This was a convenient rep-
resentation for both Nkomo who wanted to be remembered as an advo-
cate of unity and Mugabe who did not tolerate any political challenges
and who was still committed to establish a one-party state in Zimbabwe.
Mugabe perched himself on the success of the unity accord and travelled
together with Nkomo to Matabeleland and Midlands regions to sell the
unity accord to the people. Mugabe also wanted to be recognised as a
nation-builder and a statesman committed to nation-building.2
After the signing of the Unity Accord, Nkomo and other PF-ZAPU
leaders seemed to be satisfied by being accommodated in ZANU-PF and
government. In the immediate post-Unity Accord period, Nkomo was first
given the position of Senior Minister. When PF-ZAPU and ZANU-PF
structures were finally formally merged, he became co-Vice-President
of the republic together with Simon Muzenda (Ncube 1989). Nkomo
avoided talking about the immediate political past that led him to escape
into exile in 1983. While for the victims of the violence of the 1980s, the
Unity Accord was important because it managed to end both dissident
and Gukurahundi activities in Matabeleland and the Midlands regions;
there were no other post-conflict rehabilitation measures to help heal
the wounds (Ndlovu-Gatsheni 2003: 24–30). What followed was a dead
silence and no official apology was made by government to the victims.
Within this terrain of politics, a new discourse began to emerge in
the Matabeleland and Midlands regions in which Nkomo and former
PF-ZAPU leaders were seen as having sold-out their followers for per-
sonal political gain. The official government was that the past of those
atrocities had to be forgotten for the sake of national unity. When CCJP
and LRF Report broke the silence in 1997 through the publication of
detailed human rights abuses by the Fifth Brigade, Nkomo immediately
reacted to the report by storming into CCJP offices in Harare want-
ing to confiscate all the copies of the report, stating that it was going to
divide the nation (The Sunday Mail, 22 July 1997). Mugabe also reacted
to it by emphasising the need to forget the past (CCJP and LRF 1997;
Werbner 1998).
Instead of dealing with the troubled past, Nkomo became engrossed
in debates over land redistribution and black empowerment. He became
an important voice for the emerging black middle classes and aspiring
black bourgeoisie (Raftopoulos 1996). He consistently warned about the
inevitability of land wars in Zimbabwe as long as the unequal patterns of
land ownership continued. In 1993, he warned white commercial farm-
ers as landowners that they would soon be challenged by blacks over
their citizenship as long as they refused to share strategic resources like
land with blacks (Financial Gazette, 28 January 1993).
But not all Zimbabweans celebrated the signing of the unity accord as
a national achievement and the swallowing of PF-ZAPU as a wise deci-
sion on the party of Nkomo. By 1990, a small party emerged that called
itself Zimbabwe Active People Union (ZAPU) that tried to claim the
political vacuum left by PF-ZAPU. The party blamed Nkomo for selling
out his own people after they had been massacred by ZANU-PF.3 While
this party was insignificant, it symbolised a counter politics that saw the
unity accord as not only a surrender document but also Nkomo as a sell-
out rather than a selfless nation-builder.
Nkomo as ‘Father Zimbabwe’

After Nkomo died at the age of 82 on the 1st of July 1999, he continued
to be represented as a unifier. Following the burial of Nkomo, Mugabe
addressed the nation, thanked the people for demonstrating a spirit of
oneness and stated that Nkomo’s last words were ‘Unity, Unity, Unity’.
He argued that Nkomo’s life story ‘is in large measure the story of our
nation, yes, the story of you and me as our destiny took a painful and
tortuous meander towards self-rule and full nationhood’ (The Herald,
10 July 1999). At Nkomo’s burial, Mugabe also described the atroci-
ties of the 1980s as having happened during a ‘moment of madness’ and
took time to assure the people from Matabeleland that the Unity Accord
was going to be respected despite the fact that the ‘great unifier’ was no
longer present (Zimbabwe News, July 1999).
But apart from a nation-builder, Nkomo was posthumously also given
the title of ‘Father Zimbabwe’ by ZANU-PF. Nkomo was suddenly
reconstructed as a hero. For example, Mugabe announced Nkomo’s
death as follows: ‘The mountain has fallen’, and further added that
‘[i]t is a loss so keenly felt by all of us, by all Zimbabweans who saw
in the Vice-President a father-figure, a founder of our nation. The giant
has fallen and the nation mourns’ (Zimbabwe News, July 1999: 3).
ZANU-PF’s official publication, Zimbabwe News, inscribed Nkomo in

the line of pre-colonial religious and political leaders:
The death of Cde Joshua Nkomo must give birth to national rededica-
tion to those ideas that made him a national hero. To act any otherwise
would be betrayal of not only Cde Joshua Nkomo, but all those in whose
footsteps he walked such as Ambuya Nehanda, Sekuru Kaguvi, uMzilikazi
kaMatshobana and Lobengula the Great. (Zimbabwe News, July 1999: 2)
All this happened against the background of ZANU-PF’s fading legiti-

macy. Nkomo became useful in a number of ways. He proved crucial to
provide legitimacy to ZANU-PF’s main campaign issue in the 2000s, the
unequal distribution of land. ZANU-PF frantically tried to justify their
determination to correct the land imbalances through the fast-track land
reform programme as part of fulfilment of the last wishes of Nkomo
(Mugabe 2001; Sachikonye 2003). The programme was explained
in terms of Nkomo’s last words: ‘Land, Land, Land’ as reported by
Mugabe after his death. A blueprint on land reform which Nkomo had
written in 1981 as PF-ZAPU’s guide on land reform was republished by
SAPES Publishers in 2001. Nkomo’s emphasis during his time as Vice-
President on black economic empowerment and a resolution to the land
issue made it possible for the ZANU-PF government to represent him as
a major champion for land reform.
Furthermore, in the new context of the emerging opposition MDC,
Nkomo’s willingness to sign an agreement with ZANU-PF enabled
government to depict him as a visionary who saw the value of national
unity, an issue that suddenly had obtained a new urgency in the face of
an increasingly popular opposition party. For example, during an official
ceremony to commemorate Nkomo in July 2002, President Mugabe
stated as follows:
We remember him as the Father of Zimbabwe, as the one who pio-

neered the struggle and one who was committed to the very end to lib-
erate his people and after liberation wanted the people to get their land.
We also remember him as father of the family and politically, as father of
all of us. But what’s important now is that we should follow his steps on
those things that he showed us as virtues and that he wanted done. And
the things he emphasised most were, firstly, the unity of all Zimbabweans.
That unity is important as the basis on which we can put our minds
together, our energies together, and work as one and for the good of us
all, the good of our children. The second issue is land and this issue must
be resolved in the interests of the people of Zimbabwe. Therefore impe-
rialism must never be allowed to thrive and prosper in Zimbabwe. (The
Herald 2 July 2002)
By associating Nkomo with major ZANU-PF campaign issues, the party

sought to gain support in Matabeleland where the opposition MDC had
become increasingly popular. In order to drum up support, the ruling
party equated voting for ZANU-PF with giving support to Nkomo and
opting for MDC was represented as abandoning Nkomo’s belief in unity.
For example, in a speech during a visit to Joshua Mqabuko High School
in Matobo District, Matabeleland (where Nkomo was born), Mugabe
criticised residents for having given their support to the MDC in previ-
ous parliamentary and local elections:
You gave your school the name Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo on your own
volition. On the other hand, you say you want the MDC and Tsvangirai.
What contradiction is that? Do you still have Nkomo in mind? Do you
have him in your heart? I heard the schoolchildren here singing a tune that
says Nkomo is still alive. That is as it should be. However, we should show
that he is still alive in our hearts, in our minds, in our whole lives […]. He
taught us to be united. He also taught us to be the owners of our land and
to suffer for our land; to defend our land so it is not sold to the enemy.
(Herald 30 November 2004)
The revival of Nkomo’s legacy and the silence of the ruling party’s
treatment of Nkomo in the 1980s was expressed most strongly in the
introduction of the Umdala Wethu Music and Cultural Gala (‘Our
Father’ in isiNdebele) which was launched in Harare in July 2001 and
from then on served as an annual commemoration of Nkomo’s death.
After the Harare launch in 2001, the gala rotated annually in different
provinces such as Manicaland (Mutare) in 2002, Midlands (Gweru) in
2004, Matabeleland South (Beitbridge) in 2005, Bulawayo in 2006 and
Mashonaland East (Marondera) in 2007. The rotation of the event in
provinces throughout Zimbabwe served to reinforce Nkomo’s status as
‘Umdala Wethu’ (Father of the Nation).
The galas were generally announced weeks in advance on television
and radio through numerous advertising notices a day. State newspapers
such as The Herald published special supplements about Nkomo’s life.
Clips of Nkomo were shown on television repeatedly, illustrated with
music from ZAPU’s choir, the Light Machine Gun (LMG) Choir. A
significant amount of LMG choir recordings were destroyed by govern-
ment officials in the early 1980s and ZBC did not allow their music to be
played during the 1980s because government feared it would help mobi-
lise support for ZAPU.4 However, against the background of the rising
popularity of the opposition party MDC in Matabeleland, Nkomo’s leg-
acy suddenly became useful for the ruling party in efforts to gain support
from those who had supported Nkomo in the past but had switched to
MDC after his death in 1999.
In television clips shown in the weeks before the 2004 edition of the
gala in Gweru, Joshua Nkomo was portrayed in four different ways:
Joshua Nkomo as statesman; Joshua Nkomo as freedom fighter; Joshua
Nkomo as nationalist; and Joshua Nkomo as the unifying force. These
identities which the ruling party emphasised were convenient for its own
purposes and served to mask the way in which Nkomo was viewed by the
state in the early 1980s. ZANU-PF government’s framing of Nkomo as a
national hero in 2000s differed sharply from its construction of Nkomo
as ‘regional dissident’ in the 1980s (Ndlovu-Gatsheni and Willems
2010).
While in the 1980s, Nkomo was considered as a threat to the nation,
he was celebrated as a hero in the changed context of the 2000s and
reinscribed into the nation. This reconstruction should be understood
against the background of political changes occurring in the country.
While Nkomo passed away in July 1999, it was only in July 2001 that
the musical gala was introduced, reinforcing the idea that political moti-
vations were behind introduction of the gala. After ZANU-PF’s loss of a
significant number of parliamentary seats in the June 2000 elections, the
gala was introduced in 2001 in order to gain support from Matabeleland
voters. Later, ZANU-PF government built a statue of Nkomo at the
centre of Bulawayo and renamed the Bulawayo Airport as the Joshua
Mqabuko Nkomo International Airport as part of recognition of his con-
tributions not only to the anti-colonial liberation struggle but to post-
colonial nation-building.
Organisation of the Book

The essays in this book—grouped broadly under Part I ‘Imperialism,
Nationalism, Liberation Struggle and Leadership’; Part II, ‘Legacy,
Diplomacy, Political Philosophy and Fatherhood’; and Part III,
‘Nation-Building, Persecution, Autobiography and Rehabilitation’—

constitute collectively the first ever academic attempt to reflect on the
life and legacy of Joshua Nkomo Mqabuko and his contributions to
the liberation of Zimbabwe and post-colonial nation-building project.
The chapter that follows this introduction is by Eliakim Sibanda—a
Zimbabwean historian based in Canada who has written a book on
ZAPU entitled The Zimbabwe African People’s Union, 1961–1987: A
Political History of Insurgency in Southern Rhodesia (2005). The book
did not focus on Nkomo per se. Here, Sibanda specifically explores
Nkomo’s political life, paying particular attention to his contributions
to the country’s independence. Sibanda reestablishes Nkomo’s role as
founder and leader of key nationalist revolutionary movements that laid
the foundation for the armed struggle and underscores Nkomo’s active
international campaigns for the liberation of Zimbabwe. International
campaigns by Nkomo put the Rhodesia question on the global map and
immensely to eventual attainment of political independence in 1980.
The following chapter, by the military historian Martin Rupiya, which
compliments Sibanda’s analysis very well as it specifically highlights
how Nkomo contributed to the internationalisation of Zimbabwe’s lib-
eration struggle—an aspect that Rupiya argued is downplayed in the
Zimbabwean historiography of the anti-colonial liberation struggle.
Chapter 4 is by Kenneth Tafira. Just like Sibanda and Rupiya, Tafira
continues with the question of rebutting those narratives that tried to
belittle Nkomo’s contribution to the liberation of Zimbabwe. Tafira spe-
cifically builds a convincing case of Nkomo as an astute politician who
consistently worked for unity and peace before and after independence.
Tafira presents two related arguments. The first is that Nkomo’s partici-
pation in talks over a long stretch of time was meant to achieve unity,
peace and independence without excessive loss of life. Pursuit of peace
and unity was never a sign of weakness. The second is that through-
out the struggle against colonialism the question of unity of all libera-
tion movements was a central concern of Nkomo’s political thought. To
Tafira, maintaining unity, peace and harmony was ingrained in the rev-
olutionary armed struggle as inseparable attributes of commitment and
sound leadership as compared to the paradigm of war.
Part 1 is completed by Gorden Moyo and Pathisa Nyathi’s related
chapters that open the canvas to the global context within which Nkomo
operated. Moyo and Nyathi highlight how Nkomo became a victim of
the invisible but active operations of colonial/imperial matrices of power
as well as Cold War coloniality. Moyo’s chapter introduces an important

concept of ‘imperialism of decolonization’ whereby the colonial powers
worked actively but subtle to identify and promote those African lead-
ers they considered of being useful for neo-colonialism and protection of
colonial-white interests after the end of juridical colonialism. He posits
that the British towards the end of their empire were consistently but
invisibly favouring Mugabe over Nkomo. Nkomo, ZAPU and ZIPRA’s
close alliance with the Soviet Union disadvantaged them in the context
of the Cold War coloniality. Moyo also reveals that at Lancaster House
Conference, Mugabe knew the British were on his side and just pre-
tended to be radical to hide his complicity with the imperial power. To
Moyo, Mugabe was a ‘recruited’ and ‘managed’ inheritor of the colo-
nial state of Zimbabwe in the broader context of imperial global designs.
While this sound like part of conspiratorial historiography, it helps in
explaining why the persecution of Nkomo, ZAPU, ZIPRA and his sup-
porters in Matabeleland and the Midlands regions of Zimbabwe in the
1980s, continued without any open condemnation from the Western
capitals for almost 10 years.
Nyathi’s chapter compliments Moyo’s analysis, and it specifically
brings to the fore how the negotiations that took place at Lancaster
House in 1979 were not only underpinned by Cold War coloniality
manoeuvring but also messed up Nkomo’s grand military plan of tak-
ing over Zimbabwe through outright military onslaught on the white
settler colonial state using regular ZIPRA military units. Nyathi builds
his analysis from the fact that ZAPU and ZIPRA under Nkomo’s leader-
ship and command and with the support of the Soviet Union and Cuba
had developed a grand military strategy of using regular and well-trained
and well-equipped mechanised ZIPRA battalions to storm Rhodesia and
execute a clear military takeover. Nyathi postulates that leakage of this
grand military strategy might have contributed to the convening of the
Lancaster House Conference itself to prevent a black liberation army
backed by the Soviets militarily defeating a white settler colonial army
and the colonial state.
Part II opens with the historian Timothy Scarnecchia’s chapter which
paradigmatically shifts the conventional narrative of Nkomo as a vacil-
lating and inconsistent anti-colonial revolutionary through a counter-
narrative which highlights Nkomo as a confident nationalist diplomat.
Scarnecchia posits that less has been written by historians about the
extensive diplomatic work Nkomo engaged in after his release from
detention in 1974. He further asserts that unlike Mugabe, Nkomo was

the recognised leader of the nationalist movement from the perspective
of both sides of the Cold War. He had managed through his connections
developed in the early 1960s to receive training and military weapons
for ZIPRA from the Soviet Union and important Eastern bloc countries
that were willing to invest in the liberation wars of Southern Africa, most
notably Yugoslavia and Bulgaria.
The next chapter is by William Jethro Mpofu, and it posits that both
the affirmations and negations of the political figure of Nkomo tend to
cloud rather than illuminate his status as a political theorist and philoso-
pher of liberation whose ethics of revolutionary struggle privileged dia-
logue and the preservation of life against war and its costs to humanity.
Dispelling the caricatures of affirmation and negation that accompany
the multiplicity of narratives on Nkomo, Mpofu argues that he was nei-
ther a messianic legend nor a cowardly opportunist but was a political
thinker and philosopher of liberation who was formed and shaped by
concrete historical experiences and political conditions of colonialism
under which he was socialised, educated and trained. Drawing inspira-
tion from Enrique Dussel—the father of philosophy of liberation, Mpofu
delves deeper into the liberatory philosophical vision of Nkomo as that
which was not limited to the liberation of black Zimbabweans from
Rhodesian colonialism but one that also incorporated ideas of how to
integrate white Rhodesians into the Zimbabwean nation as full citizens.
The Chap. 3 under Part II is by Blessed Ngwenya who continues the
exercise of delving into the key political assumptions of Nkomo and his
political thought as shown mainly in speeches, his autobiography, and
other writings. Ngwenya highlights how Nkomo was committed to a
philosophy of non-violence which set him apart as a decolonial human-
ist symbol of the paradigm of peace among those who fought for the
liberation of Zimbabwe. Even under overt provocation soon after the
end of the anti-colonial liberation struggle by ZANU-PF government,
Nkomo managed to avoid falling into the paradigm of war. According
to Ngwenya, throughout the liberation struggle, Nkomo remained a
steadfast champion of dialogue by condemning violence as a process that
dehumanised both the colonial master and the colonised subject. Based
on a close reading of Nkomo’s speeches and writings, Ngwenya convinc-
ingly proved that Nkomo realised that the brutal colonial system did
not only need liberation for blacks but the whites too, something fellow
nationalists did not appreciate.
The Chap. 4 is by Morgan Ndlovu who deploys the Fanonian soci-

ogenic approach to make sense of Nkomo’s political behaviour and
political philosophy. Ndlovu delved deeper into the indigenous cultural,
political, epistemological and ideological springs that shaped the politi-
cal philosophy of Nkomo as well as his ideas of the nation and libera-
tion. Also writing on the theme of Nkomo’s political philosophy and
specifically his practical contribution to post-colonial nation-building
is the sociologist Rudo Gaidzanwa who highlights Nkomo’s vision
on land reform and land use in Zimbabwe. Just like Ndlovu’s chapter,
Gaidzanwa delves into Nkomo’s peasant background and experience
with limited landholding in a peasant household and explains how this
influenced his ideas about land policies and land reform. Gaidzanwa also
explored how Nkomo initiated and developed concrete land-based pro-
jects and programmes for peasants, war veterans and others after the end
of the anti-colonial liberation struggle.
The last chapter under Part II is by Everisto Benyera, and it departs
from the prevalent reading of Nkomo in terms of power politics by
introducing a new reading of Nkomo’s contribution to nation-building
from the perspective of transitional justice and politics of national heal-
ing. He excavates Nkomo’s views on transitional justice that are contra
to those of the government he served as he opposed such statist mecha-
nisms as amnesties, indemnities and pardons in favour of truth telling,
reparations, accountability, memorialisation and indeed institutional
reforms. Benyera points that Nkomo was cognisant of the need to seek
accountability for human rights abuses, especially in the Matabeleland
and Midlands Provinces in post-independence Zimbabwe but was not
able to convince ZANU-PF on the need of such a trajectory as the party
and state were directly involved in the commission of atrocities.
Part III opens with a chapter by Busani Mpofu and Sabelo J. Ndlovu-
Gatsheni which compares Joshua Nkomo and Nelson Mandela as poli-
ticians. The justification for comparison springs from the fact that they
belonged to the group of the first generation of African nationalists to
fight anti-colonial struggles that eventually led to black majority in
Zimbabwe and South Africa, respectively. Mpofu and Ndlovu-Gatsheni
posit that Nkomo and Mandela’s overriding quest for peace and unity
presents interesting similarities of the ideas that they had for their coun-
tries and the conceptions of liberation they envisaged. While Nkomo did
not ascend to power as President of Zimbabwe in 1980 as his party lost
elections to a rival nationalist party, Mandela assumed power in 1994.
However, their autobiographies, just like that of other post-colonial

‘fathers of the nation’, give us glimpses of the development of their
political consciousness, the ideas of the Zimbabwe and South Africa they
were fighting to create, and the conceptions of freedom or liberation
that they envisaged, respectively.
The next chapter is by Josiah Nyanda and is informed by a literary
approach predicated on the concepts of hauntology and spectrality in the
reading of how Nkomo used his political memoir to reconstruct the self
and illustrates a specific understanding of reconstructing the self. Nyanda
posits that the memoir presents a life of pain and suffering dedicated to
liberating Zimbabwe and Zimbabweans, first from colonial bondage and,
second from Mugabe’s ZANU-PF’s tyrannical rule. He further argues
that through massive investment in the symbolic infrastructure of pain
and suffering, the memoirs of Nkomo embrace in them the language
of ‘ghosts and the uncanny—or rather anachronic spectrality and haun-
tology’. What emerges from this chapter is that through self-narration,
Nkomo archives himself as a political ghost that cannot be done away
with but whose spectres will forever haunt and occupy that special place
in Zimbabwe’s political history and landscape regardless of how ‘altered’
this ‘terrain of the struggle itself’ is.
The Chap. 3 under Part II is by Tendayi Sithole, and it ventures into a
difficult comparative analysis of two separate ‘self-writings’ by an ex-slave
(Frederick Douglas) and an anti-colonial nationalist leader (Nkomo).
Sithole begins by stating that while his two subjects of study ‘occu-
pied different geographies, lived in different centuries under different
regimes’ they were brought together by a set of existential questions and
concerns about the plight of being human under enslavement, racism
and colonialism. What is interesting about this chapter is the dynamics of
‘self-writings’ of Douglas and Nkomo that both expand into a reflection
of a life under opptression. The last three chapters by Sylvester Dombo,
Henry Chiwaura and Thabisani Ndlovu address the common themes of
memory, memorialisation, immortalisation and commemoration.
Dombo’s chapter looks at the struggle over the memory of Nkomo
in Zimbabwe’s history through the lens of the press, both private and
state media. He posits that while the state media sought to overlook
the controversies surrounding the relationship between Nkomo and
the ZANU-PF government, the private media effectively promoted
debate on and about his life pointing to his treatment at independ-
ence as demeaning. The private press thus questioned the choice of the
selection of makers of his statue, the place to erect his statue and what
it meant to the state viz-a-vis what it meant to the veteran nationalists’
supporters. The chapter is focused on the immortalisation of Nkomo
into Zimbabwe’s cultural landscape. The immortalisation of Nkomo
can shade light on the complex nature of nationalism in Zimbabwe.
Chiwaura shifts the lens to the immortalisation of Nkomo through a
statue, grave and naming process.
This book ends with Thabisani Ndlovu’s rich chapter which employs
heritage interpretation as a lens to read contestations over the statue(s)
of the late Joshua Nkomo with a view to examine the role of statuary
in recent Zimbabwean historiography. The process of unveiling the
bronze statue of Nkomo on 22 December 2013 at the intersection of
8th Avenue and Main Street, and the subsequent name change of the
latter to JM Nkomo Street, was a slow process mired in contestation and
controversy. While it took government more than 6 years to sanction the
name change as proposed by the city council of Bulawayo, the bronze
statue (one of a pair) of Nkomo had to be taken down before its offi-
cial unveiling in 2010, following complaints by the Nkomo family and
Bulawayo public. The government had planned that the second of the
two statues would be erected in Harare’s Karigamombe Centre to which
there were objections by both the Nkomo family and the owners of the
space for the proposed site, revealing the importance of the spatialisation
of public memory. The focus of this chapter is on the Bulawayo statue,
which was (re)erected on the spot where that of Cecil John Rhodes used
to be, facing the same direction (North) suggesting some kind of disso-
nance.
Conclusion
This book is written in a context of Zimbabwe where ZANU-PF has not
only monopolised power but also history of the nation. What Ranger
(2004) depicted as ‘patriotic history’ is consistently mobilised to silence
other pertinent histories. The choice of Nkomo as a subject of this book
is a modest means meant to address the broad question of silencing in
history and existential suffering through delving deeper into politics of
the nation and its narration. What emerges poignantly is that anti-colonial
nationalism was not only a terrain of liberation visions but contestations
among nationalist actors. The contestations were described by Masipula
Sithole as part of ‘struggles-within-the struggle’. What also emerges is
that Nkomo’s political life story was in large measure intertwined with the
historical tapestry of the evolution of Zimbabwe from a colony to post-
colonial nationhood. His story is that of an active politician and tran-
scends colonial and post-colonial divides of Zimbabwean political history.
Political contestations over power dovetailed into equally complex and
competing nationalist regimes of truth in the broader context of produc-
tion and reproduction of history of the nation through political narra-
tives and rhetoric. These representations are significant as another way
through which one could understand the consistent underlying competi-
tions for dominance among key nationalist actors throughout the strug-
gle for Zimbabwe. This book offers a window into struggles-within-the
struggle and struggles-after-the-struggle. There is no doubt that nation-
alist politicians had permanent political interests rather than permanent
opponents. Through use of political rhetoric, they built enemies, and
through the same process, they rehabilitated those enemies as long as it
was convenient to their political stakes of the day.
Notes
1. The term has been used extensively in existential philosophy, notably by
Jean-Paul Sartre in Being and Nothingness to define the relations between
‘Self’ and ‘Other’ in creating self-awareness and ideas of identity. The con-
cept of the ‘Other’ has also been widely used in post-colonial theory. Their
definition of the ‘Other’ is rooted in Freudian and post-Freudian analysis
of the formation of subjectivity, most notably in the work of the psycho-
analyst and cultural theorist Jacques Lacan.
2. This was clearly demonstrated by the effective use of the picture taken after
the signing of the unity accord in which Mugabe and Nkomo grabbed
each other’s hand and raised them high. This picture was used in the 1990
elections representing Nkomo and Mugabe as ‘the stars of Zimbabwe’.
3. This insignificant party finally joined ranks with Edgar Tekere’s Zimbabwe
Unity Movement (ZUM) that contested the 1990 elections on the plat-
form of resisting a one-party state in Zimbabwe.
4. Sibanda, Maxwell, Music central tool in Zimbabwe election, 29 March
2005, available from: http://www.freemuse.org/sw8620.asp (last
accessed: 24 March 2017).
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PART I
Imperialism, Nationalism, Liberation

and Leadership
CHAPTER 2
The Contributions of Joshua Nkomo

to the Liberation of Zimbabwe
Eliakim M. Sibanda
Introduction
Joshua Nkomo was one of the dominant forces in the anti-colonial
independence movements in colonial Zimbabwe between 1949 and
1980, and then a major political figure in independent Zimbabwe from
1980 until his death in 1999. Nkomo’s fame survived his electoral
defeat in 1980. Even those hostile to him conceded he possessed great
abilities and a streak of genius, as evidenced by his contributions to the
decolonization and building of Zimbabwe, which made him an endur-
ing hero. When he was leader of ZAPU, Nkomo played a robust part in
the rough-and-tumble of national politics of decolonization. His image
as a nationalist had, however, a distorting effect which opened him to
both positive and negative mythmaking. Interestingly, these negative
myths of 1980–1987 were remarkably different from the great hero as
he was generally perceived to be in the 1990s and posthumously. This
chapter explores Nkomo’s political life, paying particular attention to
his contributions to the country’s independence, and how it sharpened
E.M. Sibanda (*) 
University of Winnipeg, Winnipeg, Canada

50 E.M. Sibanda
the beginnings of an independent Zimbabwe. Specifically it focuses on

his role as founder and leader of revolutionary movements and his inter-
national campaign for the liberation of Zimbabwe which contributed
immensely to its independence. Because a lot has been written over the
years on Nkomo’s perceived weaknesses, this chapter will not repeat
those foibles of his although some might criticize it as hagiography.
Thus, in a way, this chapter must be understood against a broader tapes-
try of the African liberation and anti-colonial discourse.
Early Trade Unionism and Leading the Southern

Rhodesia African National Congress (SRANC):
1948–1959
Nkomo’s decision to take on a position in 1947 as organizing secretary
of the Rhodesian African Workers’ Union launched him on a political
path. Black politics until then had never articulately questioned and chal-
lenged white supremacy, contenting itself with petitions for better liv-
ing conditions, neither were previous unions, such as the 1948 SRANC
led by Reverend Thompson Samkange, very radical. The SRANC, the
African Voice Association, and the Reformed Industrial and Commercial
Workers’ Union not only spoke actively against racial discrimination, but
also seem to have accepted the inevitability of some form of white domi-
nation.
In 1948, Nkomo was employed by the Rhodesian Railways,
a government department that was headquartered in the industrial
city of Bulawayo (Nkomo 2001: 45). He was one of the first black
Africans to be given a senior managerial office in the company, which
was led entirely by whites and relegated blacks to the lower ranks. He
worked as a welfare officer, attending to the working and living condi-
tions of railway workers (Ranger 2010: 196). This position required him
to be in constant contact with the grievances of the ordinary African
worker. He also lived with them in the compounds in Bulawayo, where
the conditions were squalid and unfavourable. Nkomo travelled often
between Bulawayo and Lusaka on business, witnessed inequities in the
distribution of jobs in colonial economic organizations.
In the same year, Nkomo was also elected president of the African
Railway Employees Association (Scarnecchia 2008: 72). The association
had been founded in 1946, when it organized a massive strike. It was
2 THE CONTRIBUTIONS OF JOSHUA NKOMO … 51
one of the earliest formidable workers’ unions to emerge in Southern

Rhodesia and was a political force in its own right. The 1946 strike had
taken place while Nkomo was still in South Africa, however, so he did
not yet realize the threat this institution was beginning to pose to white
dominance of the railway industry. The association’s strike was seen as
first evidence of the ‘waking up’ of the African working class in oppo-
sition to colonial domination, and Nkomo had just become its leader
(Bond et al. 2015: 123–124). Whether or not this was his intention,
almost overnight Nkomo became the face of African working-class resist-
ance to colonial injustice.
The African Railway Employees Association was forced to assume
a political role in the late 1940s due to the Southern Rhodesian gov-
ernment’s increasingly oppressive approach towards African workers.
Though not illegal, workers’ unions were resented by whites. In addi-
tion, the demands of the African workers had evolved from social wel-
fare issues, such as better food rations, to more important issues, such
as adequate accommodation and improved wages. This shift was impor-
tant because it affected key state institutions such as the Native Affairs
department. It was evident that the association was incubating the ear-
liest forms of black insurgency against colonialism and was the most
organized black movement of the time. Joshua Nkomo thus became
the leader of the biggest black movement in Southern Rhodesia, and (in
more ways than one) the development of the African Railway Employees
Association presented him with the opportunity to incubate his future
political career.
From being a union organizer, Nkomo became involved in the early
1950s with African political movements. When he got back from South
Africa in 1948, he found a weak local SRANC, which a few revolu-
tionaries, Clement Muchachi, Jerry Vera, Aaron Mazibisa, and Edward
Ndlovu, were trying to strengthen. It was a regional political party based
in Bulawayo, the second city of the country (Sellström 2003: 294). Its
concerns only included local grievances, not pushing for constitutional
and political changes, and Nkomo was elected its president in 1952.
Evidently, the SRANC’s members had been impressed by his ability to
mobilize support and had witnessed his vibrant leadership of the African
Railway Employees Association after becoming its president in 1948.
He initially rejected the offer, but was convinced by friend and fellow
politician, Eric Dumbutshena, to take up the task (Nkomo 2001: 82).
52 E.M. Sibanda
One of Nkomo’s most important attributes was his talent both for
sensitizing the workers to bigger issues and for mobilizing them against
colonial rule. Under his leadership, the African Railway Employees
Association evolved from a workers’ union concerned only with work-
related welfare to concern with broader issues demanding the Southern
Rhodesian government’s political attention. The calls for equality
between whites and blacks spilled over from the workplace and industry
into the political sphere. It was through the example set by the African
Railway Workers Association that blacks began to demand suffrage
and representation in decision-making bodies at both institutional and
national levels.
No doubt in response to such a growing sentiment, in 1952, the
white settler communities in Southern Rhodesia, Northern Rhodesia,
and Nyasaland intensified their discussion to form a Federation in
order to further consolidate and entrench their power. It was first nec-
essary, however, to consult with Britain the colonizing power. Through
Reverend Percy Ibbotson (a man Nkomo respected), Prime Minister Sir
Godfrey Huggins invited Nkomo to be part of the Southern African del-
egation to the London Conference that was making preparations for this
Federation. Before he responded, Nkomo consulted with his SRANC
executive who after reluctantly agreed that Nkomo be part of the del-
egation, warning that he should reject the whole idea of the Federation.
Through its connection with other African movements from Northern
Rhodesia and Nyasaland, the SRANC executive was aware that their
counterparts were vehemently opposed to the notion of the Federation,
which they feared would concentrate power in white hands and unduly
delay what they saw as inevitable independence.
The London Federation talks of 1952 proved that Nkomo was not
only a respected African leader, but also a politically attentive one who
listened to the voices of millions of aggrieved Africans. Initially, Huggins
had chosen Nkomo on the basis that he was respected by fellow Africans
and would make a good and submissive representative (Casey 2007:
93–95). Nkomo was also selected on the basis that the negotiations
needed the nominal presence of an African leader. After the fact, there
is some irony in Nkomo at time being viewed as a passive African leader
who would not threaten the agenda of the Rhodesian government.
Nkomo must have surprised his sponsors when he strongly spoke about
the concerns of the Africans in national affairs and their widespread dis-
approval of the idea of Federation.
Despite African resistance, however, the Federation was imposed in

1953, and a negligible number of non-whites were invited to sit in par-
liament. After failing to win his party’s support for his own candidacy,
Nkomo ran for the African seat in Bulawayo, his home town, and lost.
Despite his role in opposing the Federation, his participation in these
elections (though unsuccessful) would be counted against him by his
comrades in the early 1960s as one of the reasons they needed to break
away from his party to form a new one that was less likely to collaborate
with the colonial status quo.
Federation saw the intensification of nationalism on the part of
Africans and added to the hardship that the black population was already
enduring. For instance, in 1923, African voting rights were restricted by
the imposition of financial property, as well as educational and owner-
ship requirements. In 1930, their lands were expropriated through the
introduction of the Land Apportionment Act, giving blacks, who were
95% of the population, less than two-thirds of the available land, and
whites, who were 5%, a third, which also happened to include the best
arable land. These laws were followed by the Industrial Conciliation Act
(1934), which unfairly regulated the state of trade unions, wages and
industrial workers, and the Native Land Husbandry Act (1951), which
restricted the number of cattle blacks could own and abolished commu-
nal land ownership.
In response to these restrictive laws and the formation of the
Federation, Africans became politically radicalized. By the mid-1950s, a
new generation of activists had emerged that went beyond mere petition-
ing for better living conditions to demanding majority rule. These activ-
ists formed the Southern Rhodesia National Youth League under the
leadershipof James Chikerema, Edson Sithole, and George Nyandoro.
The Youth League was later joined by Jason Z. Moyo, Lazarus Nkala,
and Joseph Msika. This group was radical in its demands and severely
criticized the ‘tea time partnership’ of interracial organizations. The
group’s greatest achievement was the boycott it organized in August
1956 to protest the hike in bus fares for blacks living in Salisbury. The
Youth League suffered essentially from the same weakness from which
the SRANC suffered; however, it too was regional, with no membership
beyond Salisbury. The government responded to this protest by intro-
ducing the Unlawful Assemblies Act to try and suppress any future such
opposition.
54 E.M. Sibanda
In August 1955, Nkomo became one of the founding members of the

revived SRANC (first called the Southern Rhodesia Bantu Congress, in
Bulawayo) and its president. As a somewhat elitist group itself, its main
objective was to mitigate rather than eradicate African grievances. They
resorted to delegations and petitions as a way of influencing the settler
government to govern them better; however, they needed a leader who
was both respectable and educated. Nkomo met both of those criteria:
he had a university degree and was already widely known through his
union activities at the Railways. With the introduction of the Unlawful
Assemblies Act, Nkomo quickly became aware that the SRANC’s elit-
ist approach could not respond adequately to the hardships the govern-
ment had imposed. The approach needed was a national one and so he
resigned from the party.
On 12 September 1957, the African National Congress combined
with the Youth League to form the Southern Rhodesia African National
Congress (SRANC), which gave the new organization a national charac-
ter. The new party then decided to find skilful leadership that was already
prominent, so Nkomo was elected the first president of the expanded
SRANC. His arrival on the scene also marked a generational shift in
the political landscape. This was a time of mass politics, a phenomenon
unknown before, so much so that the formation of SRANC has been
considered the beginning of mass African nationalist engagement. While
its main goals were modest, it opposed racial laws contained in the con-
stitution and demanded equal treatment.
Nkomo’s desire for the SANC to become a mass party, encompass-
ing both educated and uneducated Africans from both rural and urban
areas, became a reality as the party dealt with issues causing discontent
among all Africans. By early 1958, the weekly political meetings became
huge mass rallies. Nkomo, whose addresses were more conversational,
intimate, and charismatic, riveted large audiences. He drew comparisons
with Lobengula and Nehanda, reminding people of resistance that had
occurred half a century ago. His speeches buttressed the continuity of
struggle, which resonated with his audiences. Consequently, he attracted
massive followings all over the country, showing great empathy, a quality
that is so crucial to any politician’s success.
Nkomo played also a pivotal role in internationalizing the Southern
Rhodesia political crisis through attendance at successive confer-
ences, including the 1953 Constitutional Review Conference held in
London (Nkomo 2001: 58). It was during these political trips that he
encountered various civic organizations, religious groups, civil rights

movements, labour groups, and trade unions, all of which showed sym-
pathy to the plight of the Africans (Nkomo 2001: 58). Although the
SRANC was still a small political movement, Nkomo managed to broad-
cast the plight of the Africans to the Western world through various con-
ferences and events in Britain. The current plight of the Africans was not
much in the public eye; Nkomo enlightened the Western world about
the harsh colonial privations that Africans experienced in their country.
Although Nkomo showed great leadership and strength, the SRANC
proved not to be militant enough to deal with strongly established
colonial institutions. This was witnessed in the 1956 Salisbury Bus
Boycott in which urban dwellers, industrial workers, and the City Youth
League staged a demonstration by boycotting state-run bus services
on urban routes such as from Highfield to the central business district
(Muzondidya 2005: 168). In this protest against the colonial administra-
tion, the SRANC failed to increase support among Africans. In addition,
the SRANC failed to export the demonstrations to other towns and cities
such as Bulawayo and Gwelo, where Africans were facing the same chal-
lenges. In his biography, Nkomo admitted that the SRANC failed to reg-
ister itself as an effective political movement, leading to his resignation
in 1956 and signalling his personal dissatisfaction with the organization
(Nkomo 2001: 70).
International politics were also changing in a positive way for
Nkomo and his party. Ghana became the first sub-Saharan country to
get its independence from Britain in 1957; this resulted in a national-
ist euphoria in most African countries, particularly those under British
rule (Bourret 1960). An independent Ghana offered Nkomo’s SRANC
financial and political support. Through those improved relations,
Nkomo attended Kwame Nkrumah’s All-African People’s Conference in
Ghana, meeting with other nationalist leaders from across Africa. There
Nkomo and others learned new techniques of agitation and subversion
and adopted the doctrine of pan-Africanism, which he merged with his
party’s political agenda. As a pan-Africanist, he and his party were com-
mitted to the liberation and unity of Africans across the continent and
the struggle for the total liberation of Africa (Sibanda 2005: 73).
By 1959, the SRANC, thanks to Nkomo, had become a known rev-
olutionary movement. President Nassir of Egypt had offered financial
support to the party as early as 1959 after making contact with Nkomo
(Nkomo 2001: 78). Thus, Nkomo’s role on the continental front made
56 E.M. Sibanda
the SRANC stronger and more widely known. In the eyes of some of his
lieutenants and some liberal white supporters of the struggle at the time,
his international travels were criticized as a jet-setting performance that
epitomized his personal flaws; in reality, however, these trips gained the
party invaluable political capital both regionally and internationally.
On 26 February 1959, the SRANC was banned by parliament under
the newly passed Unlawful Organizations Act, effectively putting a stop
to the nationalist movement for just under a year. Nkomo was travelling
in Cairo at the time (Nkomo 2001: 78) and was not among the 500
arrested. He was able to establish a base in London in the interim and
was chosen as president of the new, more radical New Democratic Party
(NDP) upon his return to Rhodesia. It can thus be argued that it was
through Nkomo’s leadershipthat the SRANC became enough of a threat
to the white supremacist regime in Southern Rhodesia that it, in self-
defence, had to intervene to curtail its activities. As a result of the ban,
Nkomo was forced into exile for 22 months away from home, fuelling
further opposition to colonial rule and enhancing his public role in the
struggle.
Return from Exile and Leading the National

Democratic Party (NDP) 1960–1961
The ban of the SRANC in 1959 was intended to derail the national-
ists’ agenda of political freedom and equality in Southern Rhodesia.
The arrest of leaders such as James Chikerema and George Nyandoro
was only part of the colonial government’s strategy to thwart any nas-
cent revolutionary plans. For Nkomo and other leaders, the ban of the
SRANC meant a more aggressive political stance was required. It was
Nkomo’s desire to see an independent Zimbabwe that prompted the
formation of a successive nationalist party, despite the prevailing hostile
political climate.
Nkomo returned to Southern Rhodesia to embark on a more militant
struggle for political independence amidst increased mass support. At
Salisbury International Airport, he was met by 50,000 supporters, which
signalled the beginning of more aggressive nationalism (Nkomo 2001:
93). Nkomo drew new support as the icon of revolutionary activity in
the country, being both a nationalist and traditional leader (Ranger
1999b: 3–4). His role as president of the NDP became intimately
associated with the celebrated First Chimurenga wars of 1896–1897,

which had resisted colonial encroachment. Nkomo received traditional
semi-military paraphernalia from one of the spirit mediums who had
fought in the First Chimurenga. This gesture cemented his status as a
leader of liberation movements in the country (Nkomo 2001: 93). The
praise name Chibwechitedza (a ‘Slippery Rock’) was also given to Nkomo
in honour of his role in leading the nationalist movements on his return
from exile. Nkomo’s return marked a renewed interest in the ongoing
struggle and resuscitated the hopes of many nationalists who were incar-
cerated in prisons and concentration camps, thus giving him iconic sta-
tus.
As president of the NDP, Nkomo was invited to resolve Rhodesia’s
constitutional future at a British conference in Salisbury in 1961. There,
Nkomo accepted a deal giving nationalists 15 of the 65 parliamentary
seats, even though this franchise agreement would delay majority rule
several decades. Though this deal upset many ZAPU members, includ-
ing Mugabe, Nkomo was unable to renege on it once negotiations had
been concluded and it became law in 1962. While the party increasingly
disagreed on a number of issues including ideology and tactics, Nkomo’s
method of constitutional negotiations was the only one that reached the
international scene, including both the African Congress and the United
Nations. Those that opposed him offered no clear and viable alternative
and conceded that Nkomo was still popular within the country (Ranger
1963). The acceptance of the new constitution had a brighter side to it
for the African population; it denied the whites any form of independ-
ence from Britain that excluded them, and introduced a bill of rights that
nationalists were able to use to argue or appeal their cases.
Echoing what happened to SRANC, the NDP was banned in
September 1961. ZAPU was formed by the banned NDP leaders on
17 December 1961, 10 days later (Sibanda 2005: 72). By this time, the
party’s support had grown to include people of all classes in urban and
rural areas. All this occurred under the presidency of Joshua Nkomo.
The new movement was different from its predecessor because it was
more consistent in its call for total independence as well as its strategy to
win the country through military confrontation. To that end, it formed
one of the earliest modern guerrilla armies in the country, the Zimbabwe
People’s Revolutionary Army (ZIPRA). There was also a war council,
which worked specifically towards the war cause.
58 E.M. Sibanda
Nkomo’s direction for the reconstituted party did not change, how-
ever, and some nationalist leaders within the party became increasingly
frustrated with a perceived lack of progress. As president of ZAPU,
Nkomo was criticized for being indecisive and weak, while security laws
still constricted nationalist activities. Nkomo wished to continue nego-
tiations through constitutional means, however. He hoped majority rule
could be reached through peaceful negotiations through the support of
the international community. Nkomo believed that Britain eventually
would be forced to intervene in Rhodesia, implementing majority rule
for them. In order to make contacts abroad, Nkomo thus travelled often,
leaving ZAPU without effective leadership at home. When ZAPU was
banned in September 1962 and other leaders were arrested, Nkomo
was once again out of reach, this time in Lusaka, and so avoided arrest,
remaining abroad to establish a government in exile. Many nationalist
leaders, disillusioned with the ineffectiveness of the international com-
munity, were starting to believe that Africans in Zimbabwe were the only
ones who could bring about liberation for Zimbabwe. These factors,
combined with personality clashes and the divisive role played by white
liberals who supported the nationalists, led to a split among the nation-
alist leaders in 1963. Fifteen of them left ZAPU to form ZANU, the
Zimbabwe African National Union, under the leadership of Ndabaningi
Sithole. The split led to unprecedented violence and hostility between
ZAPU and ZANU supporters, no doubt to the delight of the white
establishment.
At this point, both ZAPUand ZANU acknowledged that constitu-
tional negotiations were not advancing their cause. Nkomo turned to
the Soviet Union for support, and ZAPU became recognized as one of
the ‘authentic seven’ black nationalist movements by the Organization of
African Unity. ZAPU was given military and diplomatic support from the
Soviet Union and was encouraged by other nationalist groups striving for
independence in Africa.
When Nkomo returned to the country, he was sent to a desolate
detainment camp at Gonakudzingwa and remained there for 10 years
starting April 1964. While in exile, Nkomo had continued to lead ZAPU
and maintained control over its Soviet-trained military wing, ZIPRA.
Though recognizing the effectiveness of guerrilla warfare, Nkomo main-
tained his position preferring diplomacy to guerrilla warfare. This created
increased suspicion and hostility from ZANU and its military compo-
nent, Zimbabwe African National Liberation Army (ZANLA), who
relied heavily on guerrilla war tactics. Progress towards independence

was impeded by ongoing clashes between the two groups.
Nkomo’s role in the road to independence during this period thus
was characterized by ongoing negotiations with the ruling Southern
Rhodesian government. The white regime under Garfield Todd was will-
ing to address the political imbalances in the colony, but without reduc-
ing the economic autonomy of the white minority. Nkomo negotiated
with the Todd government on several occasions, but the two differed on
the issue of majority rule and ‘one man, one vote’. Despite these seri-
ous differences, Nkomo convinced the Todd government to adjust the
constitution in order to pave the way for negotiations with the hope of
making an easy political transition to majority rule. In terms of deal-
ing with the constitutional impasse during this period, Nkomo gained
considerable ground when the government agreed to suspend the con-
stitution. As a result, in 1960, Nkomo issued a joint statement with
Todd announcing the suspension of the Southern Rhodesian constitu-
tion (Ranger 1992: 72). This was a landmark step, as the constitution
was the primary weapon used to systematically and effectively subject
Africans to perpetual subordination. It had also been used to disenfran-
chise Africans through land clauses and the protection of white enter-
prise. Thus, Nkomo’s role in suspending the constitution in 1960 was of
cardinal importance on the road to independence because he had man-
aged to also have suspended, the legislative apparatus that had haunted
the African masses for decades during colonialism.
Nkomo’s leadership capabilities had also been sharpened by the rough
political environment in Southern Rhodesia as well as his exposure to inter-
national politics. Ranger vividly captures how the personality of Nkomo
had, within a short period of time, developed a strong political stamina:
I have heard Joshua speak twice since his return from London - once at a
meeting of 20, 000. He seems to have gained greatly in stature […] I am
glad Joshua came back at once so that he could take a firm grip on the
situation here […]. (Ranger 1992: 90)
Clearly, Nkomo’s return from exile was a landmark political development

in the colony, which led in turn to an improved political strategy. His
return was a well-timed political move which ensured continuity of the
quest for independence in Southern Rhodesia.
60 E.M. Sibanda
Furthermore, the 1961 demonstrations under the leadership of

Nkomo signalled the dawn of an aggressive revolution, something that
was to remain visible throughout the liberation struggle. Previously,
Nkomo had pursued dialogue with the Rhodesian government as early
as 1949 as well as in the constitutional review talks of the early 1950s.
There was thus a clear shift between Nkomo’s earlier dialogue approach
and this new approach in the early 1960s under the NDP. Nkomo, as
the president of the NDP, should be credited for driving the nationalist
elements from a position of restraint, which had proved ineffective, into
more direct opposition to colonial rule.
The beginning of Nkomo’s militancy may be traced to the 29 of
November 1961 when he convened a meeting with the agenda of
crippling industry, the backbone of the colonial economy (Nkomo
2001: 118). At the meeting, Nkomo requested all the people present
to take off their shoes, a symbolic act associated with preparation for
a major task. The taking off of shoes signalled that Nkomo and his
NDP were ready to destroy Rhodesian industry as part of their new
strategy to weaken the government. This undoubtedly helped cul-
tivated a much-needed militancy in the minds of ordinary Africans.
Although it took a long time, the seeds of Nkomo’s changed approach
were to bear fruit throughout the liberation struggle, both in urban
and in rural areas, as the masses cooperated to defeat the colonial
government.
The ban of the party and restriction of its leaders is proof that Nkomo
and his colleagues had achieved success in mobilizing Africans under a
systematic political framework. The NDP had become the biggest politi-
cal movement representing the plight of the Africans in the region.
Among other achievements, Nkomo had opposed the government’s
oppressive land policies, had led demonstrations against the referendum,
and had eloquently expressed the African voice to the Rhodesian govern-
ment. Meanwhile, the ban of NDP did not deter Nkomo from working
towards the political independence of Rhodesia. In fact, the end of the
NDP placed Nkomo at the centre of the armed struggle within ZAPU
party.
Nkomo’s ability to withstand internal divisions in the NDP helped
ensure continuation of the struggle for independence. These differences
assumed varying forms at different times. Of particular importance in
this case was internal opposition against Nkomo which emerged in the
backdrop of the ‘Destroy Industry’ campaign of 1961. Nkomo’s greatest

internal opposition came from trade unionists in the party who opposed
the destruction of the colonial economy. Their basic argument was that
the destruction of the colonial economy would have devastating ripple
effects on the urban population that depended entirely on these institu-
tions, as the colonial economy was comprised of agriculture, mining, and
the manufacturing industry.
At the same time, Nkomo’s acceptance of the 1961 constitution
resulted in the widening of the political differences within the NDP. The
proposed constitution between the British government, the Southern
Rhodesian government, and Nkomo had set aside 15 seats for Africans
in parliament out of 65 seats. This quota was seen as inadequate by
many, considering the fact that the Africans who were to be given only
15 seats in parliament were the majority and comprised more than 80%
of the entire population. In addition, the proposed arrangement had
actually reduced the participation of Africans in overall decision-making
instead of increasing it (Ranger 1992: 95). The results of these talks and
the proposed constitution showed that Nkomo had failed to bargain for
what the Africans really wanted: one man, one vote, and equal represen-
tation.
Michael Mawema, based in Salisbury, and Leopold Takawira in
London then became the greatest of Nkomo’s critics (Ranger 1992: 95).
Writing on 15 February 1961, nationalist leader Maurice Nyagumbo
expressed his disapproval of Nkomo’s actions, arguing that ‘the results of
the constitutional talks were very disappointing. The franchise was raised
instead of lowering it. Only 15 Africans in parliament out of 65 mem-
bers’ (Ranger 1992: 95). Although the proposed arrangement did not
come to fruition, it is clear that Nkomo’s alleged political blunder had
divided the party. Those in prison, including Maurice Nyagumbo, were
also seriously divided.
In the face of mounting internal opposition and attacks by the
Rhodesian security forces, however, Nkomo was still able to maintain his
strong command of the party structures. He organized a mediation con-
ference in Accra, Ghana, where the nationalist leader met with Kwame
Nkrumah, who commanded great influence among African liberation
movements. Nkrumah’s mediation was credited with stabilizing the
party, but the role of Nkomo in settling the differences should not be
overlooked.
62 E.M. Sibanda
Nkomo’s Political Career with the Zimbabwe African

People’s Union (ZAPU), 1961–1980
In 1962, ZAPU under Nkomo’s leadership became the first nationalist
party in the country to explicitly call for independence on a one man,
one vote basis (Sibanda 2005: 72). During this period, the majority of
Africans could not qualify to vote due to the oppressive nature of colo-
nial governments which qualified voters on the basis of education and
economic status. Only those who met a certain economic standard and
formal education could qualify for suffrage. Because most Africans dur-
ing this time had not attained the required level of economic status and
education, they did qualify in the required economic class. Suffrage
thus was clearly determined on racial basis. In effect, whites were indis-
criminately given the right to vote regardless of their status, ability to
pay taxes, or level of education. Thus, the founding of Nkomo’s ZAPU
interrupted this strongly established racist system.
By calling for independence through one man, one vote, Nkomo and
ZAPU were forging political equality in the country; this became one of
the major cornerstones of the struggle for independence. One man, one
vote implied that Africans, Europeans, Asians, and those of mixed race
needed to be viewed as equal. This call for equality was an important step
in sensitizing other Africans who had been influenced to believe that they
were politically, ideologically, and economically inferior to whites. The
call for political equality awakened Africans to the possibility of democ-
racy and majority rule, which became the motivation for the more mili-
tant demand for both political independence and the equality of races.
The calls for political equality were also important because they
exposed the Southern Rhodesian government’s constitutional and legal
imbalances. The unequal treatment of Africans symbolized the citizen
versus subject relations in which the African was only allowed to play a
minor role in decision-making. The Southern Rhodesian constitution
protected these imbalances and racial biases through the respective con-
stitutional clauses meant to reduce the autonomy of Africans in decision-
making and political activities of the colony. The stance by Nkomo and
other leaders allowed Africans to view themselves as equal to their colon-
isers, motivating them to face the colonial government and demand their
independence through military confrontation if negotiations failed.
This approach was important to ZAPU movement and to Africans in
various ways. First, the call for independence on a one man, one vote
basis showed a common grievance of all Africans, resulting in the emer-

gence of a common call, demanding equality and suffrage. Second, it was
ideologically potent, providing the focus for negotiation or the justifi-
cation for military confrontation. It became the major rallying point in
various negotiations, including the 1979 Lancaster House Agreement
that eventually resulted in independence in 1980. The demand for equal-
ity thus was of crucial importance in the much-awaited transition from
white minority rule to majority rule by Africans.
Nkomo’s tenure as the president of ZAPU also witnessed the interna-
tionalization of what came to be known as the Rhodesian crisis. Nkomo
spent the first half of 1962 lobbying countries such as Cuba, Russia,
Egypt, and Ethiopia to support the war of independence (Sibanda 2005:
73). He negotiated with the British government, which had considerable
influence in the political affairs of Southern Rhodesia. Nkomo also lob-
bied for support from other African leaders such as King Hailie Selassie
of Ethiopia, who provided him with much-needed financial and moral
support. He also established good relations with President of Egypt,
Nasser, spending several weeks there, where he acquired financial and
military support in preparation for a full-scale war against the colonial
government. Support from these foreign governments pushed the colo-
nial authorities to the negotiating table to work on a political transition,
because the alternative was becoming more ominous. In the end, the
Rhodesian government was forced to announce a ceasefire to pave way
for the negotiations that culminated in the 1979 Lancaster talks and sub-
sequent majority elections in 1980.
Nkomo’s role in the internationalization of the Rhodesian war was
more evident in the post-1975 period after Mozambique attained its
independence. The geopolitics of the Southern African region became
tense after the defeat of the Portuguese in Mozambique because the
incoming FRELIMO government was sympathetic to the national-
ist cause (Mzumara 2011: 359). Chigwedere (2003: 2), an historian,
argued that this resulted in Britainand the USA pressuring Ian Smith to
accept majority rule in Southern Rhodesia or risk the country’s military
takeover by a Communist black government. Thus, he conclude that due
to the pressure exerted by Nkomo, other nationalists, and foreign gov-
ernments, Ian Smith thus eventually accepted the idea of majority rule
(Chigwedere 2003: 2).
It was not an idle threat, either. ZAPU began its first armament ini-
tiative in 1962 after Nkomo had acquired firearms from Egypt with the
64 E.M. Sibanda
help of President Nasser. The weapons were smuggled across borders

through Tanzania and Zambia, and with the help of other nationalists
like Joseph Msika, the weapons were destined for Southern Rhodesia
with the hope of launching attacks against specific state institutions and
government officials. Although the firearms were confiscated by the
police before reaching Bulawayo, the mission served as a warning to the
colonial government of what a failure in negotiations certainly would
mean.
Throughout his career ZAPU, Nkomo managed to amass politi-
cal support through his multi-racial approach. His party included peo-
ple of different racial backgrounds—whites of European origin, those of
mixed race mainly in Salisbury, and Asians, particularly Indians. ZAPU
under Nkomo not only accommodated non-Africans in its structures,
but also gave them leadership positions, illustrating that the struggle
was not against the white race, but against a system of racial discrimi-
nation. Such figures included, for example, Judith Todd, daughter of
former Rhodesian Prime Minister Sir Garfield Todd, who was eventu-
ally deported by the Ian Smith government for her role in the national-
ist movement (Nkomo 2001: 68). On 15 June 1962, Terence Ranger,
a white academic from the University of Rhodesia and Nyasaland,
was elected ZAPU’s deputy district chairperson (Ranger 1992: 128).
Ranger remained active in nationalist politics together with his wife,
Shelagh. The ZAPU branch under the leadership of Steve Lombard at
the University College of Rhodesia and Nyasaland (UCRN) was domi-
nated by whites, demonstrating that race was not a primary concern
for Nkomo and other ZAPU nationalists. Marlborough, a white-domi-
nated suburb in Salisbury, was under the leadership of Margaret Moore
(Ranger 1992: 128). There was also a ZAPU branch in Acadia, an area
comprised of mixed races.
Nkomo was also on the forefront of a campaign against racism in
Southern Rhodesia. ‘Citizens Against the Colour Bar’ was most promi-
nent in 1961, although it remained a part of the nationalist discourse
up to the independence period (Ranger 1992: 83). In his biography,
Nkomo writes: ‘We did what we could to show that our fight was not a
racial one, against the whites, but for all the people of the country. From
white supporters outside, we received precious help’ (Nkomo 2001:
137). Ranger observed that for Nkomo, however, the campaign against
the colour bar was a step towards a greater goal—to swim with whites,
not in pools but in parliament (Ranger 1992: 88). Thus, it can be argued
Nkomo popularized the notion of racial and for that matter, ethnic
equality, thereby laying the foundations for militant mass nationalism in
the colony that rose above race and ethnicity.
Continued militancy by ZAPU under Nkomo resulted in its ban by
the government in 1962, followed by house arrests of its leaders, includ-
ing Nkomo, who were restricted to their rural homes for 3 months.
Nkomo made sure that the quest for freedom would not die by creat-
ing a temporary reprieve called the People’s Caretaker Council (PCC) in
1962. The PCC was responsible for offering Africans political sanctuary
at a time when nationalist activity was criminalized. Nkomo thus ensured
continuity of the nationalist euphoria which had engulfed most parts of
urban and rural Rhodesia.
Furthermore, Nkomo played a pivotal role as one of the nationalist
leaders who took part in the formation of the Organisation of African
Union (OAU) in Tanzania in 1963. Led by Julius Nyerere of Tanzania,
Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana, Samora Machel of Mozambique, and
Kenneth Kaunda of Zambia, it was the biggest body made up of inde-
pendent countries and its main objective was to give support to the
nationalist movements to achieve independence. The presence of Nkomo
as the leader of the nationalist movement in Zimbabwe resulted in
increased support from the OAU throughout the liberation struggle.
ZAPU and later on ZANU became members of the OAU nationalist
movements, receiving various forms of support throughout their strug-
gles for independence. Thus, under Nkomo’s presidency, ZAPU was suc-
cessful in getting continental support and attention that was vital to the
country’s quest for independence.
The widening of internal differences in ZAPU resulted in Nkomo
and his fellow nationalists suffering a major setback in the form of a split
in 1963. The ZANU split undoubtedly undermined Nkomo’s role in
the struggle for independence, resulting in a loss of public confidence
in his leadership. Scholars such as Sithole and Kriger have called it the
‘mother of all splits’ due to its magnitude and its impact on the national-
ist cause (Zvogbo 2008: 115). Nkomo, however, managed to restruc-
ture the party by filling in the vacant posts, enabling new leaders such
as Joseph Msika to assume influential positions. Nkomo was also able to
identify and groom a new crop of leaders to continue with the fight for
independence after the split. His efforts in the ZAPU did not go unno-
ticed as he was elected life president of the party at a meeting held on
10–11 August 1963 (Nkomo 2001: 120). These developments point
66 E.M. Sibanda
to his ability to maintain the relevance of the ZAPU party in the coun-
try’s quest for independence and ZAPU prominent among other African
nationalist movements in their common pursuit for freedom.
His efforts towards independence also had personal consequences,
resulting in his arrest on 16 April 1964 with other nationalist lead-
ers such as Joseph Msika, Ruth Chinamano, and Josiah Chinamano.
Because they were deemed dangerous citizens by the colonial gov-
ernment (Crummey 1986: 377), they were sent to Gonakudzingwa
Restriction Camp, located in a game park on the south-eastern tip of
Zimbabwe near the Mozambican border. For the next 10 years, the
Rhodesian government separated Nkomo from nationalist activity,
but could not take away the political will that had enabled him to lead
nationalist politics for decades (Crummey 1986: 377). The government
eventually released Nkomo from prison in 1974, and he went into exile
in Zambia.
Nkomo then embarked on an accelerated political exercise which saw
the restructuring of ZAPU’s military wing, the ZIPRA. From exile, he
directed, coordinated, and led the liberation struggle as leader of the war
council. The restructuring process took place after 1975 and intensified
recruitment of war fighters from Southern Rhodesia to countries such as
Egypt, Tanzania, and Zambia for military training. He arguably created
one of the best trained and disciplined freedom armies consisting of both
guerrilla and conventional units.
Between 1975 and 1979, Nkomo organized foreign military aid,
acquiring both expertise and ammunition. ZIPRA force began to receive
military training from Cuba and the Soviet Union (Nkomo 2001: 180).
With the help of other ZAPU leaders, Nkomo was responsible for iden-
tifying potential military leaders and commanders for extensive military
training in these countries. They returned and imparted their acquired
military knowledge to new recruits.
The military expertise acquired from these countries helped
ZIPRA engage the Rhodesian security forces in direct combat and
acquainted ZIPRA leaders with modern tactics, weaponry, and strat-
egies that undoubtedly helped the nationalist movement to win key
battles throughout the war. ZAPU and the Soviet Union also agreed
to send future nationalist leaders to Moscow to acquire education.
Scholarships were targeted at youth activists, women, and trade union-
ists to study general military subjects and specialized guerrilla warfare
(Shubin 2011).
It can therefore be argued that Nkomo, as leader of the ZAPU party

and chairman of the ZIPRA war council, played a pivotal role in coordi-
nating foreign military aid that eventually resulted in the incapacitation
of the Rhodesian security forces. It is evident that without Nkomo and
other nationalist leaders’ efforts in acquiring external military support,
the independence struggle in Zimbabwe would have taken longer. The
fighting forced the government back to the negotiating table, which is
what Nkomo had wanted from the beginning.
Nkomo was also responsible for directing the war from Zambia. He
worked closely with the commanders who trained guerrillas at Wheatland
Farm in Zambia which was in this case the headquarters of the ZIPRA
base (Chigwedere 2003: 4). At one point, the ZIPRA base in Lusaka
housed about 20,000 guerrillas who were undergoing military training
in preparation to invade Rhodesia (Tamarkin 1990: 23). Through his
role in overseeing the military operations, ZIPRA under Nkomo desta-
bilized most parts of Rhodesia, particularly the Matabeleland region and
north-western parts including the Zambezi area. Rhodesian govern-
ment administration in such areas thus became crippled. Such significant
losses on the battlefront were crucial in forcing Ian Smith’s government
to negotiate with the nationalists, leading to the 1979 Lancaster House
Peace talks which resulted in the independence of Zimbabwe in 1980.
The period from 1975 to 1979 saw Nkomo participating in several
rounds of negotiations in quest for a peaceful solution to the political
crisis in Zimbabwe based, however, on one man, one vote. In 1975,
Nkomo met with Ian Smith for negotiations on a transitional govern-
ment. The talks were mediated by the Zambian president Kenneth
Kaunda and took place secretly in Zambia (Mtisi et al. 2009: 148).
Both Smith and Kaunda chose Nkomo as the right candidate for nego-
tiations for two reasons. First, because it was perceived, he was a gener-
ally acceptable figure among Zimbabweans, also as a possibly leader of
an independent black government. Second, Kaunda in particular saw
Nkomo as an astute negotiator who would not betray his people by
negotiating for nothing less than majority rule. To Kaunda, Nkomo had
already shown good political negotiating skills throughout his career as
the leader of SRANC, NDP, and now ZAPU. Although the talks broke
down over the timing of the introduction of the majority rule, Nkomo
was willing to compromise on some aspects in his quest for independ-
ence. One thing that he could not compromise on though was the need
for political independence and equality on a one man, one vote basis.
68 E.M. Sibanda
The following year, Nkomo attended the Geneva conference where

talks centred around the, again, the transitional government. This time,
Robert Mugabe, Ndabaningi Sithole, and Abel Muzorewa were pre-
sent. Although they spoke with one voice in as far as their demand for
independence was concerned, they had serious differences regarding
how independence was to be introduced. Throughout the talks though,
Nkomo notably stood for one man, one vote, a position that represented
the demands of especially millions of Africans in Rhodesia. Although
some leaders had given into proportional representation which did not
guarantee an African majority in parliament, Nkomo remained firm on
his demand for a majority rule based on a one man one vote, and that
was one of the reasons why the talks failed to bear fruit.
In 1978, Nkomo was one of the nationalist leaders who played a piv-
otal role in condemning the Zimbabwe–Rhodesia agreement signed
between Abel Muzorewa and Ian Smith’s Rhodesian Front Party.
Although the agreement between Muzorewa and Smith allowed Africans
to enter into parliament, it did not ensure them the majority rule which
they wanted. The suffrage system was not based on a one man, one vote
system (Martin and Johnson 1981). In addition, the name Zimbabwe–
Rhodesia implied that Rhodesian elitist and racist tendencies were to
remain strongly entrenched in the new system. Thus, it became the
responsibility of nationalist leaders such as Joshua Nkomo to reject the
offer and continue with the struggle for total independence.
The Lancaster House Peace talks epitomized Nkomo’s role in the
independence of Zimbabwe. The talks came as a result of ceasefire
calls by Ian Smith’s Patriotic Front government in December 1979
and were brokered by Lord Carrington in London. Britain, the USA,
and the African Frontline States were also part of the talks (Mtisi et al.
2009: 148). The major talking point of the conference was the manner
in which power was to be handed over to the new black government.
Nkomo and other nationalist leaders insisted on the one man, one vote
system, Nkomo’s, constant refrain. The talks paved the way for the first
majority election in 1980.
During the ceasefire period, Nkomo was the pillar of a united
movement which was known as the Patriotic Front. The Patriotic Front
consisted of the two major African nationalist movements, ZANU under
the leadership of Mugabe and ZAPU under Nkomo. It came into exist-
ence after concerted efforts from both local and frontline leaders who
desired to see a united black government under one political body.
As the leader of ZAPU, Nkomo was part of this arrangement and was
very clear in his desire for unity among all African nationalist move-
ments. Despite Nkomo’s efforts towards the cause of a Patriotic Front,
Mugabe launched an election manifesto soon after the Lancaster House
Agreement expressing his clear disregard for both Nkomo and ZAPU,
thus making the Patriotic Front’s dream a failure (Asante 2015: 317).
Even though the Patriotic Front failed to contest the 1980 elections as
a united entity, Nkomo remained pro-unity in postcolonial Zimbabwe
even after what he termed the greatest betrayal of his life (Nkomo 2001:
201). Nkomo’s dream of one man, one vote finally came to fruition in
March 1980 when majority elections were held. Although Nkomo’s
party won 20 seats against ZANU’s 57 seats, he had played a pivotal role
in ensuring a majority for Africans in parliament (Sithole and Makumbe
1997: 126). Africans dominated more than 75% of parliament seats with
Nkomo’s ZAPU in control of 24% of the total (Sithole and Makumbe
1997: 126).
Conclusion
A closer look at the life of Joshua Nkomo from 1949 to 1980 reveals
that his life revolved entirely around his quest to see an independent
Zimbabwe. Through his domestic leadership and his role in involving
the international community in the struggle for liberation, he made the
independence of Zimbabwe achievable. Through alliances initiated by
Nkomo, the struggle for independence became internationalized, result-
ing in an inflow of much-needed military, technical, and financial sup-
port from foreign countries. Because of these alliances, Zimbabwe was
able to pave the way for majority rule that became the basis of African
politics in independent Zimbabwe. As a nation-builder, Nkomo demon-
strated that there was no ‘contradiction between being a cultural leader
and being a nationalist’, being a nationalist and being a nonracist, being
cultural, without being chauvinistic, being adamant on principles with-
out being repulsive. All these traits are part of his legacy with which he
bequeathed Zimbabwe in particular, and in general all those engaged in
fighting imperial and colonial legacies that deny agency and independ-
ency to their people.
Nkomo’s role in dialogue with the Rhodesian government from the
1950s to 1979s makes it clear that he was a strong believer in negoti-
ations, and only used the armed struggle as a last resort. Without the
70 E.M. Sibanda
contributions of Joshua Nkomo, Zimbabwe’s independence would

have taken a completely different and likely more troublesome course.
Undoubtedly, the memory of Nkomo’s contributions to the decoloni-
zation of Zimbabwe, as father of Zimbabwean nationalism, astute and
untiring negotiator, nationalist and subsequently in the postcolonial
Zimbabwe, statesman, will forever be part of our history. That is what
perhaps Eddison Zvogbo, a onetime Minister of Justice, when he posi-
tively reflected on Nkomo’s legacy a few days after his death. He stated,
‘It is true that all of us die, but some truly don’t die. It will never be
possible for Joshua Nkomo’s name to vanish from our history. Josh will
never die’ (Zvogbo 1999). The words of Zvogbo are definitely echoed
by many today in Zimbabwe as they reflect on Nkomo’s lasting contribu-
tion to the independence of their country.
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CHAPTER 3
Joshua Nkomo and the Internationalization

of Zimbabwe’s Struggle for Liberation
Martin Rupiya
Introduction
Early in the struggle for independence, especially during the armed
struggle period, those leading the calls for freedom were confronted by
partisan media houses, owned and dominated by imperial governments,
ready to suppress, twist and besmirch the emerging opponents in a bid
to support the status quo. In the case of the struggle for Zimbabwe, we
have yet to ascertain, persons who were responsible for bridging this
breach, how they operated, succeeding to shape contrary opinions, on
behalf of the black majority leading to the lifting of the oppression by
a white-settler minority regime? Amongst the many individuals who, in
numerous anecdotal references, appear to have played a part and con-
tributed to the internationalization of the struggle for Zimbabwe is the
role played by Joshua Mqabuko Nyongolo Nkomo, from the early 1950s
until independence in 1980. However, his role and contribution has
remained unacknowledged. And yet, based on the available evidence on
this score—the internationalisation of the struggle for Zimbabwe—the
M. Rupiya (*) 

74 M. Rupiya
contribution by Joshua Nkomo stands head and shoulders above most

political actors of his time. And yet, this contribution has been under-
played, swept under the carpet and marginalised. Why?
Before delving into the discussion that looks at Nkomo’s unique con-
tribution towards the internationalization of the struggle for Zimbabwe,
it may be illustrative to cite a few examples of his monumental achieve-
ments. Chiedza Chimhanda begins the toting up by stating the obvious
when he asserts that, the first major contribution that Umdala Wethu
made towards the armed struggle in Zimbabwe is almost trite and that
is, ‘almost every prominent figure in Zimbabwe’s nationalist politics
and armed struggle, had their careers shaped within Zimbabwe African
People’s Union (ZAPU)’ (Chimhanda 2003: 4). ZAPU was a politi-
cal party ‘with a short legal life’, placed under a ban during the 1960s
and forced to assume pseudo identities—such as the People’s Caretaker
Council (PCC), the African National Council Zimbabwe (ANC (Z) and
PF ZAPU within Zimbabwe after 1980.
The second major contribution that Nkomo made was reach-
ing a decision to launch the armed struggle and create an entity, the
Zimbabwe People’s Revolution Party (ZIPRA) that was to compliment
and concretise the political party work. By establishing the military
wing, ZAPU–ZIPRA succeeded to become one of the ‘OAUs recog-
nized Authentic’ six liberation movements, an equal in the company of
African National Congress of South Africa, (ANC-SA), the Front for the
Liberation of Mozambique (FRELIMO), the People’s Movement for
the Liberation of Angola (MPLA), PAIGC and the South West African
People’s Organization (SWAPO) as acknowledged in the 1969 meeting
in Khartoum (Zimbabwe Review 4 Oct/Nov 1969: 6). The third impor-
tant contribution made was the clear policy formulation and articulation
describing the plight of the oppression of the majority by a white-settler
minority through force of arms, with the support of the former colonial
power and its allies, including apartheid South Africa. This soon led to
international condemnation, sanctions and an arms embargo through
the United Nations and triggering support amongst Socialist and the
Non-Aligned (NAM) Countries Movement member states and even the
exhausted humanitarian organisations that have been swayed to support
the status quo. Soon, the liberation movements found themselves being
treated as ‘equal partners’ with the Non-Aligned Movement countries,
found common ground and ideological partners, succeeding to shape
international opinion, harnessing diplomatic support and developing
3 JOSHUA NKOMO AND THE INTERNATIONALIZATION … 75
serious and significant contacts with the then Socialist World and other
progressives to result in the provision of military weapons, equipment
and training, amidst international political and diplomatic support
towards the armed struggle. Through the well thought out and man-
aged, Zimbabwe Review publication, Nkomo created an effective plat-
form for posterity, is crucial in providing empirical information in order
to correct the missing gaps, against what has been condemned by the
renowned Terence Ranger as Zimbabwe’s versions of patriotic history
(Ranger 2006).
Nkomo’s Role in the Shadows

In retrospect, we now note that for Joshua Nkomo, instead of Joshua
Nkomo enjoying the fruits of his labour, at the precise juncture of
establishing the new state, the hitherto conflictual relationship between
Nkomo and Mugabe, ZAPU/ZIPRA and ZANU/ZANLA, worsened.
First, the fractitious relationship between Joshua Nkomo and Robert
Mugabe—suspicious of each other even as the partners in the Patriotic
Front (PF)—continued to guide, inform and influence the immedi-
ate post-independence era of April 1980. This immediate, post-inde-
pendence development had its roots in the last stages of the struggle
period—with the violence between ZANLA-ZIPRA escalating during
the campaign period following the December 1979 ceasefire. Months
before the February 1980 Lancaster House inspired election, ZANU
announced that it was to go it alone, formally splitting from the struggle
partnership with ZAPU. In the subsequent elections, ZANU secured an
absolute majority of 57 seats from the available 80 Common roll seats.
ZAPU was the second runner-up with only 20 seats, confined to the
Midlands and Matabeleland regions. In spite of the mathematical major-
ity, soon afterwards, ZANU invited ZAPU into a coalition Government.
However, the next round of political contestation was just round
the corner. This was the August 1980 local government election in
which the ruling party sought to sweep the polls, only to experi-
ence resistance in the now ZAPU dominant areas of the Midlands and
Matebeleland. From this moment on, the old rivalry and suspicion poi-
soned the new Coalition Government relationships (Report Breaking
the Silence 1997). What now appears to have taken place is that a care-
fully laid out and comprehensive strategy, by the new state, aimed at
extinguishing any positive contributions by Nkomo and accuses ZAPU
76 M. Rupiya
of complicity in political subversion and the ZIPRA forces as fifth col-

umnists (Alao 2012: 14–20). At the apex of the strategy was an attempt
to cast Joshua Nkomo as a counter-revolutionary—one who had inten-
tions to remove by force—the newly elected ZANU PF government
relying on the so-called ZERO Hour option (Kynoch 1997). In this,
practitioners of the new state attempted to ideologically cast Nkomo as
the counter-revolutionaries Movement for the Total Independence of
Angola (UNITA) leader, ‘Jonas Savimbi’ or ‘Alphonso Dhlakama, leader
of the RENAMO—the National Resistance Movement of Mozambique’
of Zimbabwe (Stapleton 2013: 276).
A second string to the bow was to attempt to decouple Nkomo from
his international and regional traditional support bases. Part of this was
manifested in the ‘blocking of the Soviet Union from establishing an
Embassy in the new capital of Harare’ even as other Western countries
proceeded to do so. Moscow was only allowed to establish an Embassy
in February 1981, 13 months after independence after agreeing condi-
tions—in conversation with Ambassador Valentin Vdovin—‘to cease all
contacts with PF ZAPU’ (Shubin 2008). There were also deliberate and
aggressive diplomatic moves to remove the rear bases that Nkomo had
enjoyed especially in Zambia while tarnishing his credibility amongst
the then former member of the Front Line States (FLS). By November
1980, Nkomo was officially, enemy number one, culminating in the
launch of the war against Dissidents and Operation Ghukurahundi—that
violently targeted and eliminated the core of ethnic and perceived sup-
porters in the Midlands and Matabeleland (The Simplisius Chihambakwe
Commission of Inquiry, 1983–84—Report not released by Government;
Report On the 1980s Disturbances in Matabeleland & Midlands, 1997).
The ferocious state-sponsored violence that included units firing heavy
gunfire on his residence in Bulawayo, forced close family and aides to
strongly urge Nkomo to leave the country (Alao 2012: 18). In March
1983, Nkomo was forced to flee into exile, closely behind or followed
by other notables such as Akim Ndlovu while the ZIPRA hierarchy,
Generals Lookout ‘Mafela’ Masuku and his deputy, Dumiso Dabengwa
were arrested and jailed even as the courts found no evidence of their
transgressions (Alao 2012: 83–85; Stapleton 2013: 275–276). The
impact of the strategy was horrendous to state and civil society relations
as well as directly to Nkomo, ZAPU and ZIPRA. Curiously, President
Robert Mugabe was to later concede that the aggression was with-
out foundation and executed on misperceptions during a ‘moment
of madness’. The Catholic Commission notes that ‘the only govern-

ment official to register contrition’, when he acknowledged the Report
cited in The Sunday Mail, 6 September 1992, was Minister of Defence,
Moven Mahachi, who expressed deep regret on ‘the events of the period
are regretted and should not be repeated by anybody, any group of peo-
ple or any institution in this country’ (Catholic Commission Report
1997: 17)
This sordid phase in the history of Zimbabwe was to end with a tri-
umphant capitulation of Nkomo, through the treaty now popularly
known as 22 December 1987, Zimbabwe National Unity Accords—
agreed to in order to stop the generalised state sponsored pogrom.
(Vladimir Shubin 2008: 189). The reality of the Unity Accord was—
‘a splinter part from ZAPU in 1963, ZANU had by 1987, swallowed
ZAPU’ (Chimhanda 2003: 1–7). But the damage had been done. By
1987, any references to Nkomo had become truncated. Only as an after-
thought, when Nkomo had died was the ‘official’ title Father Zimbabwe
appears episodically in the state controlled media.
Airbrushing and Patriotic History

In the subsequent history of the admitted mishap, even after three
and half decades after independence, the proper history of the strug-
gle for Zimbabwe remains largely untold. What is available, disparag-
ingly described as ‘patriotic history’ by the renounced historian, Terence
Ranger, focuses on the different aspects of the struggle, failing to pre-
sent a fair, just and comprehensive picture of the equally complex phase
of the country’s decolonization period? (Ranger 2006) For example, for
only a brief period, David Martin and Phyllis Johnson’s The Struggle for
Zimbabwe: The Chimurenga War (1981), stood as the preferred national
history, promoted by adherents of the ruling party, the Zimbabwe
African National Union Patriotic Front (ZANU (PF) (Chimhanda 2003:
15–16). Soon, however, exposed to serious academic inquiry, its objec-
tivity on various key historical junctures was found wanting and open
to different interpretation. For instance, there have been differences on
when and which organization fired the first shots in the armed struggle
comparing the Zimbabwe African Peoples Union and its military wing,
the Zimbabwe Revolutionary Army (ZAPU–ZIPRA) and the ZANU
and its military wing, the Zimbabwe African National Liberation Army
(ZANLA)?
78 M. Rupiya
While Martin and Johnson cited the genesis of the armed struggle as
represented by the 1966 Sinoia campaign, this was contradicted by ZAPU,
asserting that, armed campaigns had already been commonplace from
1965 (Chimhanda 2003: 13–15; Chimhanda 2008; Alao 2012: 78–79).
Furthermore, in an associated event, the question of who was responsible
for the bombing of the fuel depot in the capital, Salisbury now Harare, dur-
ing late 1978 appears contested. On the one hand, ZANU–ZANLA claims
to have carried out the attack while accounts in the ZAPU–ZIPRA’s pub-
lic mouthpiece, The Zimbabwe Review, also claim authorship (Zimbabwe
Review Oct–Dec 1978: 4–5). In yet another seminal event, the assassina-
tion of Herbert Wiltshire Chitepo, ZANU’s Chairman of the War Council,
on who was responsible for his death; in a car bomb as he drove out of
his residence in Lusaka on 18 March 1975 remain contested (Martin and
Johnson 1981: 141–167; Horne 2001: 256). The historian Luise White
in her book The Assassination of Herbert Chitepo: Texts and Politics in
Zimbabwe (2003) has provided a painstakingly and empirically research
account whose import cannot be dismissed. In this, Luise argues, convinc-
ingly, of uncovering ‘four confessions’ and several accusations as to who was
responsible for Chitepo’s death. According to her, these accounts tend to
surface at particular historical junctures in the history of post-independent
Zimbabwe, appearing to seek to influence opinion, credit or discredit oppo-
nents and in the process leaving readers wondering (White 2003: 1–7).
More recently, Fay Chung has also added fuel to the fire, indicating
serious internal divisions and infighting within ZANU just before the
assassination of Chitepo. Luise White has accused her of ‘once Chung
manages to find out who killed whom—she is ready to ‘close this sad
chapter’ in ZANU’s history’ and is not prepared to, boldly state the
facts. (Chimhanda 2008; White 2003). On Fay Chung published
account, reviewers appear to have had a filed day, generally, severely
criticised her work as—‘while providing more plausible version than the
established ZANU PF canon’—the work remains partisan and uncritical
of Mugabe’s role (s) and yet harsh and sustained against utterances of
Wilfred Mhanda, a former ZANLA-Zimbabwe People’s Army (ZIPA)
Military Commander until 1977 (Ranger 2006). To that end, the recent
written account by Wilfred Mhanda in Dzino: Memories of a Freedom
Fighter (2014) that has been disparagingly condemned by the coun-
try’s only national state newspaper, The Herald as ‘self serving narrative’.
Opinions in state controlled Herald newspaper directly represent the
thinking of the ruling political elite, and the paper has been credited with
‘successfully extinguishing’ unwelcome thoughts casting aspersion on the

leading political elite from the unsuspecting masses.
To provide some useful background, at the time, following the coup
in Lisbon that then changed the political context in the Portuguese ter-
ritories, Nkomo was hastily transferred from the bordering area next to
the then Portuguese East Africa, now Mozambique to the Salisbury, now
Harare, and Maximum Prison. From the archival texts, Nkomo contin-
ued to exert his influence through ZAPU, even from the prison walls,
issuing instructions for his key aides to work with the UANC’s Bishop
Abel Muzorewa and directing the internal dynamics of the struggle.
Nkomo was released from prison as part of the negotiations in 1974 and
soon fled into exile in Zambia in order to more effectively lead the strug-
gle for Zimbabwe. The final curtain to his work was his contributions
during the Lancaster House Conference of 1979, where a transitional
framework was finally agreed to before the parties returned to Zimbabwe
and the Patriotic Front split, announced by ZANU PFs, Enos Nkala in
township of Highfields, before the elections.
What is posited here is that Joshua Nkomo is an acknowledged leader
who was able to define, create platforms that effectively presented the
case for Zimbabwe’s just struggle to the international community,
against machinations of imperial media and other supporters who were
convinced of the civilizing mission of colonialism as well as apartheid
South Africa, seeking to maintain the status quo. This was able to ben-
efit the struggle for Zimbabwe in several ways. An innovative structure
that was capable of providing military strategic tracking and analysis
as well as providing intelligence to enable counter-action was put into
place, whose outputs were regularly published in The Zimbabwe Review-
the Official Organ of ZAPU Zimbabwe (Rhodesia). This also provided
insightful summaries in the military arena, appearing to have followed
one the leading and authoritative international security publication of the
London-based Institute for International Strategic Studies (IISS).
Internationalization of the Struggle for Zimbabwe

Discerned from the available ZAPU documentation, Nkomo and his
colleagues appeared to have carefully examined the contemporary

situation of the 1950s, dominated by Western philanthropists before

deciding to carve out a deliberate niche to engage in the battle of
influencing opinion (s) on the international stage.
80 M. Rupiya
In a policy statement (undated) made in a number of editorial com-

ments as well as to UN 4th Meeting of the UN Committee of 24 by
the National Secretary for Information and Publicity Department and
also the Editor-In-Chief of the Zimbabwe Review, T. George Silundika,
affirmed that: following the end of slavery, partisan organizations, even
within imperialist countries had emerged, to champion for the emanci-
pation of the Africa continent and its people. However, from the 1980s
and 1990s, Humanitarian Organizations and Churches championing
independence had become weak and allowed themselves to become
tools of imperialism where they were ‘beginning to see “benefits” of
imperialism-such as development, jobs and the so-called British civiliz-
ing missions as a necessary precondition and period of justified extended
colonialism’ (Zimbabwe Review Jan–Feb No. 1/75: 13). In the absence
of an alternative and credible champion of African independence, then an
organization was needed to fill the vacuum.
However, in confronting the philanthropists, the message had to be
sensitive to the justification of the armed struggle, characterised by the
use of violence against political repression. By the late 1950s, ZAPU had
adopted the decision to embarking on the armed struggle for political
freedom. This was to be conducted by an armed wing of the political
party. However, communicating this to the outside world that included
the Humanitarian and Church groups required sensitivity and justifi-
cation (Zimbabwe Review, Jan–Feb 1975). To this end, the message
put out was cast against the United Nations resolution on UDI and
Rhodesia that projected the same as regime representing an illegal entity
that constituted a threat to international peace and therefore subjected
to morale and practical economic sanctions, weapons embargo and dip-
lomatic isolation.
The next step after policy was infrastructure and entry points of
engagement; the most important organizations for the struggle for
Zimbabwe turned out to be the Socialist Countries and the Non-
Aligned Movement (NAM). After regular and persistent appeals to the
International Committee of NAM for material, financial and diplomatic
support, during the 3rd Meeting of NAM held in Algeria, the organiza-
tion officially expressed its position on anti-imperialism and recognised
liberation movements as ‘equal partners’. This was a major diplomatic
achievement as it, henceforth shaped the relationships of member states
with the international community. Progress was to continue to bear fruit
as, in the 4th NAM Meeting, held between 5 and 8 September 1973,
agreed to place the matter of ‘opposing world systems—that of imperial-

ists and socialists’. More significantly, for the struggle for Zimbabwe, the
same meeting also adopted a resolution supporting a ‘Conference on the
Decolonization of Zimbabwe’.
This decision had culminated from the lobbying and in principle deci-
sion obtained 3 months earlier, during a meeting on 19 June of the Afro-
Asian Peoples Solidarity Organization (APPSO) with Edward Ndlovu,
the Deputy Secretary-General of ZAPU. Securing political, diplomatic
and practical support to host the Conference on the Decolonization
of Zimbabwe in Mogadishu was a major milestone and diplomatic tri-
umph that would, subsequently, provide opportunities to focus support
on the Zimbabwe struggle. It can therefore be claimed that, historical
Mogadishu Conference on Zimbabwe—held during 25–27 November
1973—was the harbinger for several organization formally adopting the
struggle for independence in Zimbabwe as part of their agenda.
In attendance was a myriad of international organizations, including
agencies from the UN such as the Special Committee on Anti-Apartheid,
the International Organization of Journalists; World Federation
of Trade Unions; World Federation of Youths; Italian and French
Labour Organizations; World Council of Churches; the Arab League;
International Conference of Arab Trade Unions; the International
Labour Organization; American Committee on Africa; Canadian
Liberation Support Movement; the rest of the other five ‘authentic six’
African liberation movements—the ANC (South Africa), FRELIMO,
MPLA, Party of Africans for the Independence of Guinea and Cape
Verde (PAIGC), SWAPO and ZANU; the OAU; Independent African
countries of Ghana, Guinea, Nigeria, Egypt, Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda,
Zambia, Sudan, Togo, Upper Volta-now Burkina Faso; Botswana;
Lesotho; Swaziland; Algeria; Morocco; Cuba and other countries such
as Belgium; New Zealand; Syria; USSR, UK, USA, Canada, Czech,
Bulgaria, Hungary, France, Iraq, India, Nepal, the Republic of Congo.
The impact and outcomes of the Mogadishu Conference on Zimbabwe
were afterwards ventilated in several issues of the Zimbabwe Review.
Attendance and the message delivered through the conference were to
constitute an important psychological, ideological and diplomatic sup-
port platform that then reinforced the political and military work under-
taken by Zimbabweans themselves.
In the following year, Nkomo intensified the focus with the
international intervention serving the purpose of effectively criminalizing
82 M. Rupiya
the supply and delivery of oil, arms or normal trade that would sustain
the white minority settler regime in Rhodesia. To this end, Nkomo
embarked on a spirited and public international campaign aimed at ‘iso-
lating not only Salisbury but also its alliance partners. In this, the docu-
ments reveal that the UK, the West and NATO and the apartheid South
African regime convinced Nkomo (Statement to the UN 4th Committee
by T.G. Silundika 1974 in Zimbabwe Review Jan–Feb 1975). The
impact of the intervention was almost immediate. During, early during
the 1970s, the initiative was able to expose ‘Britain, via Jordan, selling
missiles and Centurion tanks to Rhodesia and South Africa’ in a move
publicly criticised as ‘an unfriendly blow to the decolonization of Africa’
(Zimbabwe Review 1974).
Demonstrating a keen understanding of international diplomacy,
Nkomo devised a strategy that would question the morality of the for-
mer colonial power within the Commonwealth. In January 1966, in a
Commonwealth meeting held in Nigeria, the latter received a briefing,
and ‘a request to assist with diplomatic support within the international
arena for Zimbabwe’s decolonization’ (Zimbabwe Review Mar–Apr
1975: 12). The Zimbabwe Review also reveals performance in the secu-
rity arena, adversely highlighting imperial and settler colonial collabo-
ration, especially that aimed at consolidating the status quo—against
the While initially focusing on the 1965 sanctions after Unilateral
Declaration of Independence (UDI) the exposures soon included the
1977 UN Arms Embargo (Zimbabwe Review 1974: 15). The evidence
shows that, in practice, ZAPU–ZIPRA had a fair sense of the military
cooperation between apartheid South Africa and Rhodesia. Citing an
International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) assessment of the 1969–
1970s military capabilities of Rhodesia, the publication revealed that,
of the 6 million population, made up of 5.5 Africans and half a million
Whites, Asians and Coloureds, the white minority state had organised
a Defence Force, divided into three elements of Air, Army and Para-
Military Forces made up of a 3400 Army, 1200 in the Air Force, and
6400 Para-Military Forces that could be increased to about 28,500,
when the white Reserve Force was marshaled. This was complimented
by the combination of supportive South African and Portuguese Forces
in Portuguese East Africa, now Mozambique and Angola, averaging about
14,8000 (Zimbabwe Review 1974).
The knowledge on military matters, significantly, went down to
unit level, revealing tactical awareness of the existence of the all white
SAS and Rhodesia Light Infantry (RLI) units (Daily Mirror Testimony
Mar–Apr 1976: 10–12). The Editor-In-Chief of the Zimbabwe Review
appeared confident of their information when, in Vol. 4, Mar–Apr, No.
2/75, wetted the appetite of readers by announcing that the following
issue would provide, ‘a detailed account of the Smith regime’s military
strategy’ (Zimbabwe Review Mar–Apr 1975: 14). It is also revealing
that the Zimbabwe Review demonstrated a sound appreciation of the
scorched earth and human concentration camps curiously presented as
Protected Villages as the struggle for Zimbabwe war intensified. To this
end, the publication provided detailed insights and criticism of what it
called, ‘Smith’s concentration camps now called Protected Village’
(Zimbabwe Review 1974: 13).
Furthermore, the Zimbabwe Review was also used for propaganda and
morale weakening purposes—when it highlighted Rhodesian Security
Forces’ deaths and wheelchair bound service men and women killed
or wounded in the liberation war (Zimbabwe Review 1976: 12–13).
Condemning Sporting Links with apartheid and Rhodesia The Zimbabwe
Review also became an important platform for signalling and condemn-
ing cultural contacts and sporting links. This soon became an important
consideration in cricket, rugby and related sports tours especially from
the UK, the USA and Europe.
Next, and in parallel, Nkomo and ZAPU were able to engage with
the Organization of African Unity (OAU), with Jaison Moyo and other
others addressing the Standing Committee of the OAU Liberation
Committee on a regular basis (Zimbabwe Review Mar–Apr 1975). For
Nkomo and ZAPU, regular briefings to the OAU were important as
ZAPU had been recognised as one of Africa’s ‘authentic six’ (Zimbabwe
Review Mar–Apr, 1976: 9). Furthermore, the Zimbabwe Review, in ret-
rospect, the publication was able to correctly analyse the events associ-
ated with the collapse of the Marcello Caetano regime, toppled by
General Spinola on 25 April 1974 in Lisbon and the subsequent events
in Southern Africa. Again the paper reveals the October 1972 secret visit
by Ian Smith to Lisbon where he conferred with Caetano seeking to
urge them to do more as the situation on Eastern front was deteriorating
fast.
This meeting was followed by another coordinating meeting cited
in Pretoria between Ian Smith and President Johannes Balthazar
Vorster in Pretoria (Zimbabwe Review 1974). As the security situ-
ation in the Portuguese colonies deteriorated, Nkomo was moved
84 M. Rupiya
from Gonakudzingwa, where he had been incarcerated since 16 April

1964 to Salisbury, now Harare, Maximum Prison. This period was
to coincide with the increased attention towards attempting to resolve
the Zimbabwean political crisis, culminating in the formation of
the umbrella grouping—the UANC under Methodist Bishop, Abel
Muzorewa. Nkomo issued instructions for the party and cadres to sup-
port Muzorewa—an initiative that he saw as continuing to advance the
cause for independence (Zimbabwe Review 1976).
Next in the seminal events was the emergence of UANC, during the
intensified armed struggle when Nkomo sent word from inside prison to
support the Bishop, Abel Muzorewa’s initiative on the ground.
There were also challenges faced with the task of conducting the
Zimbabwean campaign, even amongst fellow African countries. For
example, Nkomo faced a difficult relationship with Tanzanian President,
Julius Nyerere. In the drive to present a unified front, the Patriotic Front
had been allowed to open offices a Headquarters in Dar es Salaam on 20
April 1977 (Zimbabwe Review 1977: 13). However, implementing the
PF idea operationally continued to experience major difficulties. Under
pressure, particularly from Dar es Salaam and yet sensing undue interfer-
ence, Nkomo issued a veiled statement: ‘as liberation movements, grate-
ful for support from OAU and others but, one or two countries […]
while assisting […] gone out of their way to interfere […] this is a crucial
point […] Zimbabweans lead the struggle’ (Zimbabwe Review Sept–Oct
1976: 3).
Given this post-independence trend of ahistorical accounts, claims of
singular, supreme gallantry and the deliberate attempts to ‘Savimbisize’
Joshua Nkomo in information and even misinformation, one area that
has remained obscured from view is, who internationalised Zimbabwe’s
decolonization struggle and how did they do it? The purpose of the
strategy towards the internationalization of the armed struggle had a
twin objective. Its primary goal was to make the global community aware
of the political injustices of imperial and partial settler minority rule in
the country. Secondly, the strategy provided a platform of confronting
the political injustice, which was open for support from well-wishers.
To this end, the political process was to receive Diplomatic, Financial
and Material support when the decision was later taken to take up the
armed struggle. Furthermore, as this discussion is to demonstrate, the
implementation of the strategy to internationalise the armed strug-
gle was also conducted in an innovative manner. For example, in spite
of the early incarceration of Joshua Nkomo for political reasons in

Gonakudzingwa on 16 April 1964 until May 1974 when he and oth-
ers were transferred to Salisbury (now Harare) Maximum Prison follow-
ing threats of possible abduction by the newly installed government of
FRELIMO in Mozambique, the policy continued to function. Later,
the same was also adaptive when it was the bedrock of the Muzorewa
led ANC. But precisely how was this to be achieved? What concrete and
practical achievements can be attributed to Joshua Nkomo’s contribution
in the internationalization of the armed struggle and how this made an
impact on its course in the then Rhodesia?
As the parties left Lancaster after the protracted talks, PF headed for
a split. In retrospect, ZANU appeared determined to seek an identity
that would distance itself from Nkomo and ZAPU–ZIPRA before the
scheduled elections. The former liberation movements then entered into
enclaves with distinct ethnic, regional and liberation history difference.
Soon after the election in which ZANU secured a ruling majority of 57
seats from the available 80, with ZAPU winning 21, the former then
invited the latter to become a partner in the first coalition government.
Whilst Nkomo and ZAPU accepted the invitation, by August of 1980
when the country was preparing to go for local government elections,
the intense competition revealed that, already the former Patriotic Front
allies were heading for a major showdown. It is therefore evident that,
at the point of euphoria for the newly acquired independence in April
1980, Joshua Nkomo, ZAPU and ZIPRA had their backs to the wall—
under an intense onslaught by former allies now in the form of the new
government in Zimbabwe—hunted down and shot at using government
weaponry, forced into exile or killed—by ZANU determined to occupy
center stage and embrace all the historical liberation accolades.
Again with the benefit of time, we can see that the strategy against
Nkomo and ZAPU had at least six strands, comprising an integrated:
the vilification and exorcising the personal image of Nkomo and his rela-
tionship with the struggle for Zimbabwe in a process that sought to cast
him as a counter-revolutionary—akin to the new ‘Savimbi’; mount the
diplomatic culling of all established external links related to Nkomo; dis-
mantle all known and existing structures of sister organizations such as
ZIPRA and ZAPU; to disperse and destroy its supporters, ethnic base
and purge its regional base.
On the diplomatic front aimed at curtailing Joshua Nkomo’s the
evidence now reveals that Mugabe and ZANU (PF), using the newly
86 M. Rupiya
acquired state machinery, embarked upon the comprehensive disman-

tling of ZAPU and Joshua Nkomo political and military contribution
towards the struggle for Zimbabwe. We now know that, at the diplo-
matic level, the Soviet Union, identified with supporting Joshua Nkomo,
was prevented from establishing formal relations with the new and inde-
pendent Zimbabwe. Meanwhile, a parallel process targeted the person
of Joshua Nkomo, succeeding to fire shots at his residence in Bulawayo
forcing his family to compel him to leave the country and into exile, via
Botswana in order to save his life. As the decapitation of the leader of
the organization occurred, former ZAPU senior officials were sought
and arrested while former ZIPRA commanders, led by Lookout Masuku
and his Deputy, Dumiso Dabengwa were taken into custody. The new
government forces, comprising partisan units of the 5th Brigade and
party aligned Militia—were deployed in the Midlands and Matebeleland
against the so-called dissidents.
At the time, these differences resulted in the emergence of compet-
ing, political parties and armed factions, representing the domestic eth-
nic, linguistic and regional flaws of ZAPU–ZIPRA and ZANU–ZANLA.
At independence in 1980, the faces of the two organizations were that of
Joshua Mqabuko Nyongolo Nkomo and that of Robert Gabriel Mugabe.
Finally, the proper documentation of the account of the war was hijacked
at independence, when one faction of the nationalists, ZANU (PF) won
the first election in February 1980 and proceeded to brutally emascu-
late both the image and personality of Joshua Nkomo, ZAPU and
ZIPRA and institutional structures. The post-independence factional
fight soon assumed the character of genocide, wiping thousands of
actual and perceived supporters, incarcerating leading commanders and
ZIPRA Generals, including Masuku and Dabengwa while forcing into
exile, Joshua Nkomo and others. As evidence was to show, this violent
period also sought to depict Joshua Nkomo as a sell-out to the national-
ist cause. Only in late 1987 was the conflict ended with the capitulation
of victims, signified by the signing of the Unity Accord of 22 December
1987. Thereafter, with Joshua Nkomo compelled to disband ZAPU and
ZIPRA the cacophony of the ahistorical accounts reached new levels—
presenting a one sided version.
Reflecting the deep personal, linguistic and regional differences within
the nationalist movement, as the goal for achieving Zimbabwe’s political
independence appeared within grasp, military clashes between the armies
of ZAPU–ZIPRA and ZANU–ZANLA intensified—each determined
to establish the so-called liberated zones and prepared to exterminate

each other in the process (Tendi 2015; Shubin 2008: 180–182). This
created advantages for the surprised and bemused Rhodesian Security
Forces (RSF). In the subsequent election, ZANU (PF) secured a com-
fortable majority of 57 seats or 63% from the available 80, sufficient to
govern on its own. However, Robert Mugabe and ZANU (PF) invited
Joshua Nkomo and ZAPU (PF) who had garnered 20 seats, representing
24% of the vote and confined to the Midlands and south of the coun-
try in Matebeleland, to join the new government. Although the gesture
appeared magnanimous, the point had been made that ZAPU was a
junior partner and only served at the pleasure of the dominant party—
ZANU (PF) (Tendi 2015: 937–940).
Conclusions
As Zimbabwe’s independence beckoned in 1980, the country’s lib-
eration movements, departing from the Lancaster House Conference
in London split. Both in the media and on the battlefields, the parties
engaged in fratricidal combat, to the bemusement of the white minority
regime in Rhodesia. In the subsequent elections, once ZANU secured
a comfortable ruling majority, the party invited Nkomo, ZAPU and
ZIPRA as junior coalition partners. Signs of continued, competitive strife
were barely concealed. In this early period, the USSR was prevented
from establishing an Embassy—a position that remained in place for the
next 13 months—until Moscow was forced to accept conditionalities,
on record, towards disengaging from supporting Nkomo. Ninety days
into the newfound coalition, as the country prepared to hold the August
1980 local government elections, violence broke out between the par-
ties.
By the end of the year, a deliberate campaign to cast Nkomo as the
new ‘Savimbi of Zimbabwe’, and ZIPRA forces as fermenting dissidents,
while ZAPU was cast as a counter-revolutionary fifth columnist organiza-
tion, was launched. The result was that Nkomo was forced into justifying
his position—announcing that he harboured no intentions to dislodge
the new government by force while a number of his senior political
officials were hounded, arrested or forced to flee into exile. In parallel,
the ZIPRA military hierarchy, from its Commander, General Lookout
‘Mafela’ Masuku and his Deputy, Dumiso Dabengwa and other sen-
ior officers where also targeted, arrested and thrown into prisons.
88 M. Rupiya
While witnessing the harsh and ferocious conduct of state-sponsored

forces in Operation Gukurahundi that resulted in thousands of people
in the Midlands and Matabeleland losing their lives, Nkomo’s family and
close friends appealed to him to leave the country. Humiliated, Nkomo
was forced to seek exile in London in March 1983.
Four years later, he was forced to reach an agreement, nay, capitula-
tion—in order to save the same ethnic and regional supporters as well as
senior colleagues held in the new Zimbabwe’s prisons. The perpetrators
were later to admit that this episode was but an aberration—conducted
in a ‘moment of madness’ but the damage had been done: there was lit-
tle opportunity to pay homage and acknowledge the sterling role that
Joshua Nyongolo Mqabuko Nkomo had played in internationalizing the
struggle for Zimbabwe in a development that ‘shortened the period of
fighting’.
In retrospect, we can cite the following achievements that can be
attributed to Joshua Nkomo: that every political and military player in
the struggle cut their teeth under Nkomo and ZAPU/ZIPRA. That as
early as the late 1950s, Nkomo accurately read the international media
and decolonization agenda to note that the wave had turned, the pre-
vious advocates for African political freedoms had been influenced to
change their opinions, beginning to see value in the civilizing benefits
of continued imperial and colonial control. In the emerging conceptual
confusion, an organization whose task was to reverse the partisan view of
Africans’ inability to govern and justifying the utility of the armed strug-
gle against illegal regimes condemned by the UN as constituting threats
to international peace and security was urgent. In the OAU meeting in
Khartoum held in 1969, ZAPU was accorded the singular recognition
that it was one of the ‘authentic six’ liberation movements on the conti-
nent: joining the likes of ANC, FRELIMO, MPLA, Party for the African
Independence of Guinea and Cape Verde (PAIGC) and SWAPO. Once
this policy position had been developed, a tireless campaign to con-
vince the UN Committee of 24, the OAU Liberation Committee and
parallel work with APPSO as well as NAM, within a few years began to
bear fruit. In 1973, NAM accepted the position that the Anti-Apartheid
would guide and inform the organization’s political, diplomacy and
relationships in the international community. The same conference also
recognised liberation movements as equal partners. In 1974, NAM indi-
cated its support for the Mogadishu Conference on Zimbabwe concre-
tizing its earlier position adopted in Aden, Yemen. By now, Nkomo had
managed to establish fruitful and productive relationship with the Soviet

Union and other Socialist countries that proceeded to provide political,
diplomatic and military training.
All this work and contribution was to come to naught—at the hands
of the divisive and unrelenting harshness unleashed just before the elec-
toral campaigns in early 1980. This became part of the fully-fledged civil
war that was in place by the end of that year until 1988. As this research
has shown, perhaps now the time has come to finally acknowledge the
crucial and dedicated role that Nkomo played towards internationalizing
the struggle for Zimbabwe—as part of what he pointed out would be the
shortest route towards ending the violence and repression of the people.
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CHAPTER 4
Joshua Nkomo and the Quest for 

Unity and Peace in Zimbabwe
Kenneth Tafira
Introduction
Joshua Nkomo has in his political career presided over Zimbabwe’s
armed liberation struggle, as the leader of Zimbabwe African Peoples’
Union (ZAPU) and its armed wing Zimbabwe Peoples’ Revolutionary
Army (ZPRA) which fought alongside ZANU/ZANLA. From trade
unionist to nationalist liberation hero detained for 11 years in Ian Smith’s
jails, Nkomo oversaw a heroic guerrilla struggle. The protracted armed
rebellion would culminate in the Lancaster House Agreement signed in
December 1979 where a ceasefire and a post-independence constitution
were agreed. This chapter argues that Nkomo’s participation in talks over
a long stretch of time was meant to achieve unity, peace and independ-
ence. This was misconstrued in various political quarters. Nkomo’s rev-
olutionary credentials are impeccable as the historical record attest. For
example, ZPRA’s ability to blast installations and army camps led to peas-
ants to see the guerrillas as possessors of mystical powers who were sent
to perform such confounding acts by Nkomo and ‘his name also became
K. Tafira (*) 
University of South Africa
Pretoria, South Africa

92 K. Tafira
associated with some inexplicable legend possessing extraordinary powers

to conquer and liberate Zimbabwe’ (Cliffe et al. 1980: 57).
For Nkomo, failure by Britain to peacefully bring independence neces-
sitated the armed struggle. The liberation movement, he noted, had the
dual responsibility and capacity to fight and ultimately ensure unity and
peace for the people of Zimbabwe. Throughout the struggle against
colonialism, the matter of unity of the liberation movement was central
in Nkomo’s political thought. This chapter notes that concepts of unity,
peace and harmony, which are ingrained in the revolutionary armed
struggle, are inseparable. Just like Amilcar Cabral in Guinea-Bissau, it
is through the revolutionary practice expressed through armed strug-
gle that unity is forged and maintained. Ultimately, the objectives of the
struggle, which is often accompanied by bloody violence and suffering,
are to both broker peace and freedom. People’s struggle for independ-
ence unapologetically requires their unity: unity of purpose, principle and
identification of common grievances and a common enemy. The strug-
gle is littered with contradictions, though. Those locked in armed com-
bat, rather than recognising themselves as comrades-in-arms, become
comrades-at-arms. A lot of energy is expended trying to unify various ele-
ments engaged in anti-revolutionary and of course reactionary tendencies
that impede the progress of the struggle. Nkomo spent most of his career
battling with these impediments. The Unity Accord achieved in 1987
after a bloody expenditure of human life should have happened in the
course of the struggle. This is a remiss of the Zimbabwean revolution.
Nkomo’s political career, diplomatic manoeuvres, statesmanship and
revolutionary credentials were heavily weighed and influenced by pre-
vailing local and international socio-political circumstances at each socio-
historicalepoch of the period under examination, 1945–1980. In the
early 1960s, the intersection between Cold War politics and Southern
African racial politics and how the United Nations intervened in the
Congo crisis created a framework for conflict between white minority
regimes and Southern African nationalists (Scarnecchia 2011). Rhodesian
Prime Minister Roy Welensky and other Southern African white politi-
cians supported Moise Tshombe to create a buffer state and stall Soviet
influence. Following the Congo crisis, Zimbabwean nationalists fell into
Cold War games with both the USA and the Soviet Union tucked in
competition for global influence.
Nkomo had unsuccessfully appealed to the UN to intervene in
Rhodesia following 1960 riots that led to deaths of scores of Africans.
4 JOSHUA NKOMO AND THE QUEST … 93
Another derivative of the Congo fiasco is the inception of the term ‘sell-
out’ or ‘Tshombe’ into the local political repertoire and rhetoric and ‘the
lesson from Katanga conflict for Zimbabwean nationalists was to keep
future Tshombes from coming to power. It was better to deal with them
beforehand’ (Scarnecchia 2011: 83). Thus, following ZAPU/ZANU split,
editorials of ZAPU publication, The Zimbabwe Review, likened ZANU,
Sithole and Harry Nkumbula of Zambia with Tshombe, as stooges of set-
tlers who were against African unity:
Africa for Africans and not for sell-outs like Nkumbulas, Sitholes and the
Tshombe mentality. United we stand, divided we fall. Unity is our salva-
tion. (The Zimbabwe Review, 1 June 1964)
Nkomo was Zimbabwe’s longest serving nationalist leader whose politi-

cal credentials can be dated to 1945 trade union strike when he was the
leader of the Railway African workers union in Rhodesia. Other national-
ists had in 1955 formed the City Youth League otherwise also known
as the National Youth League and African Youth League. In 1957, he
was elected president of Southern Rhodesia African National Congress
(SRANC) which had merged with the Youth League, at a time when
the Land Apportionment Act was being consolidated through Land
Husbandry Act which was meant to deprive Africans of stock and ara-
ble land. The ANC effectively took this theme and grievance onto their
resistance activities. When the party was banned on 23 February 1959,
he was president of the National Democratic Party (NDP) formed on
1 January 1960 and banned on 9 December 1961. Ten days after the
banishment of NDP, he became president of Zimbabwe African Peoples
Union (ZAPU) formed on 17 December 1961. Since then, his participa-
tion in the nationalist movement made him considered the founder of
Zimbabwe’s modern nationalist movement (Libby 1979). Nkomo men-
tored many leaders including Muzorewa who he asked to lead opposition
to Douglas-Home-Smith settlement proposals of 1971.
Nkomo’s leadership acumen is seen in that the breakaway party
ZANU approach to struggle was identical to ZAPU; people who formed
ZANU had been tutored in ZAPU, followed up ZAPU policies and
understood the historical realities of the struggle. Nkomo included rep-
resentatives of each of ethnic groups in the ZAPU’s executive commit-
tee. The multi-ethnic composition of ZAPU cut across ethnicity and
ZAPU members addressed each other as mwanawevhu (child of the
94 K. Tafira
soil). At its formation, the composition of ZAPU leadership reflected an

admixture of all ethnicities making it a national party. The Zimbabwe in
the acronym ZAPU indicates resonance with the masses. Indeed, ZAPU
began shifting its focus from urban centres to rural areas. Ndlovu-
Gatsheni and Willems (2010: 197) describe the multifaceted character of
Nkomo:
What emerges from the autobiography are a range of positive identities

and subject positions that include Nkomo as the authentic African leader;
as a symbol of unity; as the committed nationalist and Pan-Africanist; and
as the advocate of post-independence unity.
By the time ZAPU was banned on 20 September 1962, it had 19,0000

members. Subsequently, the Peoples Caretaker Council (PCC) was
formed on 23 August 1963. It was not an overtly political organisation,
though, but was ZAPU in disguise as ZAPU, like its leader Nkomo,
reflected many identities throughout the struggle.
British overseas policy from early 1960s included cementing a rela-
tionship with the USA, cooperation between London and Washington
on African policy and granting independence to her colonies (Butler
2000). In Southern Rhodesia, limited constitutional reforms were intro-
duced which offered majority rule to a deferred date. In 1960, the
‘Ndaba’ conference convened by the British in Salisbury and attended by
Ndabaningi Sithole preceded the 1961 constitutional conference which
endorsed fifteen seats for Africans in the legislative assembly out of sixty-
five. Nkomo denounced it and walked away. Nkomo’s NDP of course
rejected the proposals.
I will not dwell on the reasons behind the ZAPU-ZANU split, which
needs an analysis of its own except to say the split led to faction fights
which often assumed a tribal character. The regional, ethnic-based divi-
sions from 1963 were fully exploited by the Rhodesian intelligence ser-
vices, and this is captured by former Rhodesian Central Intelligence
Organisation (CIO) director, Ken Flower (1987). Between 1965 and
the Geneva conference, seven attempts at negotiations were made. In
1969, the Lusaka Manifesto or Manifesto on Southern Africa, a blueprint
for democracy in Southern Africa, was drafted by fourteen central and
eastern African states at their 5th summit and conference held on 14–16
April 1969 in Lusaka. It was endorsed by the OAU in Addis Ababa in
September 1969. It stressed the independence of Zimbabwe on the
basis of majority rule and failure of the settlers to comply would compel
Africans to capture power. However, it stated that negotiations were a
favourable option than killing and destruction to avoid ‘suffering for all
the peoples of Rhodesia, both black and white’. But the intransigence of
settler regimes made armed struggle an alternative. Nonetheless, peaceful
negotiations and armed struggle were both sides of the same coin.
In 1971, African National Council (this time Council replaced
Congress of the 1950s ANC) was established, under the chairmanship
of Bishop Abel Muzorewa, who had been nominated by Nkomo who
was in prison, to oppose the Douglas-Home-Smith agreement entered
between Sir Alec Douglas-Home and Ian Smith in November 1971.
The Tiger and Fearless talks in 1966 and 1968 by the British govern-
ment and the Rhodesians had culminated in Anglo-Rhodesian proposals
of 1971. The ANC membership included members of the banned ZAPU
and ZANU, was basically ‘non-partisan’ and used ZAPU/PCC under-
ground structures. One other interesting thing is that the campaign was
led and directed from prison where Sithole, Nkomo, Mugabe and others
were sitting. In 1971, Lord Pearce constituted the Pearce Commission
of Inquiry into African opinion on the constitutional proposals provid-
ing independence under white minority rule. The majority of Africans
rejected the proposals and didn’t see them as a genuine basis for inde-
pendence. The Pearce Report countered Smith’s illusionary assertion
that his ‘natives were the happiest in the world’.
In early 1970s, FRELIMO had invited ZAPU to join forces and pen-
etrate Zimbabwe. At that time, ZAPU was experiencing serious internal
squabbles meaning it failed to capitalise on the opportunity and the invi-
tation was instead extended to ZANU. After ZAPU crisis of 1970–1971,
members like James Chikerema and George Nyandoro quit or were
expelled. Tribal fissions between Zezuru (Shonas) led by Chikerema and
Ndebeles and Kalangas led by JZ Moyo had resulted in bloody clashes at
Zimbabwe House in Lusaka in 1970. The Zambian government could
not unite the two factions either. Chikerema’s attempt at unity with
ZANU was interpreted as representing a tribal faction in ZAPU and
therefore was not valid. The ZAPU split led to the formation of Front
for Liberation of Zimbabwe (FROLIZI) which further complicated
efforts at unity. On the other hand, ZAPU internecine conflict stalled
its armed struggle. Thus, the OAU Liberation Committee held its 19th
Ordinary Session at Benghazi, Libya, on 18 January 1972 and resolved
that the armed struggle had to resume.
96 K. Tafira
The OAU Liberation Committee compelled ZAPU/ZANU to

sign a joint declaration to achieve unity of the people of Zimbabwe
through armed struggle. The Mbeya Protocol in Tanzania resulted
in ZAPU/ZANU forming the Joint Military Command (JMC) in
March 1972 with ZANU’s Herbert Chitepo as head. It was modelled
on December 1971 Kinshasa Agreement between Angolan FNLA and
MPLA. It was tasked with planning and conducting military operations
of the two parties. Chitepo commented that the Mbeya declaration ‘was
the first major step towards true, genuine, and lasting UNITY forged in
blood and death in common battle against a common enemy endures
forever’ (Mubako 1975). The principles of JMC were reaffirmed at
Kampala meeting of OAU Liberation Committee in May 1972. This was
followed up in Accra but OAU Liberation Committee expressed its dis-
appointment that the JMC had not worked. The two parties were there-
fore prevailed to sign a ‘strategy for liberation of Zimbabwe’, a formula
previously applied to the Angolan movements.
Although they were pressured to sign, they were not obliged to
implement the agreement. Both ZAPU and ZANU confirmed that unity
is the unity of Zimbabwean people through armed struggle and those
factions not committed to armed struggle cannot be united in a revolu-
tionary organisation. Nonetheless, the JMC was not implemented and
no military operations were coordinated. On the other hand, ZAPU
commanders did not involve themselves in the implementation of JMC
because according to Dumiso Dabengwa, ZAPU’s director of intel-
ligence, at that stage the feeling was ZANU must disband and rejoin
ZAPU.
ZIPRA declared that apart from commitment to the revolution-
ary armed struggle, it endorsed the re-establishment of national unity
of Zimbabwean people in the ANC through the Lusaka Declaration
and called upon the people of Zimbabwe to ‘be vigilant and guard this
unity against manipulations by enemies that seek to divide our people
again’ (Declaration of Zimbabwe People’s Revolutionary Council, 31
December 1974 to 4 January 1975). Apparently, the FRELIMO vic-
tory was instructive on the need for unity which the national leader-
ship had to commit rather than ‘personal aggrandisement, self-seekers
and irredeemable tribalists’ (The Zimbabwe Review, 21 June 1975). The
implication was that Zimbabweans could not be split by the formation
of political parties by ‘treacherous campaigns meant to discredit some
Zimbabwean leaders’ (The Zimbabwe Review, 21 January 1975).
Following the Zimbabwe Unity Agreement of 7 December 1974

which merged the liberation movement into an enlarged ANC, a follow-
up meeting was held in November of the same year in Dar-es-Salaam
under the auspices of executive secretary of OAU Liberation Committee,
Colonel Hashim Mbita which led to Zimbabwe Military Committee
High Command in Mozambique comprising eighteen members, nine
from ZAPU and nine from ZANU. Its terms of references were: con-
solidation of unity among ANC fighters; recruitment and unified training
of cadres; unified deployment of combatants and mass mobilisation; and
consolidation of a single military command. The committee also resolved
not to engage in slogans denouncing political leadership, abolishing divi-
sive and partisan slogans and adopting new revolutionary slogans that
enhance unity of the ANC fighters. However, these agreements were not
adhered to by ZANU fighters leading to bloody clashes in Mozambique
and Tanzania.
In November 1975 in Tanzania, ZPRA and ZANLA formed the
Zimbabwe Peoples’ Army (ZIPA) with Rex Nhongo commander and
Nikita Mangena political commissar. From bases in Mozambique, it
started military operations against Smith regime in January 1976. ZIPA
collapsed by mid-1976 as a result of armed clashes between ZPRA and
ZANLA in camps in Mozambique and Tanzania. The killing of ZPRA
cadres and particularly the Morogoro incident led to their withdrawal
and return to Zambia. However, resuscitation of the concept ZIPA con-
tinued into the late 1970s. During his speech at the OAU Liberation
Committee meeting, Nkomo stressed the need for political alliance and
military union stating that ‘it is true that ZIPA has had problems but
ZIPA is an entity. The fact that the ZANU and ZAPU sides of ZIPA
operate from different geographical areas does not mean that it does not
exist as a unit’ (see Speech By Joshua Nkomo at the 28th Session of the
OAU Liberation Committee 31 January 1977).
On 7 December 1974, leaders of ANC, ZANU, ZAPU and FROLIZI
had met in Lusaka and signed a unity accord at the behest of the
Frontline States (FLS) presidents. The agreement was that all parties
unite in the enlarged ANC and the ANC would be the unifying force
in preparation for the transfer of power. The agreement was signed by
leaders of the nationalist formations (Nkomo [ZAPU]; Sithole [ZANU];
Muzorewa [ANC] and Chikerema [FROLIZI]) on 8 December 1974.
The Lusaka Unity Accord was endorsed by the OAU Liberation
Committee, and Zambian Foreign Minister Vernon Mwanga expressed
98 K. Tafira
that the ANC was the only organisation recognised by OAU. The impli-
cation was that both ZAPU and ZANU had effectively ceased to exist.
The idea was unity of the people of Zimbabwe in lieu of a forthcoming
constitutional conference in Victoria Falls. Contestations in the ANC,
however, led to Nkomo breaking away and continued with talks with
Smith, of which the talks floundered because Smith was not prepared to
transfer power to majority rule. If Smith might have considered Nkomo
moderate and dealing with him alone would divide the nationalist move-
ment, he was tragically short-sighted as later events attest. Indeed, oth-
ers in the nationalist camp labelled Nkomo a moderate for talking with
Smith. An editorial in the ZAPU publication, The Zimbabwe Review,
considers this matter:
Cde. Joshua Nkomo is a ‘moderate’ merely because he has insisted on con-

sistency and honesty in honouring conclusively agreed and signed lines of
policy including that of tactical pursuit of negotiations with the Rhodesian
regime. (The Zimbabwe Review, 5 November 1976)
Nkomo himself dismissed allegations that he was a moderate; those

labelling him harboured intentions to remove him from the struggle. He
asked:
If I were a blue- eyed boy of the Rhodesian whites, why did they keep
me in detention and restriction for so many years? The mere fact that they
kept me away from the people for so long is proof that I am not the man
they would like to hold an important post in an African-controlled govern-
ment. (ABC Rusike Interview with Nkomo, 10 January 1975)
Nkomo’s talks with Smith reveal another of his political side. Intuitively,
he might have been a shrewd and cunning politician. His talks with the
regime did not mean suspension of the armed struggle, but were meant
to prove that Zimbabwe could never be liberated through negotiations
or goodwill of the Smith regime and the regime could never negotiate a
settlement (The Zimbabwe Review, 5 November 1975). In fact after the
breakdown of Nkomo’s talks with Smith, Smith told the world that there
could never be majority rule in Rhodesia in 1000 years. Talks with the
regime also proved that it was reluctant to transfer power to the majority
(Speech by Joshua Nkomo at the 13th Session of the OAU in Mauritius,
10 June 1977). In another way, Nkomo proved to the world that the
Lusaka Manifesto and Dar-es-Salaam Declaration were inapplicable as far

as Smith was concerned. Nkomo’s strategy of talks was not an end in
themselves, but served to facilitate the next stage of the struggle. Talking
with the enemy could only be done under certain circumstances advan-
tageous to the progress and advancement of the struggle, ‘we believe
in a cumulative effect of a multi-lateral strategy in pursuing our liber-
ation struggle’, and ‘all forms of struggle, that is, military, diplomatic,
labour, political and propaganda must be used in coordination and
pushed forward as a single revolutionary thrust’ (The Zimbabwe Review,
5 November 1975). It would be erroneous to suggest that talking with
the enemy is an alternative to fighting the enemy.
Nkomo was desirous to see complete unity, failure if which would
result in bloodbath reminiscent of Angola. Unity would be dissipated
through inter-party rivalries and tribal fights which would delay inde-
pendence, and disunity would be exploited fully by the enemy and
would be favourable to the Smith regime. Nkomo had excoriated Bishop
Muzorewa who once said since he is from Mashonaland and Nkomo is
from Matabeleland, he (Muzorewa) represents more people and there-
fore should be a national leader. Nkomo said:
This is the most absurd, most dangerous tribalistic trash I have ever heard
since I became active in the struggle for the freedom of our country almost
30 years ago. (The Zimbabwe Review, 6 November 1976)
Another factor is that the unity was compelled by the OAU and enforced
unity failed to work because it did not have enough support from groups
and individuals in the nationalist movement itself (Windrich 1977).
Secondly, differing ideologies hampered unity in the ANC. The nation-
alist movements pursued their own separate lines, and their structures
were not merged and ‘rather than laying the foundation for sustained
unity, the Lusaka Accord contributed to further divisions, deepening
the rifts between the signatories, as well as the political organisations
and guerrilla forces’ (Mubako 1975: 8). The suspicion was that the
ANC was littered with Uncle Toms committed to a non-violent pol-
icy; therefore; the ANC could not work in a context of armed struggle
(Mubako 1975). Nevertheless, the PF had a measure of success because
it had a progressive material and progressive individuals. Unlike the
Angolan FNLA and MPLA, regardless of sometimes strained relations
between ZAPU/ZANU and differences in tactics, they did not assume
100 K. Tafira
antagonistic positions and were ideologically closer and were supported

by FLS (Mubako 1975: 7). The precedence had been set during
1957–1963 where the nationalist movement under Nkomo’s leadership
was fairly united. Thirdly, the Angolan experience where the liberation
movement was urged by the FLS to sign a unity agreement before nego-
tiating with the Portuguese government was meant to be tried with the
Zimbabwean liberation movement.
Attempts were made at unity between COREMO and FRELIMO in
Mozambique: MPLA, UNITA and FNLA which all failed. On 5 January
1975, FNLA, MPLA and UNITA met in Mombasa under the chairman-
ship of Jomo Kenyatta and agreed on a common ground to negotiate
the end of Portuguese rule but would maintain their separate identities.
The conference held in Portugal in January 1975 sealed the Mombasa
Accord, but there was no merger of the parties. In their 14 years of
struggle, the Angolan nationalist movement was plagued by differences
in strategies, struggles for power, personal antipathies, ethnic alliances,
dynamics of history and Mobutu’s realpolitiks (Mubako 1975: 5–7).
Elsewhere in Namibia and South Africa, the liberation movement was
sharply divided and never united.
After attending the OAU Foreign Ministers Conference in Dar-es-Salaam
in 1975 and the Commonwealth Prime Ministers’ Conference in Jamaica,
Nkomo returned to Rhodesia to negotiate with Smith and plan for a con-
gress to elect the permanent leadership of the ANC. However, Muzorewa,
Chikerema and Sithole suspected that Nkomo wanted to ascend the lead-
ership of ANC. Sithole subsequently organised the Zimbabwe Liberation
Council (ZLC) and made himself chairman with Chikerema, secretary. At
August 1975 Victoria Falls talks, Nkomo refused to recognise ZLC while
the other trio refused to recognise Nkomo as ANC leader. In September
1975, ZAPU held its own congress, ousted Muzorewa and formed ANC
Zimbabwe (ANC-Z) under Nkomo’s leadership.1 The implication was
a failure of the unity of various nationalist formations. Nkomo continued
to negotiate and hold bilateral talks, which had begun on 1 December
1975 and spread over thirteen sittings, with Smith until March 1976 of
which the talks inadvertently broke down. This followed Angolan invasion
by South Africa and Mozambique’s closure of its borders with Rhodesia.
Subsequently, ZAPU upped its military option, relaunched its armed strug-
gle and the insurgency escalated.
Meanwhile, the USA with Henry Kissinger as negotiator entered
the fray, and on 23 June 1976, he met South African Prime Minister
John Vorster in a bid to reopen negotiations between Rhodesia and

the nationalists. Kissinger visited the FLS, made a speech in Lusaka in
April 1976 and had a meeting with Vorster in Germany in September
of the same year, in preparation for the Geneva talks. In 1974, through
efforts of Vorster and business magnets in South Africa, Vorster met
Zambian president Kenneth Kaunda in a bid to stop the guerrilla war in
north-eastern Rhodesia and to call for a constitutional conference to be
attended by the Smith regime and the nationalists. The truth of the mat-
ter is that the détente exercise around Rhodesia was a reaction to ZANU
military offensive in December 1972; FRELIMO’s military advances
and the fall of the Portuguese regime in April 1974; the threat of Soviet
influence propelled Kissinger’s ‘shuttle diplomacy’ with the USA and
the West worried that Smith’s intransigence would lead to a communist
takeover; the Angolan experience would repeat itself in Zimbabwe and
Zimbabwean freedom fighters would turn to Eastern bloc for assistance
(Matthews 1979/1980). Détente meant defence of apartheid while
at the same time Zambia wished to avoid being imbricated in a long
drawn conflict. These diplomatic manoeuvres involving South Africa and
Kissinger have come to be known as détente policy on Southern Africa.
According to Ken Mufuka (1979) who was a ZAPU member,
Kissinger’s favour for a negotiated settlement and indeed the policy of
détente was meant to avoid military defeat of Smith regime by ZPRA/
ZANLA Russian and Chinese trained guerrillas who would come to
power implying the next military target would be apartheid South Africa.
In any case, military defeat of Rhodesian racist regime by blacks would
be an embarrassment to the white supremacist world. For the above rea-
sons, Vorster and Kaunda agreed that the solution lay in a constitutional
settlement where South Africa would insist end of Rhodesian white
regime and Zambia would agree to an establishment of a moderate black
government in Zimbabwe. However, the détente exercise ended with
South Africa’s invasion of Angola in October 1975.
In late 1976, Nkomo and Robert Mugabe formed the Patriotic Front
(PF) which rejected Kissinger’s proposals and intensified the guer-
rilla struggle under PF’s joint command. Three weeks before Geneva
ZAPU/ZANU issued the Maputo Declaration in which they announced
the formation of the PF:
Cognisant of the need to present a common and solid approach to national

matters and being determined that our different political identities shall
102 K. Tafira
not be a barrier to cooperation in promoting the revolutionary process in

Zimbabwe…our two organisations have resolved that they shall with sin-
gularity of purpose adopt a common approach to all issues arising from the
subject of current talks. (Liberation Support 1978: 8)
For Nkomo, the PF had the same motives: to promote the armed strug-
gle; to bring the two parties together; uniting the country after lib-
eration and ‘this has always been the driving force behind our unity’
(Liberation Support 1978: 8). He added:
We also realised it was necessary to move toward the creation of one army.
But several of us also believe that before you can form a single army it is nec-
essary to have one political organisation. The question of any army hinges
on the unity of political leadership. You can’t have one army under two par-
ties, with two leaders. Consequently, you can’t talk of uniting the two armies
without first uniting the two parties. (Liberation Support 1978: 18)
Nkomo expressed hope that ZAPU/ZANU would enter elections as

a single unit. At that time, political unity was satisfactory because both
parties entered negotiations with a single set of proposals.
The Geneva peace conference which was sponsored by Britain to form
an interim government to facilitate the transfer of power to majority rule
convened on 28 October 1976. Nkomo intimated that if the Geneva
conference failed, he could not be held liable because on many occasions
he had tried to show that talks of these nature do not succeed. Armed
struggle, rather, was inevitable and had to be intensified (The Zimbabwe
Review, 6 November 1976). After Geneva, the PF was recognised by
FLS as the sole representative and sole liberation movement of the peo-
ple of Zimbabwe at the exclusion of Muzorewa and Sithole. The recog-
nition was further affirmed at the 14th Ordinary Session of OAU heads
of state and government meeting in Libreville from 2 to 5 July 1977. At
the meeting, the OAU and FLS granted the PF political, diplomatic and
material support after the recommendation of the 28th Session of OAU
coordination committee for the liberation of Africa. Secondly, the PF’s
task was to unify the Zimbabwean people and the Zimbabwean libera-
tion movement before independence to avoid the Angolan experience.
The PF had met again in Maputo from 15 to 17 January 1977
and issued a press release signed by JZ Moyo and Robert Mugabe on
behalf of ZAPU/ZANU, respectively. It defined further its objectives
as: liquidation of imperialism and colonialism; creation of a national

democratic state of the people of Zimbabwe; eliminating capitalistic
exploitation; and creation of a social revolution. It set up a ten-member
coordinating committee comprising leaders of the two organisations to
coordinate and jointly implement agreed programmes including study-
ing problems that had affected ZIPA and how to reorganise it. The
summit of five FLS that met in Lusaka in January 1977 and attended
by Botswana, Angola, Zambia, Tanzania and Mozambique gave full sup-
port to PF. Following PF’s Coordinating Committee meeting in Lusaka
on 20 April 1977, meant to consolidate the political and military fronts
of the PF, they decided to establish headquarters in Dar-es-Salaam and
regional offices in Maputo and Lusaka. The press statement released after
the meeting stated that:
The Patriotic Front calls upon all the patriotic and democratic forces inside
and outside Zimbabwe to close ranks behind the Patriotic Front, and to
make resolute efforts to defeat imperialist machinations and to ensure a
speedy advent of genuine independence for the people of Zimbabwe. (The
Zimbabwe Review, 6 November 1976)
The coordinating committee of the PF met in Maputo from 9 to 12

September 1977 to consider latest British proposals for a settlement in
Rhodesia and came up with a position paper. After analysing the pro-
posed ‘independence constitution’, the movement stressed that it had
always advocated for independence which is non-negotiable, and that
there should be democratic elections based on universal suffrage.
At the Third Congress of FRELIMO in Maputo, 3–7 February 1977,
before Nkomo delivered his speech he first called the joint leader of the
PF, Robert Mugabe, to share the stage with him as a sign of the serious
intentions of the PF to achieve its objectives of unifying the people of
Zimbabwe. This act was received with a tumultuous applause from the
delegates (The Zimbabwe Review, 7 February 1977). Nkomo noted that
although there were differences in Zimbabwe and Mozambique’s histori-
cal experience, ‘we are culturally one people, sharing a common terri-
tory and inevitably a common destiny whether in peril or prosperity. The
Rhodesian racists are demonstrating this fact by murdering our people
on both sides of the border’ (The Zimbabwe Review, 7 February 1977).
At the June 1977 OAU Summit in Libreville, Nkomo and Mugabe
stood side by side in show of a united front and were advised to unite
104 K. Tafira
their separate armies and form a single political union than merely a
front. Still, the parties maintained the slogan, ‘We shall unite if we can,
but we shall fight alone if we must’ (Mubako 1975: 9). Nkomo found
the idea that the PF was ‘a marriage of convenience’ repulsive because
‘there is no convenience in the struggle. Our coming together is a mat-
ter of reality, and we have agreed to work together on certain issues’
(Zimbabwe Day Speech by Nkomo, 17 March 1977). At another forum
he said:
Some people say the Patriotic Front was a marriage of convenience. It is

a reality. A reality of the people who want to work together in both ways.
Now we have realised that by working separately, we could not put sig-
nificant TNT, on this rock to crack it. We brought together the two
TNT’s, ZAPU and ZANU together. We are placing heavy TNT’s on
this hard imperialist rock, and the fuse is on. (Speech by Nkomo at the
World Conference Against Apartheid, Racism and Colonialism in Southern
Africa, 16–17 January 1977)
Many times and at various international fora, Nkomo had to address the
criticism that the Zimbabwean political leadership had failed to forge and
maintain unity. He acknowledged that tribalism had been the main cause
of breakdown of ZIPA, ‘We have paid a high price in human lives for
what we considered to be unity camps, all in an attempt to achieve unity
with elements that have a mania for killing fellow comrades-in-arms’
(Address by Nkomo at the 13th OAU Session, Mauritius, June 1977).
Another reason was ZANU political leadership not willing to abandon
ZANU for the sake of unity. Secondly, ‘unity of the cadres’ while nec-
essary excluded the entire people. Thirdly, Nkomo noticed that it was
futile to discuss unity and sign unity documents without the participa-
tion of the masses. Although ZAPU/ZANU remained separate parties
and separate political identities, they agreed at least on uniting their
armed forces so as to be effective and to have one army in independent
Zimbabwe which will defend her independence:
A country can have one, two, three, four, ten political parties, but it can’t
have more than one army. This is simple common sense. (Address by
Nkomo at the 13th OAU Session, Mauritius, June 1977)
Nkomo was quick to observe that the issue of disunity was actually disu-
nity among leaders not the people of Zimbabwe who have a long history
of struggle and have fought oppression as a united people (Speech by

Nkomo at 28th Session of the OAU Liberation Committee, 31 January
1977). Since the people of Zimbabwe were commonly oppressed, it was
therefore imperative that they be united on a unity premised on basic
principle. For this reason, leaders had the responsibility of uniting people
rather than dividing them. Unity would stabilise all revolutionary princi-
ple and minimise the chances of enemy tactics of divide and rule, while
at the same time the enemy would be facing a ‘one force with one voice’.
Apparently, the question of unity sat heavily on Nkomo’s heart. In a
press statement on 30 June 1975 in Lusaka, he said, ‘After signing the
Lusaka Declaration of Unity in Zambia on December 7 last year, I felt
it my bounden duty to abide by it to the letter and spirit. The absence
of unity in Zimbabwe was a matter that had tormented and tortured
me in my 11 years of prison and detention more than the prison condi-
tions had’ (ABC Rusike (editor of Focus on Southern Africa Journal)’s
Interview with Nkomo, January 1975). Nkomo added, ‘When this unity
was achieved, I was the happiest man alive, and had a sound and peace-
ful sleep for the first time in 11 years’ (ABC Rusike (editor of Focus
on Southern Africa Journal)’s Interview with Nkomo, January 1975).
Nkomo believed unity is a weapon of the struggle which had to be main-
tained even after independence. As a man committed to service and sac-
rifice, he hoped the co-signatories would share his view, but he was to be
proven wrong. One important facet of Nkomo’s personality is that he
refrained from saying anything untoward to other leaders to avoid jeop-
ardising unity. But his silence was misconstrued by those seeking political
capital including accusations that he was making secret deals with Smith.
Nkomo always maintained that he always negotiated in public and with
a mandate from his party and the people. After the Lusaka meeting, they
had agreed to speak with one voice, but some leaders were jockeying for
positions including feathering ‘their own nests, hence the apparent divi-
sion within our ranks’ (ABC Rusike (editor of Focus on Southern Africa
Journal)’s Interview with Nkomo, January 1975).
In an article appearing in the Black Scholar, Nkomo agrees that inde-
pendence could not come by constitutional negotiations but through
armed struggle. Elsewhere, Nkomo had spoken these words:
We are also guided by the obvious truth that one cannot procure at a con-
ference table what one has not procured in the battlefield. THAT IS NOT
POSSIBLE. Therefore comrades, the revolutionary struggle in Zimbabwe
106 K. Tafira
continues. (Speech by Nkomo at the Third Congress of FRELIMO, 3–7

February 1977)
He outlines the essence of unity which is a prerequisite for the victory of

the struggle:
We in the Patriotic Front recognise the fact that unless Zimbabwean fight-
ing forces unite under a revolutionary banner against Rhodesian fascism,
the struggle against Rhodesia cannot succeed. (Nkomo 1978: 21)
Nkomo distinguishes between ‘mixed grill’ unity and ‘creative unity’

where the former involves a smattering of forces who come together
without any coherent ideas of what they want to change and the kind
of society they want to build. These lack any consistent ideology. This
includes selecting a leader to whom the Smith regime would hand over
power, a leader who will be more important than the party or govern-
ment. For Nkomo, the struggle is not about replacing Smith with a black
face. Rather, it is about fundamental change and ‘the war is not against
white people, but against a system of racism that keeps African people in
a state of slavery’ (Nkomo 1978: 22).
A reappraisal of the past efforts at unity shows sitting at a table, dis-
cussing differences and signing agreements to work together failed.
Instead, unity works through a process of shared experience in strug-
gle, and the creative unity of the Patriotic Front is found and expressed
in armed struggle. Nkomo describes the armed struggle as a ‘grinding
mill’ that eradicates mistrust and suspicions. He believed that ‘since
Rhodesians are not going to be charmed from their tree of power and
privilege’, they must be compelled before any negotiation mechanism
can be drawn. Negotiated settlement cannot be dependent on the volun-
tary cooperation of Smith nor his goodwill because Smith was reluctant
to hand over power voluntarily. In fact, the liberation movement had for
years used arguments, persuasion and talks and expressed a desire for
peaceful means to change. All was futile. Besides, Smith had an ingrained
habit of negotiating in bad faith, in dishonesty, in deceit and prevarica-
tion, only willing to negotiate when tables are turning against him and
to give his overstretched troops a breather and to sow confusion in the
ranks of the liberation movement.
In addition, the Rhodesians ‘have operated a police state for over
20 years; they have torn up their own constitution, thus risking world
criticism and action; they have detained without trial thousands of
Zimbabweans; they perverted the rule of law, tried people in camera,

hanged people in secret, legalised torture-all, they say, in the name of
western Christian civilisation and to contain communism; all, in fact, to
maintain privilege of power’ (Nkomo 1978: 23). Nkomo also acknowl-
edges the unity and support of the peoples of the FLS who faced greater
risks in the process. Nonetheless, ‘the Patriotic Front will fight by all
means at its disposal until Rhodesia is no more. We expect all those
that oppose racism and fascism to act in an equally unequivocal manner
against minority rule. We must give our blood not because we love war,
but because we love freedom’ (Nkomo 1978: 26).
According to Mufuka (1977: 58), Nkomo used to say, ‘This is not
Smith’s country—ilizwe ngelethu,’2 meaning ‘Mr Nkomo may agree
that at international law, the white colonists are Rhodesians but it seems
to me that he has never accepted that Zimbabwe, African name for
Rhodesia, is a white man’s country. Most Africans, if one can be allowed
to generalise still feel that Europeans are not vanavevhu –sons of the soil’
(Mufuka 1977: 58). Nevertheless, Nkomo believed that:
We are non-racialists; we believe in one people; we believe in one nation

– that is, the Zimbabwean nation. Our intention is to build a new nation,
not new in the sense that our forefathers did not have a nation, but new in
the sense that we are recreating it from the chaotic situation of the colonial
era where people have been divided by race. In saying this, I wish to stress
the importance of creating one nation, eliminating racialism completely
and, of course, we cannot eliminate racialism and condone tribalism. As we
have been fighting, against racialism, we shall fight, even more viciously,
against any signs of tribalism that seem to show in our country today. We
are fighting for a nation of people – black, yellow or red, people who have
made that country their home. They must feel secure, no matter what their
skin colour is. (The Zimbabwe Review, 6 January 1977)
In another context, Nkomo also reiterated:
Of course we not racialists. When we say the transfer of power to the

majority, we are not taking power from the whites and giving it to the
Blacks. We are colour blind. We don’t look at people’s faces and say they
are not our people because they are white. We don’t look at people’s
texture of the hair or their straight nose. We look at people as people.
(Speech by Nkomo at the World Conference on Apartheid, Racism and
Colonialism in Southern Africa, 16–17 June 1977)
108 K. Tafira
The Zimbabwe Review (1977) reiterated that in the PF, there was no
Shona or Ndebele but Zimbabweans. On every 17 of March of every
year was observed by ZAPU as Zimbabwe Day and was announced
by a ZAPU delegation to the conference of Afro-Asian Solidarity
Organisation in Moshi, Tanzania, in 1963. Its importance lay in that it
is the day Zimbabwean people came together in 1896 in united effort
to fight colonial invaders (Zimbabwe Day Speech By Nkomo, 17 March
1977). The 17 of March originated from the attack on Fort Mhondoro
by a force put together by Mashayamombe and Mkwati Ncube with the
two generals coming from the north and south but still demonstrating
singularity of purpose and effort. In that resistance, Zimbabwean peo-
ple forgot their differences and fought a common enemy. Zimbabwe
Day also meant to counter colonial historian assertion that the military
attacks by Africans were a rebellion by scattered, unorganised tribes with-
out purpose or direction (The Zimbabwe Review, 23 March 1974).
A disturbing trend in the liberation movement was reflected in cad-
res developing a habit of avoiding the company of someone speaking
Ndebele or Shona. An issue of the Zimbabwe Review urged abandon-
ment of this retrogressive trait because ‘both languages are the cultural
wealth of Zimbabwe and behave otherwise is to start a train of preju-
dices leading to divisive tendencies. As Zimbabweans we should be more
proud to speak and understand both languages equally well than tak-
ing pride in the knowledge of English minus one local language’ (The
Zimbabwe Review, 5 April 1975).
As the war heated up in the late 1970s, the Rhodesian propaganda
was in full drive and was using the tried and tested tactic of division and
divisive tactics. Nkomo, cognizant of the enemy efforts to split people
into tribal groups hostile to one another, said:
We belong to different tribal as well as racial groups. The racial or tribal

differences do not make us less or more Zimbabwean than we are. We
should realise that once we fall prey to such tactics practised by people
some of whom pose as nationalists, we cannot build a happy and stable
Zimbabwe. Our enemies remind us of so-called tribal wars fought by our
forefathers’ centuries ago. They remind us about these wars not to help us
understand our history but to make us hate those who do not belong to
our tribes, those who belong to tribes with which our forefathers might
have once clashed over, perhaps, grazing land, fishing or hunting areas.
We must be vigilant and expose such divisive tactics. Similarly, we should
never tolerate any form of racialism whatsoever. (The Zimbabwe Review, 6

November 1976)
Tribalism, like racism, could never perform a liberatory function but only
served to generate hatred, prejudice, bigotry and ‘aggressive suspicion’
(The Zimbabwe Review, 6 November 1976). Nkomo stressed that the
war was not about fighting white people but a cruel system that is ‘repul-
sive, indecent, inhuman, and gives a privilege to a minority to dominate
a majority’ (Zimbabwe Day Speech by Nkomo, 17 March 1977). The
cause of war was denial of human rights and a racist system. The impli-
cation was that Zimbabweans of all colours must join the struggle and
whites had a choice to either side with a racist regime or join forces fight-
ing oppression. Thus, the war could not stop without its causes removed
and replaced by a just system that does not consider one’s ethnic, racial
or tribal origin. For Nkomo, all had a solemn duty to create a nation
based on human dignity, equality and justice; bound a feeling of human
brotherliness and not torn asunder by ‘racial bigotry, hostility and
greed…in that nation one has to live a happy and dignified life which
will be nothing but human-ness’ (The Zimbabwe Review, 6 November
1976). The objective of Zimbabwean people was seeking right to deter-
mine their own destiny, to own it and be masters of their own future.
The plan for Zimbabwe which emerged from the commonwealth
conference of 1 August 1979 in Lusaka entailed observance of cease-
fire, acceptance of outcome of British supervised and internationally
observed elections. The precedence had been set in the 1977 Anglo-
American proposals which detailed surrender of power by Smith, holding
of free and fair elections and establishment by Britain of a transitional
administration. Earlier on in January 1979, Nkomo the joint leader of
PF had told Cledwyn Hughes that only a military solution was possible
in Rhodesia. If ever there was a settlement, it could only be reached by
those locked in combat. Politicians like Sithole, Muzorewa, Chirau and
Ndiweni served the divisive purposes of the regime directly or indirectly
(The Zimbabwe Review, 6 November 1976). Following the internal set-
tlement of 3 March 1978 also called the Constitutional Agreement on
Rhodesia which laid out universal suffrage as a basis of a new constitu-
tion; separation of powers and Smith supervising transition to major-
ity rule; and the April 1979 elections, the need for greater political and
military unity between ZANU and ZAPU was necessary. As for the 20
110 K. Tafira
April 1979 elections with anti-revolutionary leaders like Muzorewa at

the helm, Nkomo had forewarned that every polling booth would float
with blood (Beri 1979). Both ZAPU and ZANU of course boycotted
the polls which they considered a sham.
After several meetings with FLS which included hosts Kaunda and
Machel, Nkomo and Mugabe signed a unity agreement on 12 May 1979
to ensure greater unity and achieve military victory. ZPRA’s ‘Turning
Point’ strategy was crucial in hastening the convening of Lancaster
House which opened on 10 September 1979. Apparently, the Rhodesian
intelligence was aware of the strategy. However, the sight of outright
military conquest was short-lived as the liberation movement fell under
pressure from the FLS to negotiate. Following the Lusaka Agreement,
the FLS ‘insisted that the PF should not only attended the London con-
ference but also that they should not walk out of it’ (Gregory 1980:
15). This was after PF’s reservations of Lusaka Agreement which they
thought favoured Muzorewa and were also dissatisfied that the British
would supervise the elections. In any case, the PF was caught between a
rock and hard place:
The Lancaster House Agreement represented a compromise between very

different positions of Britain and the PF. An examination of some of the
critical stages of the conference reveals how each delegation sought to
mobilize international support on its own behalf, and demonstrate how
international forces, in turn, limited each participant’s scope for manoeu-
vre, and, indeed objection. (Gregory 1980: 15)
During 1980 election campaigns, the main theme of ZAPU (now

Patriotic Front Party) was peace, national unity and reconciliation (Cliffe
et al. 1980). Nkomo refrained from publicly attacking other leaders.
Instead, he emphasised on unity and peace despite some ZANLA and
ZANU adherents blocking his and his party’s campaigns in some areas.
In many instances, slogans like pasi na Nkomo (Down with Nkomo)
were the staple of ZANU canvassing. This political immaturity annoyed
some communities in Matabeleland where ZANLA cadres had operated
and received support from locals who were flabbergasted with this kind
of campaigning.
Nkomo’s commitment to unity and peace in the newly established
Zimbabwe is seen in ZAPU adding PF as a campaign theme for unity
and ‘Nkomo’s party made a major effort to overcome its image as a
regional, tribally based party appealing merely to the Ndebele groups
in Matabeleland where only sixteen out of eighty seats were being

contested’ (Gregory 1980). To say that ZAPU was regional based is
a historical fallacy, as shown above. During the 1980 elections, ZAPU
Shona-speaking members like Joseph Msika, Willie Musarurwa and
Josiah Chinamano contested in Mashonaland constituencies. Gregory
(1980: 183) adds, ‘The PF campaign, which received a US$5 mil-
lion from the OAU, stressed its leader’s avuncular image as “Father
Zimbabwe”’ Besides, Nkomo had decades of experience as a trade
unionist which entailed uniting Zimbabweans of all tribes and races. For
a long time, Nkomo had been regarded not only as nationalist and revo-
lutionary leader but also a spiritual leader as well. The Njelele national
rally he addressed saw some two hundred and fifty thousand people in
attendance. Thirty years earlier, Nkomo had visited the shrine consid-
ered one of the most important and holiest sites in Zimbabwean cosmol-
ogy and was anointed leader of the nationalist movement while he also
received some ritual and prophetical invocations.
Following 1980 electoral defeat, Nkomo refused to take the Savimbi
way and plunge the country into civil war. Rather, he recognised the vic-
tory and legitimacy of Mugabe’s government (Ndlovu-Gatsheni 2007).
Conclusion
The long political career of Nkomo endears him to the pantheon of
great Pan-African leaders of the contemporary times. He undoubt-
edly was a nation builder, a diplomat, a statesman and a revolutionary
leader. During his time, he earned names of affection: Mdala Wethu,
Chibwechitedza, Father Zimbabwe, Big Josh and so on. Nkomo would
be remembered for his advancement of the Zimbabwean revolution,
his quest for unity and peace and welfare of the people of Zimbabwe.
A close analysis of his speeches and writings in the period 1945–1980
reflects the depth of his commitment to liberation which of course he
believed could not happen if the protagonists are not united and at worst
are at arms against each other instead of the enemy.
Notes
1.
At a congress held on 27–28 September 1975, the ANC Zimbabwe
(ANC-Z) was formed at Gwanzura stadium. In fact, it was another
nomenclature for ZAPU. The congress was attended by 65 522 delegates
coming from eight political provinces and 200 districts. At the congress,
112 K. Tafira
Nkomo intimated that if Smith did not resume negotiations, the armed
struggle would be intensified.
2. The slogan of the NDP used to be ‘One Man One Vote’, ‘Nyika Ndeyedu-
Ilizwe Ngelethu’ and ‘Forward Ever Backward Never’.
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Mufuka, K. N. (1977). Reflections on Southern Rhodesia: An African viewpoint.
Africa Today, 24(2), 51–63.
Mufuka, K. N. (1979). Rhodesia’s internal settlement: A tragedy. African
Affairs, 78(313), 439–450.
Affairs, 30, 25–42.
Nkomo, J. (1978). The principles of unity and struggle in Zimbabwe. The Black
Scholar, 9(5), 21–26.
Scarnecchia, T. (2011). The Congo crisis, the United Nations, and Zimbabwe
nationalism, 1960–1963. African Journal of Conflict Resolution, 1(1), 63–86.
The Zimbabwe Review, (1974, March 23).
The Zimbabwe Review, (1975, April 5).
The Zimbabwe Review, Vol. 4 No. 5 (1975).
The Zimbabwe Review, (1975, June 21).
The Zimbabwe Review, (1976, November 6).
The Zimbabwe Review, Vol. 6 (1977, January).
Windrich, E. (1977). Rhodesia: The road from Luanda to Geneva. The World
Today, 33(3), 101–111.
Zimbabwe Day Speech by Joshua Nkomo, Lusaka, (1977, March 17).
CHAPTER 5
The Entrapment of Joshua Nkomo

Within Global Imperial Snares
Gorden Moyo
Introduction
This chapter is an invitation to the simultaneous deconstruction and
reconstruction of Joshua Nkomo as a towering patriarch of the anti-
colonial struggle, a ‘decolonial prophet’ and a redemptive nationalist
figure in Zimbabwe. Like so many of his contemporaries, Nkomo was
a product of a complex intellectual, political and historical milieu paved
by freedom fighters and intellectuals such as Sylvester Williams who pio-
neered the Pan-African movement; Cheikh Anta Diop who spent all his
life pushing forward redemptive African nationalist scholarship and poli-
tics; Leopold Sedar Senghor who rebelled against French assimilation
and inaugurated the Negritude movement; Frantz Fanon who unmasked
the life of the ‘wretched of the earth’; Julius Nyerere who spent his
whole political career fighting for Tanzania self-reliance and continental
Pan-Africanism; Kwame Nkrumah who became the indefatigable advo-
cate of consciencism and Pan-Africanism; Kenneth Kaunda who shared
with Nkomo the principles of black humanism; and Steve Bantu Biko
G. Moyo (*) 
Lupane State University, Bulawayo, Zimbabwe

116 G. Moyo
who like Nkomo strongly believed in the redemptive black conscious-

ness spirit. The list is endless, but these are some of the few of Nkomo’s
political and ideological ‘birth-marks’. No doubt this tapestry of ideas,
histories, memories, philosophies, experiences and knowledge had a pro-
found impact on the political formation of Nkomo’s politics, political
consciousness and political leadership.
While Nkomo’s Pan-African pedigree, liberation credentials and deco-
lonial impulses compare very well and shoulder to shoulder with those
of other Pan-African luminaries, his contribution, regrettably, has largely
remained submerged in imperial epistemic silences orchestrated by a
posse of imperial knowledge producers and ‘commissar’ intellectuals who
commit what Suarez-Krabbe (2016) termed ‘epistemic violence’. Typical
exemplars of these ‘willing scribes’ are the likes of David Martin and
Phyllis Johnson whose early independence praise text consigned Nkomo,
Zimbabwe African People’s Union (ZAPU) and Zimbabwe People’s
Revolutionary Army (ZIPRA) to the sidelines of history and marginal
locations of power, while inventing the ‘hero-stories’ and producing
very ‘patriotic histories’ of Robert Mugabe, Zimbabwe African National
Union-Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF) and Zimbabwe African National
Liberation Army (ZANLA) (see Ndlovu-Gatsheni and Willems 2010).
It is, however, instructive that even Terence Ranger who even joined
ZAPU and was led by Nkomo did not produce any work on his party.
Instead, he ventured in peasant consciousness in Mashonaland and the
biographies of the Samkange family only late in his life to distance him-
self from the patriotic histories and interpretations he inaugurated in the
1960s and early 1980s (Ndlovu-Gatsheni 2013b).
As this discussion unfolds, it will become clear that Nkomo was
a product if not a ‘victim’ of what Boaventura de Sousa calls ‘abyssal
thinking’ which is a Western thinking that divides social reality into two
realms: the realm of this ‘side of the line’ and the realm ‘the other side
of the line’. Viewed from this perspective, Nkomo, ZAPU and ZIPRA
were classified as the ‘other side’ and pushed to the realm of alter-
ity not only by tribalists in the nationalist movement but also by the
global imperial forces before and after the political-juridical independ-
ence in Zimbabwe. This was done in collusion with the ‘recruited’ and
‘managed’ inheritors of the ex-colonial state who physically located
Nkomo, ZAPU and ex-ZIPRA fighters on the ‘other’ side of ethnic
abyssal lines while imagining themselves to be situated on the ‘this side’
of abyssal lines. Invariably for years, Nkomo remained atrophied and
5 THE ENTRAPMENT OF JOSHUA NKOMO … 117
locked in the shadows of history, peripheries of power and margins of

scholarship. This has provoked a new search for alternative knowledge,
alternative methodologies, alternative histories and alternative imagina-
tions of the new Pan-Africanism in Zimbabwe.
Today, in what appears to be Kwasi Wiredu’s ‘epistemic awakening’,
there is a growing stable of the literature churned by decolonial think-
ers and revisionists from different academic climes such as Timothy
Scarnecchia, Sabelo Ndlovu-Gatsheni, Wendy Willems and others which
is quarrying ‘new’ and ‘old’ truths, peeling off folkloric and manufac-
tured ‘hero-stories’ from the historiographies of the liberation struggle in
particular and nationalist historiography in general. A battery of recently
published autobiographies adds to the increasing din of voices that
reveal new nuggets of information and evidence with what they say and
with what they don not say about Nkomo, ZAPU and ZIPRA. These
include among others David Coltart’s The Struggle Continues: 50 Years
of Tyranny in Zimbabwe (2016); Cephas Msipa’s In Pursuit of Freedom
and Justice—A Memoir (2015); Wilfred Mhanda’s Wilfred Mhanda-
Dzino: Memories of a Freedom Fighter (2011); and Edgar Tekere’s Edgar
2’Boy Zivanai Tekere: A lifetime of Struggle (2007). This surge of self-
writing by those who participated in the liberation struggle in one way
or another has immensely added to Nkomo’s own autobiography enti-
tled The Story of My Life (1984). These autobiographies reflect struggles
within the struggle and how they were carried over to the post-liberation
war era.
Furthermore, the recent declassification of the archives by the
Department of Foreign Affairs in South Africa has opened new vistas of
opportunity for revisionist historians to reanalyse in a more nuanced way
the political formation of Nkomo’s politics and his peripherised place in
the liberation history. It is also expected that more archival evidence will
be made available in the not so distant future through the opening of
archived files in Washington, London and Sydney among other sites of
Zimbabwe’s hidden historical treasures. This chapter is therefore about
inaugurating a new narrative predicated on ‘old’ and long-ignored evi-
dence as well as ‘new’ canons of an-other logic, an-other language, an-
other thinking, an-other truth and another history of the anti-colonial
struggle in Zimbabwe.
As already implied, the grammar of this chapter is that of a revision-
ist history which rejects and objects the conventionally received linear
versions of history which have attempted to pale the iconography of
118 G. Moyo
Nkomo, ZAPU and ZIPRA. This contribution is therefore a decon-

structive and reconstructive narrative whose leitmotif is to critique the
sinister motivations of those praise-texts that have been produced and
reproduced as indubitable truths of the Cartesian logic. As Maldonado-
Torres (2007: 262) would put it, ‘it is about making visible the invisible
and about analyzing the mechanisms that produce such invisibility or dis-
torted visibility in the light of a large stock of ideas that must necessarily
include the reflections of the invisible themselves’. The idea is to contrib-
ute to the decolonisation of knowledge and reconstruction of silenced
histories of Nkomo, ZAPU and ZIPRA.
What is maintained throughout this chapter is a decolonial perspec-
tive that is critical of both Western and Eastern imperialisms and their
impact on the decolonisation project in Zimbabwe. It exposes the Euro-
American deceit and hypocrisy regarding its role in the inauguration of
coloniality of power at the expiry of official colonialism in that coun-
try. Similarly, it surfaces both the decolonial and the imperial motives
of communist-Soviet in its relations with Nkomo’s ZAPU/ZIPRA.
Importantly, it will show that for most of his political life, Nkomo was
entangled, enmeshed and entrapped in the colonial matrices of power
a situation described by Achille Mbembe as ‘labyrinthine entrapment’
(Mbembe 2015). It is in this context that this chapter retraces Nkomo’s
manoeuvrings and navigations or lack of it through the murky imperial
snares and designs in which he emerged as a hybridised duality of ‘Father
of the Nation’ and ‘Father of Dissidents’.
The Political Formation of Joshua Nkomo

Jean Blondel tells us that ‘if one reduces politics to its bare bones, to
what is most visible to most citizens, it is the national political leaders
both at home and abroad, that remain once everything else has been
erased; they are the most universal, the most recognised, [and] the most
talked about elements of political life’ (Blondel 1987: 1). In line with
this Blondelian conceptualisation of political leadership, it will be realised
that Nkomo dominated the public spheres and public discourses; politi-
cal rallies and political slogans; political songs and political gossips; politi-
cal imaginations and political images; political symbols and praise-poetry;
art, music, theatre and press when he emerged and grew as a nationalist
giant in the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s.
Admittedly, there was a cult of personality in the making of Nkomo’s

politics fashioned along the lines of Great Man theory in vogue in the
1960s and 1970s. His personal appeal in the black population cuts across
ethnicities, tribes, regions, religions, creed and class. The common slo-
gan was Joshua Nkomo ‘kwese kwese’ (Joshua Nkomo everywhere). No
doubt Nkomo enjoyed the ‘Father of the Nation’ adulation and rever-
ence and literally dominated all modes of political signification in the
nascent nationalist movement in Zimbabwe. Personal clout, personal
traits, intellectual acuity and personal charisma are always necessary but
are by no means sufficient conditions in the political formation of one’s
politics. To be sure, political leaders are also ‘creatures of history floating
on the tide driven by impersonal pressures’, contexts, systems and struc-
tures (Hogan and Kaiser 2005).
With what happened later in Nkomo’s life reflects what William
E. Dubois observed that ‘Life is not simply fact’ (quoted in Mbembe
2015: xii). While pursuing the nationalist decolonial project, Nkomo was
caught up in the global imperial snares which also visited many African
nationalists who dared challenge the global imperial designs before and
after him. The historical developments, political events, social memories
and life experiences that shaped the political formation of Nkomo’s poli-
tics have to be revisited, re-examined and reinterpreted within the discur-
sive framework ‘coloniality of power’ (Quijano 2000) and ‘nationality of
power’ (Ribeiro 2011) that constituted his entrapments.
As many of his acquaintances including Nkrumah of Ghana, Sam
Mujoma of Namibia, Oliver Tambo of South Africa, Patrice Lumumba
of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Jomo Kenyatta of
Kenya, Agostihno Neto of Angola and Samora Machel of Mozambique,
Nkomo was called upon by history to make huge sacrifices by confront-
ing the mighty imperial and colonial powers. The white Rhodesians had
erected a racialised, hierarchised and a military state that exploited, alien-
ated, suppressed and oppressed the black majority who were reduced to
Fanon’s ‘zones of non-being’ the les damnes de la terre without rights
and without agency.
Nkomo, together with his Zimbabwean anti-colonial national-
ist counterparts such as James Chikerema, Ndabaningi Sithole, Jaison
Moyo, George Silundika and many others, emerged to challenge the
colonialist government in order to install a deracialised, detribalised,
de-hierarchized and de-patriarchised society. Their vocation was that of
120 G. Moyo
leading a revolution that would bring about regeneration, self-liberation,

self-determination, self-assertion and rebirth of a nation. Simply put,
the nationalists were envisioning Fanon’s liberation ethos and Diop’s
‘African Renaissance’ as well as completing the unfinished business of
the 1893–1896 Ndebele/Shona anti-colonial uprisings against colonial
intrusions.
Of this group of decolonial nationalists, Nkomo emerged and grew
as its leading figure poised to become the first black leader of the inde-
pendent Zimbabwe—a vision he never realised. As noted earlier, Nkomo
emerged and grew in the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s as the face of the lib-
eration struggle and radical resistance ranged against exocentric stance,
‘ape status’ and colonialism in all its hues including racialism, imperial-
ism, alienation, exploitation, suppression and oppression of the black
Zimbabweans. In this role, Nkomo articulated and rearticulated a his-
tory of land dispossession, racial discrimination and the subalternisation
of blacks by a political class of white supremacists. Like Amilcar Cabral of
Guinea Bissau, Nkomo’s narrative emphasised the economic implications
of colonialism and imperialism on the material and welfare conditions of
the subalternised peoples of Zimbabwe (Nkomo 1984).
Not unexpected, Nkomo’s nationalist articulations and re-articulations
invited the full wrath and violence of ‘Hobbesian heart’ and ‘Clausewitzian
mind’ from Ian Smith’s UDI government in particular and pressed a panic
button in the broader capitalist community globally. In response, the colo-
nial regime directly threatened to cut short Nkomo’s life through impris-
onment, violence and death. But, in spite of all the ‘minefields’ placed on
his path, Nkomo remained steadfastly committed to the nationalist and lib-
eration objectives of adult suffrage, freedom, justice and prosperity for the
formally disenfranchised masses. In the process, he became a macrocosm of
the anti-colonial and anti-racist struggle as a whole in Zimbabwe.
It is important to note that Nkomo’s political iconography and
iconoclastic figure were not created by a ‘big bang’ or granted to
him gratuitously by some deity or esoteric means. Instead, his politi-
cal formation was a result of personal commitment and stellar con-
tribution associated with a long list of decolonial institutions and
movements including the National Railways of Rhodesia; Southern
Rhodesia African National Congress (SRANC); National Democratic
Party (NDP); People’s Caretaker Council; and ZAPU. Invariably, all
these Nkomo-led decolonial movements were characterised by their anti-
colonial stance and espousal of an African ideology of a national right
to land, self-determination, human dignity and human development. For

our purposes here, Nkomo will be identified more with ZAPU an anti-
colonial nationalist movement he led during the liberation struggle and
its military wing ZIPRA which was specifically formed for the purposes
of launching the armed struggle in Zimbabwe.
Arguably, Nkomo’s ZAPU was a more radical decolonial political for-
mation which inaugurated a period of sabotage to create panic among
the white settler population as part of the pressure to grant independ-
ence to Africans. It intensified the issue of ‘one man one vote’ as the
foundation for a democratic developmental state in that country
(Ndlovu-Gatsheni 2011: 35). In essence, Nkomo’s ZAPU/ZIPRA was
involved in decolonial acts, that is, anti-capitalist, anti-patriarchal, anti-
colonial, anti-racial and anti-imperial project. As stated earlier, this ter-
rified the Rhodesians, apartheid South Africa and the Euro-North
American imperial powers who responded by invisibilisation strategies
which included among others imprisonment of the nationalist leadership,
splitting the nationalist decolonial movement and eventually robbing
Nkomo of his rightful place in history and society at the attainment of
the political-juridical independence in 1980.
In the early stages of his political career, Nkomo preferred a peaceful
decolonisation process as was the case in neighbouring Zambia, Malawi
and Botswana including Tanzania. However, due to the prevarications,
intransigence and bellicosity of the Rhodesian Front covertly backed
by the Euro-North American imperial powers, Nkomo was left with no
choice but to resort to the armed struggle as the only available option
for the liberation of his country (Ndlovu-Gatsheni 2011: 64). Like
Fanon, Nkomo recognised that ‘during the revolutionary process of seiz-
ing freedom, violence is necessarily applied because the very structure of
colonialism is fundamentally violent’. To this extent, Nkomo adopted
Mazrui and Tidy’s ‘warrior tradition’ of leadership as a primary method
of resistance to colonial intrusion.
Accordingly, Nkomo brought into the country the first weap-
ons of war to fight the white minority government in 1962 from
Egypt (Nkomo 1984), thereby inaugurating an era of decolonial diso-
bedience which would take almost two decades and left approxi-
mately 30,000 lives lost. It was clear to him that independence would
not be realised in Zimbabwe ‘without the use of liberating violence
by the nationalist forces responding to the criminal violence of the
agents of imperialism’. Thus, contrary to the praise-text by Martin
122 G. Moyo
and Johnson which dates the launch of the armed struggle in the 1966
ZANLA battles in Chinhoyi (Martin and Johnson 1981), the readings
of Nkomo’s autobiography and the chronicles of Vladimir Shubin indi-
cate that Nkomo’s ZAPU was the grandfather of the armed struggle in
Zimbabwe and not Sithole/Mugabe’s ZANU (Nkomo 1984; Shubin
2008). Martin and Johnson’s chronicles were tantamount to what Jack
Goody (2006) called ‘theft of history’.
Nkomo’s ‘Labyrinthine Entrapment’

The launch of the armed struggle in Zimbabwe as was the case in
Angola, Algeria, Mozambique, Namibia and South Africa necessar-
ily required the broad continental and transcontinental support. In this
respect, it is impossible to fully comprehend the political formation of
Nkomo’s politics without a clear understanding of the imperatives of the
Cold War which some commentators say was ‘cold to those who waged
it but hot to those who suffered it’. Thus, the point of departure for this
contribution is its focus on the making and unmaking of the political in
Nkomo’s politics within the context of the inter-imperialist rivalries of
the then communist-Soviet Union and capitalist USA. It reviews Nkomo
as a subject that was ‘trapped’ and ‘enmeshed’ in the ideological, geo-
strategic, geoeconomic and geopolitical nets of global imperial designs.
The implications of this ‘labyrinthine entrapment’ to Nkomo remind
one of Karl Marx’s arguments about ‘people making history but under
circumstances they have not chosen’ (quoted in Ndlovu-Gatsheni 2011:
183).
Arguably, it was not necessarily Nkomo who chose the Soviets as his
friends. Instead, his friends were chosen for him by his enemies. By agi-
tating for decolonisation and delinking, Nkomo was naturally branded
a communist by the capitalists. It may also be equally true that Nkomo
made a conscious and strategic decision to lean towards the left in order
to get assistance for his decolonial project. Whichever way one may
want to look at it, the summary of it all is that Nkomo’s long decolo-
nial walk to ‘freedom’ was paved with Western and Eastern ideologi-
cal, geoeconomical, geostrategical and geopolitical ‘thorny carpets’.
Understandably, some readers will find it discomforting that the com-
munists who supported the liberation movements and the capitalists who
explicitly and implicitly supported colonialism are placed at the same
level in this decolonial-based reanalysis.
While there has been a tendency to downplay the imperative of the

inter-imperial competition in the analysis of the liberation struggle in
Zimbabwe, this contribution contends that Nkomo’s politics was keyed
on it. To be sure, Nkomo emerged within a sociopolitical context
dominated by the bipolar tension between the USA and the ex-Soviet
Union. The British diplomats and politicians including Lord Peter
Carrington (former British Foreign Secretary and Chief Negotiator
at Lancaster House Conference); Lord Steel (the former leader of the
British Labour Party); Dame Rosemary Spencer (who worked in the
Rhodesia Department at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office); David
Summerhayes (who worked in the Embassy in Pretoria); and Wilfred
Turner (former British High Commissioner in Botswana), who attended
a seminar organised by the Institute of Contemporary British History on
‘Britain and Rhodesia: The Road to Settlement’ at the National Archive
on 5 July 2005, were all at pains to refute and dismiss the imperatives of
Cold War politics in the then Rhodesia problem (Onslow 2008; Kandiah
and Onslow 2008).
Apparently, the refusal by the British diplomats to locate the mak-
ing and unmaking of the liberation struggle in Zimbabwe within the
framework of the Cold War imperatives was not something new in
British foreign policy relations. As Mark Curtis reminds us, ‘the British
foreign policy-making system is so secretive, elitist and unaccount-
able that policy-makers know they can get away with almost anything,
and they will deploy whatever arguments are needed to do this’. Be
that as it may, a careful reading of the seminar report on ‘Britain and
Rhodesia: The Road to Settlement’ reveals that it would have been
impossible for Rhodesia to be immune to the inter-imperial compe-
tition between the then communist-Soviet and the capitalist USA,
while all other conflicts in Africa (including Angola, DRC, Ethiopia
and Somalia) and around the globe were ‘soaked’ in it. To be clear,
the session chairs of the seminar namely Terrence Ranger, Sue Onslow
and Arne Westad interventions laid bare the implications of Cold War
politics on the liberation imperatives of Zimbabwe (see Kandiah and
Onslow 2008; Shubin 2008).
It is common knowledge that Nkomo’s most trusted patron was the
now defunct Soviet Union. Together with the then East Germany, the then
Czechoslovakia and Cuba, ex-Soviet Union supported ZAPU/ZIPRA.
Indeed, there were many other countries that supported ZAPU includ-
ing Algeria, Egypt and the Scandinavian countries. The other decolonial
124 G. Moyo
movements that were supported by Soviet were the African National

Congress (ANC), the Front for the Liberation of Mozambique
(FRELIMO), the South West African People’s Organisation (SWAPO), the
Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) and the African
Party for the Independence of Guinea and Cape Verde (P.A.I.G.C) collec-
tively known as the authentic six. The Soviet assistance stretched into the
realm of arms, weapons, financial, educational and political training, includ-
ing medical and food supplies, among other things. ZAPU was also sup-
ported by the Front Line States, mainly Zambia and Angola who offered
training bases for ZIPRA (National Intelligence Estimate 1967: 13).
Some observers contend that, in supporting the liberation move-
ment in Africa, ‘Soviet Union sought to effect the abolishment of colo-
nial governance by Western countries, either by direct subversion of
Western-leaning or controlled governments or indirectly by the influence
of political leadership and support’ (Onslow 2008). More importantly,
Soviet was also canvassing for its socialist/communist project in southern
Africa. While Nkomo’s ZAPU was supported by the Soviets, it is impor-
tant to note that Nkomo was not a devoted communist. Strike Mnkandla
who was one of the intellectuals of ZAPU in exile in the 1970s and now
the Secretary General of the revived ZAPU led by Dumiso Dabengwa
insists that Nkomo was a pragmatist who believed more in the Non-
Aligned Movement (NAM) driven by the likes of Gamal Abdel Nasser of
Egypt, Ben Bella of Algeria, Jawaharlal Nehru of India and Nkrumah of
Ghana rather than the fundaments of Soviet communism (Young 2005).
Sithole/Mugabe’s ZANU is one political formation that cannot be
ignored in the analysis of the political in Nkomo’s politics. It is impor-
tant to remember that ZANU was a breakaway party from ZAPU. As
will be argued later, it is alleged that ZANU was a covert Western pro-
ject. Overtly, ZANU was a protégé of the Chinese who assisted it with
arms, weapons, training, political education and ideology. It was the
Chinese who fed, clothed, healed, taught and armed ZANLA guerrillas.
Consequently, ZANU/ZANLA’s official ideology was not just Marxism-
Leninism, but also Maoism. Notably, there was a bitter Sino-Soviet
rivalry with China trying to develop a role as a leader of the Third World
and the Soviet seeking to co-opt the same Third World to its sphere of
influence (Shubin 2008). In this contest, China claimed legitimacy from
its attendance to the 1955 Bandung Conference which inaugurated the
liberation solidarity in the Global South (Young 2005). And Soviet did
not attend the Bandung Conference. Viewed from this context, it is
worth reiterating that Soviet’s support of Nkomo’s ZAPU was informed

by its motive to undermine both the Chinese and Western influence in
Zimbabwe and southern Africa (Onslow 2008: 143).
Today, China and Russia work together within the framework of the
BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) as ‘new imperial-
ists’ in Africa. The current behaviour of Russia and China in particular
indicates that these two countries have always been if not aspirant impe-
rialists. So far the BRICS’ dealings in Africa are not about radical change
of the world system and its global orders. Rather ‘BRICS activities are
about remaking neo-liberalism work more efficiently in accordance with
the long-standing discourse of free trade’ (Ndlovu-Gatsheni 2011: 192).
This begs the question whether or not these two supporters of the lib-
eration struggle were indeed decolonial as in decoloniality or decolonial
as in imperialism of decolonisation. The answer to this question is central
to the discussion that unfolds in the rest of the following pages.
It is important to remember that in the centre of colonialism in
Zimbabwe was Ian Smith’s Rhodesian Front. This was assisted by apart-
heid South Africa and its British and American allies. While the British
and American publicly supported the economic sanctions imposed on
Rhodesian by the UN, there is ample evidence which suggests that the
two secretly supported Rhodesians against the perceived threat of Soviet
communist (Bishop, n.d.). As mentioned earlier, Rhodesia was a racially
hierarchical, patriarchal, Western-centric, hetero-normative, capitalist and
colonial regime. This was the regime that Nkomo and his fellow nation-
alist leaders set themselves to dismantle.
It should be noted that the USA also posed as a country that was
committed to the liberation of the colonised peoples of the world and a
supporter of decolonisation (Ndlovu-Gatsheni 2013a: 345) mainly as a
strategic appeasement policy for the restive civil rights movement in the
USA (for a detailed discussion on this see Ndlovu-Gatsheni 2013a). The
USA supported the rivalries of the Soviet-supported liberation move-
ments. For instance, in Angola, the USA supported the National Union
for the Total Liberation of Angola (UNITA) and the National Front
for the Liberation of Angola (FNLA) ranged against Soviet’s MPLA.
Future researchers may need to establish further whether or not the
USA had no hand in Pan-African Congress (PAC) of South Africa and
South West African National Union (SWANU) of Namibia. As will be
discussed later, this contribution has established an existence of incestu-
ous relationship between the Euro-North American imperial powers and
126 G. Moyo
Sithole/Mugabe’s ZANU at the height of the liberation struggle and

during the early years of the post-independence in Zimbabwe.
It is argued here that communist-Soviet and capitalist-USA were
both interested in economic, diplomatic, political and resource gains in
southern Africa. As observed by Ndlovu-Gatsheni (2013b: 27), ‘Soviet
modernity simply fought to refashion the rhetoric of modernity in the
language of socialisation of capital’. Controversially, as it may be, this
decolonial reanalysis argues that communist-Soviet Union was an impe-
rialist ‘to the extent of producing what the West considered to be a ‘red
and evil empire that engulfed central Europe, Central Asia, parts of
Latin America, and parts of Africa such as Ethiopia under Haile Mariam
Mengistu’ (Ndlovu-Gatsheni 2013b: 27). Tlostanova and Mignolo cor-
roborate this view by asserting that Soviet modernity was nothing other
than an opposition and not an alternative to Euro-American modernity.
To be clear, both Soviet and USA were interested in spheres of influ-
ence in Africa and elsewhere. By attempting to turn African countries
into their spheres of influence, the two were ‘subjectivation’ the futures
of those countries to serve their domestic futures. To put it metaphori-
cally, communist-Soviet and capitalist USA were like a proverbial snake
with two heads which fought for the same prey in order to feed the
same stomach. Clearly, both superpowers were simply pursuing their
imperial fortunes in Zimbabwe, southern Africa and the rest of the
Global South.
In the final analysis, we cannot escape the conclusion that Nkomo
was a product of a constellation of factors including the African tradi-
tional background, colonial experience and the imperatives of the geo-
political, geoeconomic, geostrategic and ideological clashes between the
communist-Soviet and the capitalist USA and its allies. In this respect,
the political formation of Nkomo’s politics was a function of complex
factors that were akin to what Ali Mazrui termed ‘triple heritage’ of civi-
lisations in the world consisting of Africa’s own rich inheritance, Islamic
culture and the impact of Western traditions and lifestyles (Mazrui
2003: 1). While there is no record of Nkomo’s interaction with Islam,
he certainly was produced by Christianity, African traditional religion
and Western traditions and lifestyles. However, this chapter does not
in any way seek to perpetuate Coupland’s myth of Africans as ‘dumb
actors’ in their own history (Ndlovu-Gatsheni 2013b). It is not about
Nkomo as a hapless object that was acted upon by major external pro-
tagonists. Instead, it is about imperial technologies of subjectivation
that impacted on Nkomo in a profound way, while his agency was also
equally put to test.
Nkomo a ‘Victim’ of Imperialism of Decolonisation

While Nkomo and his colleagues in the decolonial nationalist movement-
ZAPU were engaged in ways and means of dismantling colonialism, the
global imperial powers were, on the other hand, searching for strate-
gies to either stall, delay and/or control the final product of the decol-
onisation project. Among the most prominent architects of this project
were Anglo-American diplomats such as Henry Kissinger (US Secretary
of State under Nixon and Ford administrations), Cyrus Vance (USA
Secretary of State under Carter administration), James Callaghan (British
Foreign Secretary and Prime Minister), Lord Carrington (British Foreign
Secretary under Thatcher administration), Peter Ramsbotham (British
ambassador to UN) and others. ‘Historians Roger Louis and Ronald
Robinson have used the term ‘imperialism of decolonisation’ to describe
London’s effort to orchestrate the ‘peaceful transfer of power’ to which-
ever local candidates would best accommodate Britain’s continued eco-
nomic and political influence’ (McMahon 2013: 104).
Viewed from this perspective, ‘imperialism of decolonisation’ is part of
‘coloniality of power’ (Quijano 2000) and instantiates a myth of decol-
onisation. Coloniality of power is the central category mobilised here
to analyse the attitudes of the global imperial powers towards decolo-
nial actors and movements. Decolonial thinkers such as Walter Mignolo,
Nelson Maldonado-Torres, Steve Martinot, Enrique Dussel, Ramon
Grosfoguel, Sabelo Ndlovu-Gatsheni and others have come up with
elaborate expose of coloniality of power in recent times. Loosely defined
‘coloniality of power’ denotes the continuation of colonial habits long
after the judicial colonialism has expired. This includes the control of the
economy among other factors (Mignolo 2007). The widely cited defini-
tion of coloniality is the one provided by Nelson Maldonado-Torres who
observed that:
Coloniality is different from colonialism. Colonialism denotes a politi-

cal and economic relation in which the sovereignty of a nation or a peo-
ple rests on the power of another nation, which makes such a nation an
empire. Coloniality, instead, refers to long-standing patterns of power that
128 G. Moyo
emerged as a result of colonialism, but that define culture, labour, inter-

subjective relations, and knowledge production well beyond the strict
limits of colonial administrations. Thus coloniality survives colonialism. It
is maintained alive in books, in the criteria for academic performance, in
cultural patterns, in common sense, in the self-image of peoples, in aspi-
rations of self, and so we breathe coloniality all the time and every day.
(Maldonado-Torres 2007: 243)
Observably, the Anglo-American alliance of the then Rhodesia, apart-

heid South Africa, UK and USA was in complete agreement about ‘the
importance of squelching the nascent communist presence in Southern
Africa’ (Bishop, n.d.: 9) and of laying a solid foundation for ‘coloniality
of power’ in Zimbabwe well ahead of the expiry of the judicial coloni-
alism. The literature is replete with examples of how the global impe-
rial designs installed their protégés at the end of official colonialism in
Africa. Such examples of pliant governments include among others
Mobutu of DRC, Amin of Uganda, Bokassa of Central African Republic
and Muzorewa of Zimbabwe Rhodesia, temporarily. On the other hand,
those African leaders who resisted the machinations of the global impe-
rial powers such as Lumumba and Nkrumah were ruthlessly ‘disciplined’.
In Zimbabwe, the Euro-North American powers believed that Nkomo’s
ZAPU would be the biggest impediment to the inauguration of their
coloniality project. Given its dependence upon Soviet largesse, the
Anglo-American concluded that Nkomo’s ZAPU was likely to become
a Soviet satellite and bulwark against their version of coloniality in
Zimbabwe, therefore needed to be enfeebled, disfigured and destroyed.
One of the technologies of subjectivation mobilised by the global
imperial designers of coloniality to ‘disable’ and ‘discipline’ Nkomo’s
ZAPU was ‘divide’, ‘conquer’ and ‘rule’ strategy. Apparently, this cov-
ert tactic constitutes one of the long-standing ways through which
‘global imperial designs diluted, confused and destroyed many counter-
initiatives aimed at humanising and democratising the unequal world
order in favour of Africa’ (Ndlovu-Gatsheni 2013b: 48). While hotly
contested, the argument that the ZAPU split of 1963 was engineered
by the British and the Americans is strong and compelling. Indeed,
the most widely disseminated view of the split was based on the myth
of its inevitability due to Nkomo’s alleged weak leadership, his alleged
unwillingness to embrace confrontational politics, his endless inter-
national safari and tribal differences among other superfluous reasons
(Ndlovu-Gatsheni and Willems 2010. However, these reasons do not

pass a credibility test. In fact, these are what some decolonial thinkers call
‘epistemicides’ dismissed by ZAPU as fabrications minted by the Central
Intelligence Agency (CIA). To this extent, this section privileges the
under-researched and often neglected role of the Anglo-American alli-
ance in the split.
Vladimir Shubin one of the most important ex-Soviet diplomats
in southern Africa has revealed that the then Soviet Union embassy in
Tanzania was aware of the UK/USA’s underhand in the ZAPU split of
1963 through their intelligence operations (Shubin 2008). Available lit-
erature also notes that prior to the split, the USA educated politician,
Ndabaningi Sithole had spent 2 months in the USA openly raising ques-
tions on Nkomo’s leadership with the US State Department’s African
Bureau (Shubin 2008: 158). After his US trip, Sithole announced the
split in Tanzania raising suspicions that he had actually got his divisive
ideas from the US State Department. On the other hand, Nkomo’s auto-
biography implicates Nyerere as the chief architect of the split of ZAPU
in 1963 as well as in 1971. Not surprisingly, the name ZANU resembles
that of Nyerere’s party—Tanganyika African National Union (TANU)
(Shubin 2008: 158).
Apparently, after the formation of ZANU, Nyerere approached both
the Soviet Union and the Cubans to persuade them to divert their arms
supplies and financial assistance away from ZIPRA to ZANU/ZANLA
(Nkomo 1984). At that time, Tanzania, like Kenya and Tunisia, had
closer links with the West ‘as a redeeming move and a counter to infiltra-
tion of communism’ (Ndlovu-Gatsheni 2013b: 63). Moreover, Timothy
Scarnecchia has written tomes about Tanzania being used as the conduit
for the ZANU funding from the American government though most of
the funding came from the private American corporations especially the
mining moguls (Scarnecchia 2008). Furthermore, David Moore (2004:
4) cites some Rhodesian archival files in which Americans were pressuris-
ing the British to financially support ZANU. It was recorded in those
files that ‘the Americans told the British that if the West did not support
the new party on the block the Russians will establish control over them’
(Moore 2004: 5). If this line of argument is correct, then ZANU was an
imperialist project prepared from inception to inaugurate colonial matri-
ces of power in the event of the end of official colonialism in Zimbabwe
in spite of its Marxist-Leninist-Maoist rhetoric.
130 G. Moyo
While the West also funded ZAPU and the Soviet also funded ZANU,
Scarnecchia records that USA preferred ZANU over ZAPU simply
because ZAPU was a Soviet Union protégé bent on giving communism
a foothold in southern Africa (Scarnecchia, n.d.). In short, the split of
ZAPU/ZANU was part of the global imperial power strategy to pave
the way for the inauguration of coloniality of power at the end of judi-
cial colonialism in Zimbabwe. These imperial powers needed an alterna-
tive party that would be compliant and malleable to them. Obviously,
Nkomo’s ZAPU was not the suitable candidate for juridical independ-
ence because of its association with Euro-North America’s competitors.
Viewed from this perspective, the liberation project in Zimbabwe like
in many other African countries was ‘overseen by the erstwhile colonial
masters who were burnt on channelling it into a neocolonial direction
rather than genuine liberation’ (Ndlovu-Gatsheni 2013b: 39).
The most decisive fiddling by global imperial designs against Nkomo’s
ZAPU was the derailment of ZIPRA’s massive military operation code—
named the ‘Turning Point Strategy’ and the ‘Zero Hour’. Addressing
a Lookout Masuku Memorial Lecture on 5 April 2016 organised by
Ibhetshu likaZulu held at the Bulawayo Progressive Residents Association
(BPRA) Local Governance Centre in Bulawayo, Dumiso Dabengwa
claimed that ‘Margaret Thatcher got worried when she learned of ZAPU’s
stockpiles of weapons and training of cadres in preparation for the launch
of the Turning Point Strategy’ and the ‘Zero Hour’ (Dabengwa 2016).
Quite clearly, in the late 1970s, Soviet redoubled its assistance to
Nkomo in order to launch the ‘Zero Hour’ and the ‘Turning-Point’
attack. The plan was to train and equip at least five battalions of ZIPRA
soldiers which were task-organised following the model of Soviet
Motorised Battalions for the purposes of launching a conventional
war. This plan was set to be ZIPRA’s military apogee in the liberation
effort. It was estimated that this would be the minimum force required
to defeat the Rhodesian Security Forces and liberate Zimbabwe from
colonial bondage. According to Dabengwa, some of the weaponry was
tested by ZIPRA guerrillas on 17 February 1979 when they downed a
Viscount (civilian plane) in Victoria Falls believed to have been carrying
General Pater Walls (Dabengwa 2016). It is worth noting that the kill-
ing of the 19 white civilian tourists infuriated the West so much so that
it reinforced the thinking that Nkomo was a bloody communist. To lay
credence to the ‘Turning Point’, Nkomo said:
We had set in motion what we called the ‘turning-point’ strategy, for a

transformation of the war from a guerrilla operation into a full-scale con-
flict in which we would match the Smith regime’s armour and air cover
with armour and air cover of our own. We had requested the Soviet Union
to accelerate the training of our aircrews in that country, and to make
available sophisticated modern aircraft which could strike on equal terms
against Rhodesian strategic installations, communications and fuel supplies.
(Nkomo 1984: 196)
Instead of facing the military challenge from the Soviet-ZAPU/ZIPRA,

the Anglo-American alliance resolved to deprive the Soviets and Cubans
of any opportunity to influence Zimbabwe’s future through settling the
Zimbabwean conflict through a negotiated settlement which would pro-
duce a relatively pro-Western black government in Harare. It stands to
reason that Margaret Thatcher and Jimmy Carter administrations hur-
riedly pushed for a negotiated peace conference in Lancaster House in
London in 1979 as a pre-emptive strategy to steal the victory away from
Soviet-sponsored Nkomo’s ZAPU. More precisely, the Anglo-American
imperial alliance was in a hurry to defang the horrid prospect of another
Vietnam, another Ethiopia and another Angola in Zimbabwe (Shubin
2008: 180). Kandiah and Onslow (2008: 60) record that Zibigniew
Brzezinsk, an American statesman, believed that ‘if the new regime in
Zimbabwe came to power at the head of a column of Russian tanks, it
would be a Russian –sympathising regime, and if it came to power as
a consequence of a Western-negotiated diplomatic process, it would be
more sympathetic to Western interests’. Herbert Chingono stated that:
The whole idea [of Lancaster House Conference] was to avert a situation
where the guerrillas would March from the bush to government offices
armed with communist ideology and possibly with direct Cuban military
involvement. The Lancaster House Agreement of 1979 was successful
in doing exactly what Kissinger had set out to achieve: political freedom
for the black majority and avoidance of Cuban and Soviet involvement in
Rhodesia. (Chingono, n.d.)
It is commonly known that in Ethiopia, Russia sent its officers, military

advisors, tank crews, and fighter pilots, and the entire operation sup-
ported by an in ‘impressive air bridge that conveyed armaments and
supplies directly from Russia to the frontlines’ (McMahon 2013: 113).
132 G. Moyo
Thus, the Anglo-American alliance feared the possibility of a repeat of

Ethiopia and Angola in Zimbabwe which would result in a pro-Soviet
government which would be unfriendly to the West (Kandiah and
Onslow 2008: 90). To this extent, on 15 March 1976, James Callaghan
sent a message to Henry Kissinger which stated that ‘we both agree
that in the short term the communists have scored a major success [in
Angola] and that we must do everything we can to prevent the same
thing from occurring again (Callaghan 1976: 10). Callaghan predicted
that ‘Rhodesia was poised to become the next domino to fall unless
immediate action was taken’ (Bishop, n.d.: 11).
In order to avert the Angola, Ethiopia and Vietnam complex recur-
ring in Zimbabwe, the Anglo-American alliance was ready to support any
force save for ZAPU. As already mentioned, the global imperial powers
were worried by the growth of the Soviet influence in southern Africa
and at the same time afraid of the possibility of the use of Zimbabwean
territory by the ANC of South Africa in the event of a ZAPU govern-
ment in that country (Shubin 2008: 183). What frightened the Anglo-
American alliance most was the possibility of Zimbabwe bridging
the Soviet interests from the Indian Ocean to the Atlantic Ocean (i.e.
Mozambique–Zimbabwe–Angola). In its effort to combat this commu-
nist belt, the Anglo-American alliance came to the conclusion that dip-
lomatic finesse rather than military prowess offered the best chance of
success (Shubin 2008).
It remains, however, a mystery to this day how Nkomo was cajoled
into a negotiated table given the advanced plans of a ZAPU military
takeover. If Dabengwa’s chronicle during the Memorial Lecture of
Lookout Masuku is anything to go by, then the ZAPU leadership went
into the Lancaster House Conference against the wise counsel of its
military commanders who preferred to settle the Zimbabwean question
through the barrel of a gun (Dabengwa 2016). Perhaps, Nkomo was
enticed by the nationwide support he enjoyed during his hay days hence
the confidence in negotiated settlement. Perhaps, he was charmed by the
Anglo-American alliance which spoke of him as the natural leader of the
nationalist movement in Zimbabwe hence the obvious leader of the first
black government. Perhaps, the imperialists were not necessarily anti-
Nkomo but anti-Soviet; hence, Nkomo reasoned that engaging them
would help open new vistas of opportunity for him and his party. What is
clear is that Nkomo and the ZAPU leadership which had been in deten-
tion (1964–1974) were not operating at the same wavelength with the
battle hardened military commanders who were more inclined towards

the east and were prepared for a military takeover.
However, it cannot be denied that the Conference was partly a result
of complex and multifarious factors that included among others the for-
mer President of Zambia, Kenneth Kaunda, and the former President
of Mozambique, Samora Machel, who were desperate to end the war
which had led to the serious loss of lives and economic dislocation in
their countries; nationalists who were now tired of war; Rhodesian
economy and sociopolitical life which was now under severe stress; and
Nigeria which had threatened to block British investments in Nigeria
until the Rhodesian crisis was resolved (Shubin 2008; Moorcraft 2012).
This narrative has ostensibly become a favourite auto-explanation and,
in many instances, the mono-explanation of the reasons behind the
Lancaster House Conference. On the contrary, this decolonial-based
reanalysis indicates that the Conference was largely motivated by fear
of a military takeover by ZAPU/ZIPRA. Repetition may be necessary
here for emphasis, the Thatcher and Carter administrations could not
stomach the direct Cuban and Soviet involvement in Zimbabwe similar
to those of Angola and Ethiopia which left the Euro-North American
geopolitical, geostrategic and geoeconomic interests in disarray in those
countries.
As previously stated, Nkomo’s links with the Soviet Union were
believed to be detrimental to Anglo-American interests. Therefore,
Nkomo’s ZAPU was supposed to be silenced and confined to the other
side of abyssal lines—the side of non-existence. In fact in line with ‘abys-
sal thinking’, the British and the Americans used the Lancaster House
Conference to torpedo Nkomo’s ZAPU and endorse Mugabe’s ZANU.
Ivor Richard who chaired the Geneva Conference in 1976 is cited by
Moore as having said ‘we gave Mugabe the chance to come into power.
And there were many, many people, or let’s say a significant few, with
power in the British state who were supporting Mugabe as opposed to
Nkomo, who they feared a little bit because he would get support from
the Soviets’ (Moore, n.d.: 27). This reminds us of Kwesi Kwaa Prah who
observed that political leaders, ‘no matter how dynamic and visionary
they are, work and operate within structural parameters demarcated by
interests of the major powers within the society in question. Without
the implicit or open support of these constituencies in one combination
or the other, the leader will not reach the position of power in the first
instance’ (Prah 2008: 2). Nkomo, ZAPU and ZIPRA were subjected
134 G. Moyo
to the worst of global imperial designs which left them at the mercy of
Robert Mugabe’s ‘nationality of power’ as will be discussed later.
In spite of all his Marxist-Leninist-Maoist rhetoric, Mugabe was
closely linked to Denis Brennan who coordinated the Ariel Foundation
that was funded by the CIA to help young students to counteract Soviet
influence (Kandiah and Oslow 2008: 120). This group was constituted
to apply pressure on the British ‘to do the right thing’ in Rhodesia
(Kandiah and Oslow 2008: 120). Notably, after the 1980 elections, a
meeting was organised by Ariel Foundation in Guernsey to celebrate the
victory of the Foundation’s model of decolonisation in Zimbabwe. Not
surprising, the group consisted of American, British and Australian par-
liamentarians (Kandiah and Oslow 2008: 120). Moreover, it is notewor-
thy remembering that Mugabe grew up under the tutelage of the Roman
Catholic priests and Pope John Paul II spent the better part of his life
fighting communism. This is only an inkling of the relationship between
Mugabe/ZANU and the then anti-communist movement. Arguing
from an Aristotelian deductive reasoning, it is incontrovertible to con-
clude that Lancaster House was nothing but a nefarious Western plot to
hold down Soviet’s influence by sidelining Nkomo’s ZAPU in favour of
Mugabe’s ZANU.
It is also instructive to note that Lancaster House Conference was
an exclusively British affair. The Front Line states such as Zambia and
Mozambique; regional power apartheid South Africa; and the Cold
War warriors—USA and Soviet—were all ‘excluded’ in the Conference
ostensibly to stop their own interests from poisoning the talks. The
unsaid reason was that the main target of exclusion was the Soviet Union
which would have openly bolstered Nkomo’s position, yet the USA
would not have openly canvassed for ZANU due to the circumstances
of their secret/covert relationship. However, Soviet advisors of ZAPU
namely Veniamin Chirkin and Vitaly Fedorinov were in London during
the entire duration of the talks which started in September and ended
in December 1979 (Kandiah and Onslow 2008: 113). Though these
two men did not actually attend the Conference sessions, their presence
in London caused a lot of discomfort to the Anglo-American alliance
which apparently bolstered them against Nkomo’s ZAPU in favour of
Mugabe’s ZANU.
However, the centre of gravity for the Lancaster House Talks was
Lord Peter Carrington—the British Foreign Secretary. He was the nego-
tiator in chief writ large. As noted earlier, his mission was to prevent a
pro-Soviet party from assuming political leadership in Zimbabwe. In

implementing this project, Lord Carrington was secretly assisted by
General Peter Walls of the Rhodesian Front, Ken Flower, Ian Smith’s
chief spy, and David Smith, Ian Smith’s former deputy. These men
were sold to the Anglo-American plan and were rewarded in one way
or another by the new Mugabe administration. Specifically, David Smith
was drafted into Mugabe’s first cabinet in 1980, General Peter Walls was
kept on as army commander, Ken Flower became Mugabe’s spy chief
and confidant (Dowden 2008: 136). Interestingly, Mugabe’s behav-
iour at Lancaster House including his threats of abandoning the talks is
viewed here as part of cover–up tactics when reading together with the
final outcomes of the Conference. Simply put, Mugabe played hard for
the purposes of shielding his own collusion with imperialists and at the
same time presenting Nkomo as a moderate nationalist who would go to
‘bed’ with imperialists.
Lord Carrington nudged the Conference in the direction that the
Anglo-American alliance had favoured and envisaged. As pre-planned,
the Lancaster House Conference gestured towards coloniality in the
post-liberation era in Zimbabwe. The agreed Westminster-style con-
stitution which was curiously written well before the start of the talks
protected the property rights, protected the Rhodesian mercenary army,
imposed a willing seller–willing buyer formula for land redistribution,
imposed budgetary and bureaucratic constraints, reserved 20 parliamen-
tary seats for the whites, left terms of the top leadership open and dis-
couraged tempering with the constitution until after 7 years (Muranda
et al. 2013: 19). As a result, Zimbabwe was born as a successor to the
Rhodesia colonial state rather than as a new alternative to it (Ndlovu-
Gatsheni 2013b: 209). This is what Grosfoguel (2007a: 219) was
lamenting on when he posited that ‘one of the most powerful myths of
the twentieth century was the notion that elimination of colonial admin-
istration amounted to decolonisation of the world’.
In the final analysis, the Lancaster House Conference was the ‘mater-
nity ward’ where Quijano’s ‘coloniality of power’, Nkrumah’s ‘neo-
imperialism’, Spivak’s ‘neo-colonised world’, Grosfoguel’s ‘myth of the
postcolonial world’ and Mbembe’s ‘postcolony’ were actively applied
to produce neocolonies in Africa. In this political melodrama, Lord
Carrington played the midwifery’s role as coloniality was being birthed
in Zimbabwe. While Zimbabweans had hoped for the dismantlement
of colonial structures and the restoration of human dignity at the end
136 G. Moyo
of colonialism, Lancaster House resulted in Fanon’s ‘repetition with-

out change’ (Fanon 1968 cited in Ndlovu-Gatsheni 2013a). It, there-
fore, came as no surprise when a few years later, Nkomo rearticulated
his decolonial epistemic vision on land redistribution, racial relations and
economic and social justice.
Imperial Endorsement Against Nkomo’s ZAPU

The elections that followed the Lancaster House Conference in March
1980 were designed to make sure that the result will not in anywhere
deviate from the Lancaster House Agreement. Viewed from this perspec-
tive, the pro-Soviet ZAPU would not be trusted with a British-brokered
constitutional agreement. In fact, according to the chronicles of Vladimir
Shubin, Britain, South Africa, Mozambique and Tanzania were united
in their preference of ZANU over ZAPU and of Mugabe over Nkomo
(Shubin 2008: 182). This line of argument is corroborated by Paul
Moorcraft (2012: 40) who records that Lord Carrington had definitively
promised Mugabe that London unofficially supported him. It is no-gain
saying to suggest that in colluding against communist-Soviet, the Anglo-
American alliance was by extension against Nkomo’s ZAPU.
In the view of Carrington and the rest of the master-minders of the
Lancaster House Conference, the only way to protect the interests
of the global imperial powers in Zimbabwe was to hand over power to
Mugabe—a man supported by the Chinese and not Soviet and a man
from a larger ethnic group unlike Nkomo who hailed from a ‘small’ eth-
nic group. In this respect, there was no chance for a Soviet-sponsored
party to win elections that were held under the terms of the Lancaster
House Agreement, presided over by a British governor (Lord Christopher
Soames), assisted by the Commonwealth officers whose head was the
British Prime Minister and Queen who were all anti-communist-Soviet.
In short, the 1980 elections were a mere formality and a democratic ritual
best described as ‘imperial endorsement’ (for a more detailed discussion
on procedural elections in Zimbabwe, see Moyo and Ncube 2015).
The following questions provide a snapshot on the ‘integrity’ of the
independence elections in Zimbabwe. First, how come Tongogara who
expressed a desire at Lancaster House that ZAPU and ZANU should
contest the elections as one political party died immediately after the
Lancaster House Agreement? Second, why did Lord Soames and his staff
choose to ignore reports of massive intimidation of the rural populace
by those ZANLA guerrillas who had not reported to assembly points?

Third, why did the international community acquiesce to and even
actively support Mugabe and ZANU-PF while violating the ceasefire
agreement? Fourth, how come Mugabe knew the results of the elections
before they were announced? While in Dar es Salaam, he stated that his
party ZANU-PF was going to win 56 out of the 100 seats in the new
parliament of Zimbabwe? Finally, why were the used ballot paper flown
to Britain, not to be stored as historic documents, but to be burned?
They may not be straightforward answers to these questions, but they
are raised here as a way of inviting the reader to reflect on the integrity of
the 1980 elections.
Despite the fact that the intelligence community from both apart-
heid South Africa and Rhodesia had predicted a Nkomo victory or
at least a coalition government between Nkomo and Bishop Abel
Muzorewa, Mugabe’s ZANU-PF emerged with a landslide victory
(Stiff 2004). Evidence, however, indicates that much of the intelli-
gence agencies and security services work is used to promote disinfor-
mation. Thus, contrary to the intelligence community’s predictions,
Mugabe’s ZANU-PF came first with 57% seats out of the contested
80 while Nkomo got 20 and Bishop Abel Muzorewa’s United African
National Council (UANC) won 3 (Stiff 2000a: 27). The pro-Soviet
ZAPU was outwitted and lulled into believing in the electoral process
while the Anglo-American alliance was plotting the end of Soviet–USA
contest in Zimbabwe through other means. Commenting on Dumiso
Dabengwa’s presentation on Lookout Masuku Memorial Lecture,
the Coordinator of the Bulawayo Progressive Residents Association
(BPRA), Roderick Fayayo was right when he observed that ‘actually,
ZAPU did not lose the 1980 elections to ZANU-PF but to the British
themselves’. Invariably, the Euro-North American imperial pow-
ers saw the victory of Mugabe and ZANU-PF as the greatest reverse
the Russians suffered in Africa. There were ‘right’ because ZAPU was
the only one of the authentic six, that is, ANC, PAIGC, FRELIMO,
SWAPO and MPLA liberation movements supported by Soviet that
did not take over power. In fact, the defeat of ZAPU in 1980 was a
precursor of the final defeat of its handler—the communist-Soviet in
the hands of the capitalist USA in 1989.
Not surprisingly, as part of the inauguration of the coloniality project
in the newly established ex-colonial state of Zimbabwe, a big proportion
of Mugabe’s inaugural cabinet in 1980 consisted of American, British
138 G. Moyo
and Canadian trained Shona-speaking Zimbabweans including Edson

Zvobgo, Dzingai Mutumbuka, Simbi Mubako, Nathan Shamuyarira
and Bernard Chidzero who was specifically recalled from the United
Nations (UN) to become Minister of Finance in independent Zimbabwe.
A decade later, Chidzero became a central figure in the implementa-
tion of the Washington Consensus and a World Bank-IMF sponsored
Structural Adjustment Programme (SAP) an orthodox neo-liberal policy
framework. On the other hand, David Smith and Denis Norman were
drafted to Mugabe’s Cabinet to specifically represent the white interests
in the new Zimbabwe. As mentioned earlier, Ken Flower and Peter Walls
remained in the security establishment to ensure the successful imple-
mentation of the coloniality of power project.
Given the discussion above, it was not surprising that in his inaugu-
ral speech as the new Prime Minister of Zimbabwe, Robert Mugabe
declared a national reconciliation policy. This policy ostensibly served
a political function of facilitating the necessary compromise between
the rulers of yesterday and the inheritors of new state power (Ndlovu-
Gatsheni 2011: 76). For this reason, ‘Mugabe’s relationship with the
Global North was cosy in the 1980s and early 1990s when he was a fre-
quent guest of the global capitalists and was a recipient of no less than a
dozen honorary degrees from the Western universities even as his party
and army were being accused of genocide in Matabeleland and Midlands
provinces back home’ (Moyo 2015: 2). Paradoxically, the reconciliation
served the interests of former Rhodesians and not the black population.
In fact, what is celebrated as the ‘years of light’ (1980–1990) of inde-
pendence in Zimbabwe were good for the former Rhodesians, and in
reality, there were the ‘dark years’ for Nkomo, ZAPU, ZIPRA and the
peoples of Midlands and Matabeleland provinces who endured untold
suffering in the hands of Mugabe and his lieutenants in ZANU-PF.
Nkomo’s Supporters as Collateral Damage

This section shifts analysis from coloniality of power to nationality of
power. Loosely defined nationality of power refers to technologies of
subjectivation deployed by former nationalist leaders turned state leaders
(Ndlovu-Gatsheni 2013b: 157). Nationality of power was mobilised by
the new Mugabe administration against Nkomo, ZAPU and ex-ZIPRA
fighters in the early years of Zimbabwe’s independence. Armed with his
newly acquired fetishised power as Prime Minister of Zimbabwe, Mugabe
launched a military operation code named Gukurahundi roughly trans-

lated as the storm that destroys everything. Mugabe ordered between
2500 and 3500 North Korean-trained Fifth Brigade battalion into
Matabeleland and Midlands provinces where it looted, burned, raped and
murdered innocent children, women and men majority of whom were
Nkomo’s supporters (Moyo 2014).
The principal victims of Gukurahundi were Fanon’s ‘wretched of the
earth;’ Mamdani’s ‘subjects’ rather than ‘citizens’ and Mignolo’s ‘dis-
pensable and bare lives’—the subalterns whose lives were deemed worth-
less, dispensable and expendable in the pursuit of power and profits. As
Curtis argues ‘[unpeople were] the modern equivalent of the ‘savages’
of colonial days, who could be mown down by guns…in circumstances
where the perpetrators were hailed as upholders of civilisation’. The
lives of people were used as ‘collateral damage’ by both the ex-coloniser
and the inheritors of the ex-colonial state of Zimbabwe. In this context,
Nkomo’s supporters were regarded as a modern equivalent of slaves with
no human dignity, a questionable humanity, and were subjected to the
ethics of war and to what Hinkelammert called ‘the inversion of human
rights’ (Tlostanova 2014: 53).
Approximately 20,000 innocent lives were callously murdered, while
thousands of others were displaced internally and in diaspora (Moyo
2014: 74). All these people were killed within 4 years of independence
(1983–1987). And the figure is comparable to the 30,000 who were
killed during the years of the armed struggle between 1962 and 1979.
This serves to confirm Maldonado-Torres (2007: 255)’s argument that
black people endure hellish existence in which ‘Killability’, ‘rapeabil-
ity’ and ‘dispensability’ of ‘bare lives’ are normal states of life (Gordon
2007). Similar experiences in Rwanda, Somalia, Darfur, DRC, Sierra
Leone and Liberia all attest to this thesis of killability of African bare lives
within the discursive context of the nationality of power.
This has led Ndlovu-Gatsheni to make three poignant observations
that are germane to this analysis namely that the postcolonial states
have remained operating like colonial states, unleashing violence on the
African people; that juridical freedom has not been translated into popu-
lar freedom; and that African people are still treated like subjects rather
than citizens by their own national leaders. In Zimbabwe, Nkomo’s sup-
porters were the first victims of the postcolonial logic of violence, pol-
itics of alterity and epistemicides. As nationality of power took root in
post-liberation Zimbabwe, Matabeleland and Midlands were turned into
140 G. Moyo
a domain of violence, war, rape, death, murder and mourning, as they

were denied the full humanity and reduced to non-beings to this day.
Just like the USA and its allies invaded Saddam’s Iraq in 2003 on
the pretext of the non-existent Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD),
Mugabe invaded the Midlands and Matabeleland Provinces ostensi-
bly to flash out Nkomo’s ‘dissidents’. The official government line in
defence of the Gukurahundi operation was that elements in ex-ZIPRA
had become South African mercenaries and were trying to destabilise
Mugabe’s government. Observably, the situation in Matabeleland and
Midlands became worse after the abduction of six young tourists from
USA, Australia and UK. In his autobiography, Nkomo insists that the
tourists were not abducted by the so-called dissidents but implies that
the Mugabe administration was involved in order to create anger of the
West against him and his party-ZAPU (Nkomo 1984).
It is common knowledge that the West remained mum when the
innocent civilians and ZAPU supporters were butchered by Mugabe’s
crack army. Clearly, the Anglo-American allies were still celebrating for
having conquered the ex-Soviet communist in Zimbabwe and south-
ern Africa. In their opinion, Zimbabwe was sorted out and Mugabe had
become their ally. The logic of the Cold War at the time demanded the
continued tutelage of Mugabe to ensure that he did not fall into the
communist camp (Arnold 2005: 768). No doubt the Western countries
were more concerned with pursuing their project of coloniality of power
which was now taking root in Zimbabwe. And Mugabe was its leading
acolyte through his reconciliation policy and through his own nationality
of the power project.
This explains the deafening silence from the global imperial pow-
ers that often raise issues of human rights, good governance and rule
of law. But because Gukurahundi was serving their mutual inter-
ests with Mugabe, they chose to turn a blind eye to the brutalities in
Matabeleland and Midlands. In the process, Mugabe found it more
convenient to cooperate with Apartheid South African Defence Forces
against Nkomo’s ZAPU given the historic ties between ZAPU and
ANC (Scarnecchia 2004: 88). In this way, Cold War imperatives pro-
vided a convenient cloak under which to take action against the Soviet-
sponsored Nkomo’s ZAPU and ex-ZIPRA fighters.
In this way, the Gukurahundi campaign was less concerned with mili-
tary engagement with the so-called dissidents but ultimately sought to
de-legitimise and decimate Nkomo, ZAPU, ZIPRA and the Ndebele
people. The main slogans of ZANU-PF and Gukurahundi at the time

were ‘Down with Joshua Nkomo’ and ‘Forward with Mugabe’. This was
akin to what Steve Martinot termed ‘self-superiorisation through inferi-
orization of others’. In this case, it was self-superiorisation of Mugabe
through inferiorisation of Nkomo. The slogans of praise, songs, poetry
and admiration of the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s were obverted to insult
and humiliate Nkomo and his ZAPU. These scurrilous attacks on
Nkomo’s integrity were followed by attempts to eliminate him physically
after Mugabe described him as a ‘snake’ in his house (Nkomo 1984: 2).
This forced Nkomo to escape into exile in the United Kingdom in 1983
where he was further humiliated by Tiny Rowland a white capitalist
who had promised to assist him during his exilic time. Rowland pushed
Nkomo to destitution only to be saved by his relatives and some ZAPU
members in the UK (see Nkomo 1984).
By and large, Nkomo was virtually friendless, without a ‘voice’ and
without a ‘face’, while ZANU-PF managed to obtain the support of
the West and South Africa so long as ZANU-PF and the Fifth Brigade
continued to target ZAPU, ZIPRA and by extension the ANC’s abil-
ity to operate in Zimbabwe (Scarnecchia 2004: 98). It is important to
note that the Soviets, who had previously supported Nkomo, ZAPU and
ZIPRA, had also abandoned him to embrace Mugabe’s ZANU-PF dur-
ing the Gukurahundi era. Like all imperialists, it made sense for Soviet
Union to start courting ZANU-PF as a governing party in order for it
to have a foothold on the Zimbabwean resources which were now laid
bare for the imperial West after long years of UDI and liberation war.
These new developments forced Nkomo to accept the Unity Accord
which was signed on 22 December 1987 signalling the defeat and sub-
ordination of ZAPU to ZANU-PF and an end to Nkomo’s ambition to
lead the nation.
‘Doubles’ of Unity Accord

The Unity Accord was signed between ZAPU and ZANU-PF in 1987
as a pact to end the atrocities in Midlands and Matabeleland. The pact
saw Nkomo and his colleagues in ZAPU offered some government posts
where Nkomo became the Vice-President of both new ZANU-PF and
Zimbabwe. This was an elite pact which did not include post-conflict
rehabilitation, reparations and truth-telling processes (Coltart 2016).
142 G. Moyo
Nkomo’s inclusion in government was expected to act as a ‘painkiller’ for

all the traumas of Gukurahundi victims and survivors.
Arguably, the Unity Accord ‘doubles’ as a technology that ended the
atrocities, hence it is worth celebrating in that sense. But it also stands
as a silent weapon that is judiciously mobilised to continue the subju-
gation, invisibilisation and silencing of histories, memories and pain of
both the victims and the survivors of Gukurahundi. Instead of ushering
positive peace through providing space for healing through truth tell-
ing, decolonisation of knowledge and righting the wrongs of the past,
Mugabe and his associates in ZANU-PF concentrated in celebrating the
Unity Accord and Nkomo as a person while denying his supporters heal-
ing, compensation, reparations and justice. To this day, no prosecutions
of Gukurahundi perpetrators have been carried out. This has resulted in
a perennial state of negative peace in Matabeleland and Midlands.
While the Unity Accord ended the Gukurahundi military operation, it
has conveniently been deployed by the ruling elite to pursue the project
of silencing inconvenient truths about the immediate post-liberation era.
Notably, under the banner of the Unity Accord, the past is expected to
be forgotten; both Anzaldua’s ‘colonial wounds’ and the ‘Gukurahundi
wounds’ are ignored; and the whole country is expected to practise selec-
tive amnesia. Ernest Renan once suggested that forgetting is essential
to the creation of a nation. The government of Zimbabwe has adopted
this Ernest Renan approach in managing the post-Gukurahundi dynam-
ics. When the Catholic Commission for Justice and Peace (CCJP) and
Legal Resources Foundation Report broke the silence in 1997 through
the publication of detailed human rights abuses by the Fifth Brigade,
Mugabe reacted by emphasising the need to forget the past in the name
of unity (Ndlovu-Gatsheni and Willems 2010: 13).
Moreover, just as the achievements of Patrice Lumumba were cel-
ebrated after cutting his body into pieces, Nkomo’s liberation creden-
tials were only recognised after the loss of 20,000 lives of his supporters
and after he had joined ZANU-PF in 1987. To that effect, Nkomo has
received a token of valorisation from Mugabe and his associates. For
instance, an international airport in Bulawayo has been named in his
honour, his statue has been erected and stands an edifice in Bulawayo
and Harare, the Main Street in Bulawayo has been renamed after
Nkomo. The Polytechnic College in Gwanda was also renamed after
Nkomo. Apart from these, Nkomo was posthumously given the title of
‘Father Zimbabwe’ by ZANU-PF.
Almost invariably, Nkomo was reconstructed as a gallant hero of

the liberation struggle and was buried in the most prestigious national
shrine—the National Heroes Acre in 1999. A special form of com-
memoration of Nkomo known as ‘Umdala Wethu Gala’ (our dear old
man gala) was introduced in 2001 (Ndlovu-Gatsheni 2013b: 169). His
fatherly figure, his founding father pedigree and his patriarchal status
revered throughout the country were appropriated as building blocks for
national unity. In this way, Nkomo’s national ‘elder’ status (Mazrui and
Tidy 1984) was mobilised as a political resource in service of Mugabe
and his associates in ZANU-PF. The galas re-invoked the 1950s,
1960s and 1970s political signification of Nkomo. Thus, while in the
1980s, Nkomo was considered a threat to the nation as the ‘Father of
Dissidents’, he was celebrated as ‘Father of the Nation’ after his death in
the 2000s (Ndlovu-Gatsheni and Willems 2010: 15).
However, much to the chagrin of the global imperialist powers,
Nkomo used his time in unity, government revoking and rearticulat-
ing his pre-independence ideas on land, race and black empowerment.
Thus, Nkomo’s tenure in unity government was characterised with the
reinvention of decolonial liberation agenda. Following many detours
and alarums, Nkomo revived debates on land redistribution and black
empowerment (Ndlovu-Gatsheni and Willems 2010: 13). Indeed, more
importantly, Nkomo consistently warned about the inevitability of land
wars in Zimbabwe as long as the unequal patterns of land ownership
continued. In this way, Nkomo mobilised Mazrui and Tidy’s ‘sage’ tradi-
tion to educate both the ‘ex-coloniser’ and the ‘ex-colonised’ about the
dangers of neocolonialism (Mazrui and Tidy 1984).
His ‘decolonial prophecy’ and premonition became a reality in the
end tail of the 1990s and early 2000s when the war veterans invaded
white commercial farms in a typical decolonial turn. There is no room
in this analysis to elaborate on this, save to say that the land inva-
sions marked the end of the honeymoon enjoyed between Mugabe’s
ZANU-PF and the West. The current relations between Zimbabwe and
the West have suffered a rupture. In fact, Mugabe now represents an
imperial project that fatally went wrong leaving David Moore (2004: 4)
wondering how the man the West ‘created’ has mutated to ‘become its
number one enemy in Southern Africa. As a mark of soured relations, in
June 2008 Queen Elizabeth II stripped Mugabe of his knighthood given
to him the ‘summer’ of Zimbabwe-UK relations in the early 1980s’
(Moyo 2015: 2).
144 G. Moyo
In his response to the said rupture of Zimbabwe–Western rela-

tions, Mugabe turned to his default mode of pretending to be a radical
nationalist like he did during the Lancaster House talks. This time, he
launched a massive frontal attack on the Western countries for failing to
listen to Nkomo when he told them (West) to share the land with black
Zimbabweans. Thus, it became convenient for Mugabe to use Nkomo in
his fight against the West which had imposed sanctions against all those
individuals known to have perpetrated human rights violations during
the land invasions of the late 1990s and early 2000s. A list of 136 names
of senior ZANU-PF leaders, military officials and war veterans was com-
piled by the European Union, UK, USA, Canada and Australia. While
some of the names included in the lists were those known to have played
a leading role in the Midlands and Matabeleland atrocities, Gukurahundi
atrocities were not cited as reason for listings or sanctions. It was thus
embarrassing for the West to accept the reality of the Gukurahundi
atrocities even when Mugabe was no longer serving its purpose.
Despite the desperate attempt to use and abuse Nkomo and the Unity
Accord, the electorate in Matabeleland and Midlands has been vot-
ing against Mugabe and his ZANU-PF in the general elections since
2000 as a way of punishing ZANU-PF for the Gukurahundi atrocities.
Interestingly, Dumiso Dabengwa together with some of his ZAPU col-
leagues pulled out of ZANU-PF in 2007 to re-establish ZAPU calling to
question the entire claim of the continuity of the Unity Accord.
Conclusion
It was discussed in this chapter that the emergence of Nkomo as a sym-
bol of resistance against a racially hierarchical, patriarchal, Western-
centric, hetero-normative, capitalist and colonial power structure was
greeted with hope for the liberation, freedom and decolonial future of
Zimbabwe. Like many of the founding fathers of Africa’s independ-
ence, Nkomo was set to become the first black leader of that country
after defeating juridical colonialism. Yet, the global imperial designs con-
signed him and his party ZAPU to the fringes, margins and peripheries
of power, society and history. The main line of argument of this chapter
was that Nkomo got entangled within the nest of global imperial designs
paved with geoeconomic, geopolitical and geostrategic interests of the
communist-Soviet pitted against the capitalist USA and its allies. This
‘labyrinthine imperial entrapment’ of Nkomo explains the invisibilisation
and silences that he and his party suffered. Not surprisingly, his libera-
tion pedigree was distorted, disfigured and destroyed. Like Lumumba
who was recognised after his body was cut into pieces, Nkomo’s decolo-
nial liberation pedigree got some token of recognition from his erstwhile
rivals posthumously. Hopefully, this chapter has inaugurated a re-reading
of the political formation of Nkomo’s politics.
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CHAPTER 6
Lancaster House Talks: Timing,

Cold War and Joshua Nkomo
Pathisa Nyathi
Introduction
Following the Unilateral Declaration of Independence (UDI) by the
Rhodesian government of Ian Douglas Smith on 11 November 1965,
there was a flurry of efforts by successive British government leaders to
resolve the Rhodesian constitutional impasse to no avail. While Britain
was reluctant to resolve the issue militarily, a series of talks were con-
vened which sought a resolution of the gridlock. At the same time,
Britain was not keen to allow the UN to invoke Chap. 7 of its Charter
that calls for military intervention by the world body (Saul Gwakuba
Ndlovu in the Sunday News 19–25 April 2015).
As a result, British Prime Minister Harold Wilson held talks with
the Rhodesian prime minister aboard British frigates Tiger and Fearless
which failed to resolve the constitutional stalemate. Meanwhile, the
nationalists in Rhodesia established military wings of the nationalist
movements which were externally based. More importantly, the armed
liberation struggle was taking place against the backdrop of the hot
P. Nyathi (*) 
Bulawayo, Zimbabwe

150 P. Nyathi
Cold War which pitted the western NATO allies against the communist
countries which supplied arms of war, training, training camps, military
instructors and ammunition for the liberation movements.
While initially the war of liberation was low key and character-
ized in the main by sabotage, in the later stages it intensified and soon
engulfed most of the country. By the late 1970s, it had become clear
that the Ian Smith government was militarily overstretched and could no
longer resist the military onslaught. In the context of the Cold War, the
West felt threatened, more so when the former Portuguese colonies of
Mozambique and Angola gained independence following the coup de
tat in Portugal. America and her allies could not countenance the Soviet
Union exerting influence and control from the Indian Ocean to the
Atlantic Ocean.
The Zimbabwe African People’s Union (ZAPU) had had links with
the Soviet Union from as far back as the 1950s and their relations con-
tinued into the 1960s, indeed till the end of the liberation struggle. After
the 1963 split within the nationalist movement, the Soviet Union sup-
ported ZAPU at a time then there was Sino-Soviet rivalry. Hence, during
the AAPSO meeting in 1963 the Soviet Union chose to support ZAPU.
The Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU) on the other hand
aligned with China. ZAPU had had its cadres train in both China and
North Korea but in 1965 China suspended aid to ZAPU which then was
firmly in the grip of the Soviets.
In 1967 and again in 1968, both ZAPU and the South African
African National Congress (ANC) launched combined military incur-
sions into Rhodesia which marked the first serious military threats to
the Rhodesian government (Macmillan 2013: 39). With both liberation
movements supported by the Soviet Union, the West regarded the devel-
opment as posing a real threat to its political, economic and geopolitical
interests in southern Africa. At the same time, the ZANU’s military wing
the Zimbabwe African National Liberation Front (ZANLA) began oper-
ating with the Front for the Liberation of Mozambique (FRELIMO) as
from 1972 and opened the Tete operational zone to strike at Rhodesia
from the north-eastern corner. The response from the West was to drive
a wedge between ZAPU and the ANC and another within ZAPU itself.
As a result, the joint operations did not continue. ZAPU itself faced a
split that led to the creation of three factions (Mpofu 2014: 177).
ZAPU was seriously weakened militarily as the West sought to counter
the Soviet Union in the superpower struggle for the control of southern
6 LANCASTER HOUSE TALKS: TIMING, COLD WAR AND JOSHUA NKOMO 151
Africa. However, ZAPU managed to reorganize and was, by 1974, in a

position to establish the Southern Front (SF) through which guerrillas
infiltrated into Rhodesia from Botswana. The United States of America
(USA) sensed the danger posed by increased military striking power of
the guerrilla movements. It was the USA, as leader of the NATO bloc,
more than Britain with colonial responsibility over Rhodesia that sought
to arrest the march by the liberation movements.
Through his shuttle diplomacy within the broader détente exercise,
US Secretary of State Dr Henry Kissinger lurched into apply breaks
to the gathering military storm. The nationalist leaders who had been
detained in 1964 were released. Attempts were made to unite the nation-
alist movement through the Lusaka Unity Accord of December 1974.
This was a move that brought the banned ZAPU and ZANU parties into
a united front with the political outfit led by Bishop Abel Muzorewa.
The political gimmick and intrigue succeeded in applying brakes to the
pace of the armed liberation struggle (Interview with Marshall Mpofu 16
November 2015).
While slowing down the advance of the war of liberation, the more
radical elements within the liberation movement were eliminated.
ZANU’s external leader Herbert Chitepo was killed by a bomb placed
in his car in Lusaka in 1975. The leader of the external wing of ZAPU
Jason Ziyapapa Moyo was killed by a letter bomb sent to him from
Botswana. ZPRA commander Alfred Nikita Mangena was killed by a
landmine in 1978. In order to free themselves from the claws of detente,
ZAPU and ZANU formed a joint military command known as the
Zimbabwe People’s Army (ZIPA) in 1975 that resumed the war from
Mozambique. The shrewd US Secretary of State Dr Henry Kissinger
calculated that the released nationalists, less immersed in Marxist-
Leninist ideology, would clash with the leaders of the external wings
who, through exposure, had embraced political ideologies from the
Communist bloc.
The next move by the West was to convene a constitutional confer-
ence in Geneva in 1976. Joshua Nkomo the leader of ZAPU would
describe it as ‘a conference that never was conference’. A few more con-
ferences at Malta and Dar-es-Salaam were convened but yielded no posi-
tive results. It was the death of Jason Ziyapapa Moyo which led Joshua
Nkomo to move to Lusaka and lead ZAPU till a constitutional settle-
ment was achieved at the end of 1979. It was Joshua Nkomo’s involve-
ment in the leadership of the war effort which altered the complexion
152 P. Nyathi
of the war. Joshua Nkomo’s view was to end the agony that the people
of Rhodesia were facing. He wanted the war to end and sought ways
to achieve that. The war would be sharp and short. Indeed that is what
happened. Joshua Nkomo had tried to negotiate with Ian Smith in 1975
but the efforts yielded no positive results. In coming up with a rethink
on the war strategy, Joshua Nkomo was seeking political relevance. It is
our argument that the Lancaster House talks were held in London from
September 1979 precisely as a result of several related and coordinated
military strategies by ZAPU and its armed wing the Zimbabwe People’s
Revolutionary Army (ZPRA) that dictated the timing of the talks and
their positive outcome. It is the burden of this chapter to bring out those
factors that created the conditions for the holding of the talks at that
particular time and, in particular, to bring out the intended goals and
outcomes of the talks which were informed by the Cold War contesta-
tions.
The Lancaster House talks, which lasted from 10 September 1979
till 21 December of the same year, were the result of the efforts of
Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) that took
place in Lusaka, Zambia, in August 1979. On the theatre of war, a lot
had taken place. ZAPU had crafted what it termed the Turning Point
strategy with a Zero Hour component. Without doubt, it was a strategy
which was meant to seize power from the Rhodesian government. An
outright military victory would have afforded the Soviet Union a strong
foothold in southern Africa. That too would have meant the West would
have come worse off from that scenario. It was not to be. Lancaster
House talks were not about the resolution of the Rhodesian constitu-
tional impasse. Rather, it was the antagonistic superpowers playing out
their political game within the context of the very hot Cold War. It came
as no wonder, therefore, when some participants in the armed liberation
struggle saw the Lancaster House deal as a sell-out:
To me this ceasefire order came as a disappointment and we needed ample

time to internalize (it) and come to terms with it. Things had fallen apart.
We crossed safely, had enough ammunition, sound military strategies
to hit the targets, only to receive the news of a ceasefire. This agreement
(Lancaster House) did not incorporate us in so far as the future of the
guerrillas was concerned. There was no plan for them. (Ndlovu 2014: 50)
Even Joshua Nkomo was later to realize that the constitutional settle-
ment was not about the African problems.
Kissinger’s (US Secretary of State) southern Africa proposals were not

really concerned with African problems at all, but with super-power poli-
tics. I think he would have been happiest if the whole region had settled
down as a ring of satellite Bantustans depended on South Africa. His ideas
were of no interest to us. (Nkomo 2001a: 177)
The Turning Point strategy with its Zero Hour component was an inte-
grated and coordinated stratagem that linked and harmonized several
military aspects that would be unleashed upon the incalcitrant white
regime in Salisbury which had since 1978 crafted an Internal Settlement
in which Abel Muzorewa was the prime minister. As a military strategy,
the Turning Point embraced the following: importation and shipment of
heavy weapons from the Soviet Union and its communist allies. The sort
of weapons that a guerrilla army used only managed to harass the enemy
but did little more. The thrust was on sabotage using the AK automatic
assault rifle and defensive and offensive grenades. The weapons were
ineffective in terms of defence of seized territory. The Soviet Union sup-
plied the weapons as from 1977. The one type of weapon that altered
the complexion of the war was the battery of surface-to-air heat-seeking
Strela missiles, SAM 7 (Nyathi 2014b).
According to Pathisa Nyathi (2014b: 175), mechanized, artillery and
engineering divisions were set up and that meant increase military strik-
ing force. The Soviet Union and its Communist bloc allies such as the
German Democratic Republic (GDR), Cuba, Czechoslovakia, Poland,
Bulgaria and Yugoslavia provided the weapons through Dar-es-Salaam in
Tanzania. Such heavy military equipment, for example tanks, was for use
by a regular army which operated in large numbers and had the capabil-
ity and capacity to seize territory and defend it. From 1978, ZPRA, as
part of Nkomo’s drive for a sharp and short war, started training a regu-
lar or conventional army which, it was envisaged, would, in collabora-
tion with other military components, launch a lightning attack across the
Zambezi River into Zimbabwe Rhodesia (Nyathi 2014b: 175).
Training had to be ratcheted in terms of range of areas covered and
the sophistication of that training. ZPRA cadres began undergoing mil-
itary training in several countries. Some cadres that had done guerrilla
training were retrained as officers in line with their expected roles in the
regular battalions. There also had to be sufficient numbers of person-
nel that would constitute threshold figures for meaningful operations in
view of expanded operations and the technical expertise that would be
required. Indeed, that happened and the year 1977 witnessed the highest
154 P. Nyathi
level of cadres arriving in Zambia to take part in the armed liberation

struggle (Nyathi 2014b: 175).
In order to enhance its striking power and cover, ZPRA embarked
on the training of Mig 17 jet pilots and technicians. From March
1978, the training started at Kirigizstan in the south-eastern part of
the Soviet Union close to Afghanistan (Interview with Nelson Nyathi,
19 October 2015). A war that is effectively fought with a good chance
of success relies on the gathering of strategic information about the
enemy. Intelligence and counter intelligence are critical in that effort.
As from 1978, ZPRA reorganized its intelligence, scope and structure
which hitherto had been divided into civilian and military intelligence.
In the past, there was military intelligence headed by Gordon Munyanyi
(Tapson Sibanda) who was later succeeded by Abel Mazinyane as chief
of the department. Ethan Dube had been in charge of the civilian intel-
ligence and when the two were integrated Dumiso Dabengwa took over
as chief of the national security and order (NSO) (Nyathi 2014b: 175).
The fighting force was then better coordinated with many operatives
having infiltrated Rhodesian military and civilian sectors, in particular the
strategic companies in urban centres where ZPRA staged urban guerrilla
operations.
At the crossing point, DK, we found Comrade Pilate Sibanda who was
deployed in Bulawayo to carry out reconnaissance mission… but later on
we received some instruction that some of us should join Pilate and go to
Bulawayo for a reconnaissance mission. Our task was to identify targets for
attack and these included some of the big companies in the city. (Interview
by Mkhululi Sibanda with Lovemore Ngwenya in the Sunday News, 29
November–05 December 2015)
The plan had been that Nkomo as commander-in-chief of ZPRA was

going to issue the order for the coordinated forces to roll-out the strat-
egy. Western and US intelligence had got the better of him (Nyathi
2014b). The efficient snooping agencies worked through contacts within
the ZPRA forces themselves, some turned-in guerrillas who were brain-
washed and reoriented were sent back to rejoin their colleagues and
spy on them. There was collaboration between the Rhodesians and the
South Africans through sharing intelligence information. ZAPU leader
and his key political and military personnel were attending the Lancaster
House talks in London when the Turning Point strategy should have
been launched (Nyathi 2014b). ZAPU and its backers, in particular

the Soviet Union, had been outsmarted, outmaneuvred and outclassed.
The Soviet Union had banked on a military solution which was going
to allow it a strong foothold in southern Africa. Their plans went up in
smoke when an outright military victory had been thwarted through the
convening of the Lancaster House talks.
The significance of the Turning Point strategy and its Zero Hour
component is best understood against the backdrop of the Cold War.
This was the stiff competition between the West and the East in many
areas of the globe. The two blocs sought to exert influence and control
over areas of the globe that were perceived to be geopolitically impor-
tant. The Turning Point strategy and its potential for success played into
the dog-eat-dog competition within the Cold War context. The longer
the constitutional impasse went on unresolved, the greater the chance
of the Soviet Union getting more involved in the politics and future of
Zimbabwe. Bringing the antagonistic forces together to negotiate the
resolution of the impasse was the only sure way of thwarting outright
military victory which would have seriously tipped the scales in favour of
the East, the Soviet Union in particular (Interview with Roma Nyathi,
22 May 2015).
Cold War Context and Rhodesian

Constitutional Impasse
‘You go to Lancaster and you are finished’, so advised the Soviets to
ZAPU (Quoted in Nyathi 2015: 175). The advice was given in the light
of their assessment of the outcome and what the outcome would mean
to them and ZAPU. The Cold War was a post-1945 World War II politi-
cal scenario which saw the polarization of world powers into two com-
peting ideologies, capitalism versus Communism. It was a polarization
that would for a long time, inform and influence the struggles for inde-
pendence in Africa and elsewhere. Cold War politics played themselves
out in pursuit of the interests of the competing blocs, sometimes to the
total neglect of the interests of other people. While the West was for a
negotiated solution to the Rhodesian constitutional impasse, the Soviet
Union and her allies pushed for a military solution (Nyathi 2014b: 175).
ZAPU was firmly on the side of the Soviets who supplied them with
weapons and other military requirements such as communications
156 P. Nyathi
equipment, uniforms, transport vehicles, medicine, military training facil-

ities, training in science and other professional fields. From as far back
as 1959, Joshua Nkomo, then leader of the Southern Rhodesia African
National Congress (SRANC), had contacts with the Soviets. Eyebrows
had been raised when the British Representative at the UN Sir Patrick
Dean resigned from his post following Joshua Nkomo’s political cam-
paigns on the international front which led to the British official’s res-
ignation. The incident caused some embarrassment to both Britain and
the USA. ‘It was by the way, at the height of the Cold war, and any-
one who strongly opposed colonialism and the exploitation of African,
Asian or South American natural resources by the industrialized west-
ern European nations were branded a communist. That tag was made to
stick by the fact that Joshua Nkomo had visited the Soviet Union as early
as 1959, and his successive political parties had been offered scholar-
ships by Yugoslavia, the German Democratic Republic(GDR), the Soviet
Union, Czechoslovakia, Hungary and Ghana’ (Saul Gwakuba Ndlovu in
Sunday News 12–18 July 2015).
Links between ZAPU and the Soviet Union had been further con-
solidated when a National Democratic Party official, George Silundika,
visited Moscow in 1961. Among the issues raised by him were finan-
cial support and other needs, scholarships and the Soviet universities for
training of trade union, women and youth activists. In addition to ZAPU
leaders going to the Soviet Union, in Britain the Communist Party of
Great Britain exerted influence on these leaders. The party organized
platforms on ZAPU’s behalf. In the early years, training of ZAPU cadres
took place in homes and flats in the Koxhovoskaya and Chirimuski. The
cadres were being trained in the use of explosives, arms and sabotage and
guerrilla tactics. Uniformed Soviet instructors were behind the training
(Saul Gwakuba Ndlovu in Sunday News 12–13 July 2015).
More cadres underwent training in North Korea about 15 kilome-
tres from Pyongyang. In China, the training took place near Beijing and
at Nanking. In 1960–1961, the famous statements by Khrushchev dis-
turbed US President John F Kennedy whose response led to the reorgan-
ization of US armed forces to deal with ‘insurgents’. There was further
alarm in the Western quarters when Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev in his
address to the 24th Congress of the Communist Party in 1971 indicated
that the three main revolutionary forces in the current epoch were social-
ism, the international working class movement and the liberation move-
ments. ZAPU was more and more swallowed into the Cold War conflict,
and any moves it pursued were bound to be influenced by the politics of

the Cold War that was progressively getting hotter and hotter (Interview
with Roma Nyathi, Moffat N Ndlovu and Strike Mnkandla 19 October
2015).
When the newly independent African states moved towards the forma-
tion of the Organization of African Unity (OAU), they found themselves
torn between the antagonists in the Cold War. There were African lead-
ers, the most radical of the lot, who were aligned to the Soviet Union
and belonged to what was termed the Casablanca Group. Among the
leaders in this group were Gamal Abdel Nasser of Egypt and Kwame
Nkrumah of Ghana. The more liberal and pro-Western African lead-
ers belonged to the Monrovia Group and sought a gradualist approach
to the attainment of independence in Africa. Liberian leader William
Tubman, Jomo Kenyatta of Kenya and Mwalimu Julius Nyerere of
Tanzania were some of the leaders in this group (Interview with Roma
Nyathi, Moffat N Ndlovu and Strike Mnkandla 19 October 2015).
Splits within the trade union movement in 1962 apparently pre-
ceded the split within the nationalist movement. The Cold War dichot-
omies were discernible within the splits in which ZAPU found itself
within the Soviet camp. The Southern Rhodesia Trade Union Congress
(SRTUC) which had been formed by Joshua Nkomo and other trade
unionists such as Jason Ziyapapa Moyo experienced a revolt from Tom
Mswaka and associates such as Terry Jeremiah Maluleke who formed the
Southern Rhodesia African Trade Union Congress (SARTU). The fissure
extended to the continental level where the Casablanca Group opted for
a politicized trade union movement while the Monrovia Group preferred
a trade union movement that was divorced from politics (Saul Gwakuba
Ndlovu in Sunday News 24–30 May 2015).
The split in the nationalist movement was viewed by Joshua Nkomo
as having been fuelled by pro-Western interests within the Cold War
context. He noted that Leopold Takawira, one of the drivers of the
rebellion, was a member of Capricorn Society which was organized by
a former British Officer Colonel David Stirling. ‘It’s aim was to build
up African elites prepared to take over government in co-operation
with the rich white property owners. Takawira supported its scheme
for allowing selected Africans to qualify gradually for a share in power’
(Nkomo 2001: 115). After the 1963 split, ZAPU remained in the Soviet
camp. To thwart the Soviet Union in southern Africa in general and
Zimbabwe in particular, it was imperative for the West to checkmate
158 P. Nyathi
ZAPU. A victorious ZAPU in Zimbabwe would translate to a Soviet and

Communist victory in Zimbabwe and indeed southern Africa.
The situation would get worse in the Cold War context when ZAPU
and the ANC’s Umkhonto we Sizwe launched joint military operations
in 1967 and 1968. James Chikerema, the leader of the external wing of
ZAPU, and Oliver Tambo of the ANC clinched a deal for joint opera-
tions, and in 1966 a ZAPU reconnaissance party was infiltrated through
Kazungula to recconoitre the route to be followed in 1967. The Luthuli
Detachment that was infiltrated in 1967 was led by John Dube (Charles
Ngwenya). This was the most serious military engagement that the
Rhodesians had ever experienced. In the following year, another joint
military incursion was undertaken. That Pyramid Detachment was led
by ZAPU’s Moffat Hadebe (Mpofu 2014: 39). Both military operations
by Soviet-backed liberation movements were perceived as the cutting
edge of the Communists into southern Africa. That, later to be followed
by the collapse of the former Portuguese colonies of Mozambique and
Angola made the spectre of a communist domination in southern Africa
a real possibility that would not be countenanced by the western world.
Indeed, soon after 1968 the joint operations were discontinued, a
move surreptitiously engineered by Western intelligence and cherished
by the Western nations. ZAPU on its part experienced an internal cri-
sis (Nyathi). In fact, ZAPU splintered into three sections—the March
11 Movement, the Front for the Liberation of Zimbabwe (RFOLIZI)
and mainstream ZAPU (Mpofu 2014: 39). ZAPU’s military capability
was seriously affected. There was time when only a handful of guerrillas
were operating and resorted to hit-and-run tactics to create an impres-
sion there were many of them. In fact, at the time the number of both
civilians and trained guerrillas did not reach 100. Among these few oper-
atives were Roger Matshimini Ncube and Abel Mazinyane. ZAPU reor-
ganized and attained levels where it ultimately posed some real threats to
Western interests through increased military capability.
The West sprung into action once again to thwart increasing Soviet
influence. US Secretary of State’s shuttle diplomacy was calculated to
apply brakes to the gathering momentum of the armed liberation strug-
gle by the two liberation movements, ZPRA and ZANLA. Indeed, the
strategy did succeed in slowing down the pace when fighting ceased and
conflicts ensued. Meanwhile, the ideologically strong externally based
leaders of both ZAPU and ZANU were eliminated. Keen to resume the
struggle, the two liberation movements formed the Zimbabwe People’s
Army (ZIPA) which was based in Mozambique and was tasked with
the responsibility of resuscitating the war. It was strategy and coun-
ter strategy between the liberation movements and their backers on the
one hand and the Western nations on the other (Nyathi 2014b). The
latter, with Britain shouldering the responsibility of restoring constitu-
tionality in Rhodesia, resorted to constitutional conferences to resolve
the impasse. When the war escalated and the Communists were seen to
gain the upper hand, another conference was called to add more lethargy
and sluggishness to the pace of the struggle. The Geneva conference was
arranged.
Like the earlier talks between Smith and Harold Wilson, the con-
ference aborted. Its failure marked an important turning point in the
struggle for independence and the contestations between the West and
the East in the context of the Cold War (Nyathi 2014b). The former
Portuguese territories attained independence which saw ZANLA oper-
ating from rear bases in Mozambique. It was then able to open more
operational fronts and thus extended the theatre of war in Rhodesia.
If ZAPU were to attain an outright military victory in Rhodesia as it
planned to do, the whole area from the Indian Ocean to the Atlantic
Ocean would come under the influence of the Soviet Union and the
Communists. The West sprung into counter action.
After the Geneva Conference, Anglo-American diplomacy was han-
dled by the US Representative to the UN, Andrew Young, who was
supported by US Secretary of State Cyrus Vance and British Foreign
Secretary David Owen who later was replaced by Anthony Crossland.
The urgency was informed by the fact that the Portuguese former colo-
nies had gained their independence and extended the perceived southern
African frontier of Communism (Nyathi 2014b). There were numer-
ous diplomatic shuttles between New York, London, Salisbury and the
Front-line capitals. Indeed, on the 1st of February 1978 more talks
were held in Malta under the chairmanship of David Owen. These were
attended by Andy Young, US Assistant Secretary of State for African
Affairs Richard Moore and the UN Special Representative for Rhodesia
Pram Chand. The Anglo-American proposals were sold to the Patriotic
Front (PF) which had been created a few months prior to the conven-
ing of the Geneva Conference. The involvement of Andy Young and Dr
Henry Kissinger is a pointer to Western interests. The USA is the leader
of Western countries and was not the colonial authority over Rhodesia.
Clearly, the Rhodesian issue had assumed a Cold War contestation and
160 P. Nyathi
character where the East and the West sought to outmanoeuvre each
other out of self-interest.
The Geneva was a turning point towards the Turning Point strategy.
On the part of ZAPU leader Joshua Nkomo, it brought disillusionment
and a new sense altering the course and pace of the war. Describing the
Geneva Conference as a ‘conference that never was a conference’ to a
journalist, it had dawned on Joshua Nkomo that what was needed was
a different strategy, a military onslaught to bring down the Ian Smith
regime in Salisbury (Nyathi 2014b). At the time, Joshua Nkomo was
hardly 2 years out of detention at Gonakudzingwa. A few months later,
an unfortunate incident would see him leave Rhodesia to settle perma-
nently in Lusaka. The fateful incident in January 1977 was the death of
Jason Ziyapapa Moyo. He had been killed by a letter bomb delivered
through the post from a woman acquaintance in Francistown who was
a Rhodesian intelligence operative (Nyathi 2014b). The same year saw
an unprecedented number of cadres arriving in refugee camps in both
Botswana and Zambia. There were thus sufficient numbers from which
to recruit personnel for both the guerrilla struggle and the professional
training in various friendly countries. The war continued to escalate.
More and more areas in Rhodesia became operational zones. The call-
up system was introduced. Police reserves were drafted in and women
were not spared either. By 1978, ZPRA was able to score defining victo-
ries which caused consternation among not only the Rhodesians, but the
South Africans and the Western powers that were monitoring events with
an interest of containing the military tide within the context of the Cold
War (Nyathi 2014b).
Now we turn to those changes in the complexion of the war that led
the Western allies to seriously consider convening a constitutional con-
ference that would effectively checkmate both ZAPU and its sponsors
within the Communist bloc. Events in South Africa were also a cause for
alarm and concern. The student riots in Soweto had taken place in June
1976. The ANC’s Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK) was making inroads into
urban areas and politicizing the youth (Nyathi 2014b). MK and ZPRA
were both aligned to the Soviet Union and had, in 1967 and again in
1968, launched joint military incursions into Rhodesia. In the event
that both political parties came to power in their respective countries,
there was a real possibility for Communism to get a strong foothold in a
geopolitically important area of southern Africa. That was not to be. In
Zimbabwe, where there was a strong liberation movement in opposition
to ZAPU it was to become a bulwark against Communism. It would

be the preferred party to ZAPU with strong links to the Soviets. The
Chinese who supported ZANU were a lesser evil in the eyes of the West
(Nyathi 2014b).
In response to the escalating war, the Rhodesians instituted sham elec-
tions that drew in the participation of some political parties that were
no longer involved in the prosecution of the armed liberation strug-
gle. Ndabaningi Sithole, James Chikerema, Bishop Abel Muzorewa,
Chief Jeremiah Chirau and Chief Khayisa Ndiweni all participated in the
Internal Settlement in which Bishop Abel Muzorewa emerged as prime
minister of Zimbabwe Rhodesia after the elections. Sensing real danger
when the Internal Settlement failed to win international recognition, the
British government in 1978 sent a 39-member delegation of industrial-
ists to assess the situation and get a feel of the direction the country was
likely to take. Once in Zimbabwe Rhodesia, the group split into smaller
groups that visited various parts of the country. The one question they
asked was about who was likely to rule the country when independence
was granted or achieved. The generality of the black people, chiefs and
whites that were consulted all put forward the name of ZAPU leader
Joshua Nkomo. The various groups reassembled at the Meikles Hotel
in Salisbury. Boyman Mancama of the Anglo American Company played
host to the visiting group (Nyathi 2014b).
The British seemed not unduly raffled by the fact that Joshua
Nkomo was the people’s favourite choice. However, the US Central
Intelligence Agency (CIA) advised otherwise. There was no way the
Soviet Union and its Communist allies would control the whole swathe
of land from the Indian Ocean to the Atlantic Ocean. Advances were
made to Swazi king Sobhuza to investigate the links between ZAPU
and the ANC of South Africa. An emissary was dispatched to Maputo
to confer with ZAPU Representative in Maputo. Mozambican President
Samora Machel dispatched word to Tanzanian President Julius Nyerere.
Nkomo was not to be told about the goings-on. Nkomo later found
out and was told by his own representative, ‘I was advised not to tell
you’. Dr Kissinger had much earlier met Nkomo at the Intercontinental
Hotel where he asked him, ‘Are you in charge? Do you have support?’
(Interview with Saul Gwakuba Ndlovu 15 September 2015). In order
to arm-twist South Africa, Dr Henry Kissinger visited oil-rich Iran and
instructed them to stop oil supplies to South Africa. Iran relied heavily
on the income from sales of oil. They were advised the USA was going
162 P. Nyathi
to buy the oil so as for Iran to continue to get the required revenue.
Having been weakened, South Africa had no choice but to support con-
stitutional efforts to resolve the Rhodesian impasse in such a way as to
exclude the Soviet Union from the politics of southern Africa (Interview
with Saul Gwakuba Ndlovu 15 September 2015).
Events Leading to the Holding of Talks at

 Lancaster House in 1979
The year 1978 was the decisive year that led to the holding of talks at
Lancaster House the following year. The Soviet Union, sensing danger
from the West if the war was not escalated and lead to outright military
victory, ratcheted the struggle in various ways. It is these new efforts
starting from 1978 in the main and to some extent in 1977 that pushed
the West to the corner and saw them outmanoeuvre the Soviets by
arranging a US-initiated conference towards the end of 1979.
Supply of Heavy Weapons

Guerrillas did not carry heavy weapons, heavy enough to inflict tell-
ing damage to big installations that have a psychological effect on the
war. As part of the build-up to the Turning Point, ZAPU requested the
Soviet Union for the supply of heavy weapons. A department of artil-
lery came into being in 1977 at the time Sam Mfakazi was Chief of
Logistics and was deputized by Masala Sibanda, Donki Dube, Petros
Khumalo (Mpondo) and Nyawera. From inception, Andrew Ndlovu
(Dumezweni) was the chief of this new military unit (Brigadier General
Abel Mazinyane in Sunday News 5–11 July 2015).
Also getting into the hands of ZIPRA were the anti-air weapons com-
prising Strela surface-to-air missiles (SAM 7), which were used against
Rhodesian aircraft. Moscow had stepped up its avowed assistance to
ZAPU. The supply of these heavy weapons was highly controlled by
the OAU Liberation Committee in Dar-es-Salaam chaired by Brigadier
Hashim Mbita (Interview Brigadier General Abel Mazinyane in Sunday
News 5–11 July 2015). Weapons donated to ZAPU were handed over
to the Tanzanian government which then surrendered them to the
Liberation Committee. The Zambian government was then informed.
Tanzanian military then transported the weapons to Zambia where the
weapons were surrendered to the Liberation Centre in Lusaka from
where ZPRA was informed about their arrival. To ensure the safety of
the weapons, they were transported in the company of a Zambian mili-
tary officer, a senior ZPRA officer and another officer from the Logistics
Department (Interview Brigadier General Abel Mazinyane in Sunday
News 5–11 July 2015).
Sometimes, ZPRA resorted to unorthodox means to smuggle in the
weapons. For example, a Zambian military attaché in Dar-es-Salaam
was bribed with a Mercedes Benz vehicle that had been supplied by the
ANC’s MK. The vehicle was acquired in South Africa and smuggled
through Mozambique and driven all the way to Dar-es-Salaam where the
military attaché received it and facilitated the delivery of ZPRA weaponry
to Zambia (Interview with Saul Gwakuba Ndlovu 15 September 2015).
In 1978, more heavy weapons were supplied to ZAPU. Apparently, these
were spotted by Western intelligence during their movement from Dar-
es-Salaam to Tunduma on the border with Zambia. Once within Zambia,
the weapons were taken to the western part of Zambia.
The Rhodesians knew about the presence of these heavy weapons that
included tanks. Acting on Western-supplied intelligence, the Rhodesians
attacked the road infrastructure including bridges on the Chambeshi
River in order for ZPRA to find it burdensome if not well nigh impos-
sible to transport the weapons to their intended destination, Zimbabwe
Rhodesia. Aerial bombardment of the area presumed by the Rhodesians
to be harbouring the weapons was being carried out while the Lancaster
House talks were in progress (Nyathi 2014b: 207). Other heavy weapons
that ZPRA received included the Grad P which was effectively used by
the Brigadier Madliwa Khumalo-led regular battalion to withdraw from
where it was pinned down by the Rhodesian firepower and ground forces
and the B 74 anti-tank guns and the ZegUs (Interview with Marshall
Mpofu 16 November 2015).
The supply of heavy weapons, particularly the SAM 7 missiles, led
to the downing of the Rhodesian civilian aircraft, the Viscounts in the
Lake Kariba area. Before the civilian aircraft was knocked out, a number
of Rhodesian air-force fighters had been brought down. ‘We could not
claim the credit we deserved because we needed to keep secret the fact
that we had been given some Soviet surface-to-air missiles, SAM 7s. The
first time we used them we knocked down two of their strike aircraft, the
next time we got four. In all, we shot down about thirty of their planes
and helicopters: the Rhodesian Minister of Defence was forced to resign
and they replaced the losses only by importing second-hand Hawker
164 P. Nyathi
Hunters from Israel, with South African help. The only times they would
admit to losses of aircraft were when we brought down passenger planes
which we did on two occasions’ (Nkomo 2001: 172).
The Rhodesian aircraft attacked ZPRA installations in Zambia in
October 1978 probably in response to the successful creation and com-
missioning of the regular battalions. In retaliation of the attacks, ZPRA
used SAM 7 missiles to bring down the first civilian aircraft in 1978. The
next civilian Viscount aircraft was brought down with heavy casualties in
1979 (Nyathi 2014b). The aircraft downing made the West and their
Rhodesian kith and kin that ZAPU, through the collaboration and sup-
port of the Soviet Union, posed a threat to the Rhodesian state, a threat
that would favour the penetration of the Soviets into an area that the
West considered strategic to their military, economic and geopolitical
interests. There were other developments on the military front which,
when taken together with the downing of the civilian and military air-
craft created a real scare that made the West to panic and the USA in
particular to urge the newly elected Conservative Party government of
British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher to prioritize settlement of the
Rhodesian crisis in order to eliminate the Soviet factor from the region.
Prime Minster Thatcher obliged (Nyathi 2014b).
One such visible and conspicuous victory that ZPRA’s urban guerrilla
unit scored in Salisbury was to hit the oil-storage tanks. ‘Transporting
heavy weapons through the Rhodesian air cover was terribly risky, and
it was rare that we brought off conspicuous triumphs like the rocketing
of the oil storage tanks in Salisbury and Bulawayo as the Salisbury tanks
burnt for a week, a symbol of our success, but the Bulawayo reserve was
unfortunately empty when Zipra hit it’ (Nkomo 2001: 172). Other than
being conspicuous, the hitting of the oil-storage tanks was a serious eco-
nomic blow to the entire Rhodesian economy, and the war effort as fuel
runs the engines of both the economy and the transport sector on which
the military was dependent. Besides, the morale of the ZPRA cadres was
boosted, and the heroic act was immediately published in the ZAPU
newspaper, the Zimbabwe Review.
Creation of a Regular Army

Following the importation of the first arms of war into Rhodesia by
Abraham Nkiwane, Misheck Velaphi Ncube and Kennias Mlalazi in
1962, the stage was set for the commencement of sabotage stage of the
struggle (Nyathi 2014b). In 1964, at the Zidube Ranch in Mambale,

the first engagement led by Moffat Hadebe took place. In the early days,
ZPRA cadres were trained in China, Ghana and North Korea. A new
level in the armed liberation struggle was reached when in 1963 ZAPU
cadres left for Tanzania en route to the Soviet Union and other friendly
countries to undergo military training. As from 1965, the guerrilla war
started although in those early phases the emphasis was on reconnais-
sance and establishing contacts with the ZAPU political structures inside
Rhodesia (Nyathi 2014b). Despite the setbacks brought about by the
split in 1971, the guerrilla war intensified and engulfed more parts of
Rhodesia, especially, when the Southern Front was established in 1974.
For Joshua Nkomo, the turning point towards taking a new course
in the military onslaught was after the failure of the Geneva Conference
and the earlier talks with Ian Smith in 1975. Joshua Nkomo had been
asked about his next move: ‘What are you going to do (now)?’ asked
a journalist. ‘I am instructing my commanders to build an army. Mind
you, I am not building a Salvation Army but an army that is going to
take the country by force of arms’ (Interview with Marshall Mpofu 19
November 2015). That landmark speech and declaration by Joshua
Nkomo marked the first move towards building a regular brigade.
Marshall Mpofu, who had been engaged in reconnoitring the Elephant
Hills in 1977, was withdrawn from the front. He proceeded to Lusaka
where he went to Mulungushi as Deputy Political Commissar to Gedi
Dube. Training was done under the auspices of the Zambian army
(Interview with Marshall Mpofu 19 November 2015). There were about
24 ZIPRA officers who did the training and were joined by three Soviet-
trained officers, namely Gedi Dube, Cephas Khupe and Marshall Mpofu.
There were over 2000 cadres in all that underwent training, among them
Abu-Basutu, Madubeko Moyo who would later command the first bat-
talion after the integration of the erstwhile antagonistic armies that cre-
ated the Zimbabwe National Army (ZNA) (Interview with Marshall
Mpofu 19 November 2015). On the day of the pass-out parade, Joshua
Nkomo, Zambian President Kenneth Kaunda, Zambian Army com-
mander General Kingsley Chinkuli and ZPRA commander Alfred Nikita
Mangena were in attendance. The Zambian army provided logistical sup-
port to the regular outfit (Interview with Marshall Mpofu 19 November
2015).
The infantry brigade had four battalions. ‘Some ZIPRA cadres trained
at the Zambian Military Academy and these included Milton Siziba,
166 P. Nyathi
Nyamupingidza and Diye later a Colonel in the ZNA. Dubhu Nleya

was the commander of the brigade with Marshall Mpofu as Political
Commissar. Cephas Khupe and SB Sibanda were also in the com-
mand. The first battalion was commanded by Madliwa Khumalo, Zuva
Commanded the second battalion with TJ Matiwaza commanding the
third battalion. Soneni Mdlalose Moyo commanded the fourth battalion’
(Interview with Marshall Mpofu 19 November 2015).
The regular battalions were self-contained in that they included spe-
cialized units such as artillery, the signals unit, engineers unit and intel-
ligence unit, among others. Training of the regular army members took
place in various countries such as Somalia, Ethiopia, Libya, Angola (the
Cubans trained the cadres with the assistance of the Soviets and these
were later integrated into the ZIPRA army that had been trained by
ZIPRA commanders) and the Soviet Union (Interview with Marshall
Mpofu, 16 November 2015; Interview with Jaconiah Moyo 26 October
2015, Bulawayo). ‘ZAPU pinned its hopes on a regular army or con-
ventional army. The thinking was that a regular army was capable of hit-
ting the enemy and defending captured territory. Such an army would
be well equipped with advanced weapons including tanks, artillery, anti-
aircraft batteries and even Mig jet fighters’ (Nyathi 2014b: 175). That
the Rhodesians were aware of this dangerous development was evidenced
by the Rhodesian agents who frequented the nearby lake pretending to
be tourists.
At one time, the ZPRA cadres captured such agents, three men and
one woman who pretended to be journalists. Further, the first ever aerial
raids into Zambian territory were undertaken at the time when the bat-
talions were ready to roll-out towards the gorges in the Zambezi valley.
It can safely be surmised this initial bombing was meant to emasculate
the battalions and thus remove the threat of a possible outright military
victory. Indeed, Madliwa Khumalo’s battalion was attacked over several
days and nights and only retreated when they had sought and got per-
mission from the ZPRA headquarters in Lusaka to use the Grad P that
provided yellow smoke cover under which retreat was concealed and
affected. As it turned out, the battalions were never deployed across the
Zambezi River. The Lancaster House talks put paid to the Turning Point
strategy which was going to see an integrated and coordinated multi-
pronged onslaught on Zimbabwe Rhodesia.
©Training Mig 17 Pilots and Technicians

Both the Mig 17 jets and the anti-air batteries were going to provide
cover to the advancing regular army battalions. The engineers were
going to fix bridges where necessary to enable troop carriers and tanks
and artillery units to cross and destroy these bridges in order thwart
the movement of any pursuers in their attempts to close in on advanc-
ing troops (Nyathi 2014b). The timing of the training was done so as
to coincide with the completion of training by the regular army units.
Air-force personnel had done basic training in the guerrilla camps in
Zambia. Their pass-out parade took place in 1978 before the death of
ZPRA commander Alfred Nikita Mangena and the first aerial raids into
Zambia in October of the same year (Nyathi 2014b). The raids were
undertaken to more or less coincide with the passing out of the regu-
lar army battalions, and the fiercest attacks were concentrated on posi-
tions where the regular battalions were located. Through intelligence
and common sense, Rhodesians who frequently shared intelligence with
the more effective intelligence units in the West, sought to destabilize
the units that were ready to position themselves in the Zambezi valley
gorges to await the signal from the Commander-in-Chief Joshua Nkomo
who awaited the various support units to be ready so that the Zero Hour
of the Turning Point was reached when it would be systems go (Nyathi
2014b).
The air force personnel were divided into two groups: technicians and
pilots. There were close to 100 of them altogether (Retired Brigadier
General Abel Mazinyane in Sunday News 12–18 April 2015). Training
commenced in March 1978 at Frunze in Kirgizstan, a place in the Soviet
Union close to the border with Afghanistan. Though the place was far
away from the prying intelligence eyes of the West, the latter was quite
aware of the development and thus assessed the danger that the coordi-
nated military units were going to pose to the security of the southern
African region (Nyathi 2014b). Of particular significance was the threat
the Turning Point strategy posed to the Western interests as part of the
dog-eat-dog competition between the East and the West within the con-
text of the Cold War. The Soviet military advisors and the Cuban train-
ers were in Angola. ‘I first had encounter with Cuban comrades when
they drove from Angola to Lusaka in Zambia to deliver food and trucks
to ZIPRA’ (Retired Brigadier General Abel Mazinyane in Sunday News
168 P. Nyathi
12–18 April 2015). In 1977, ZIPRA hosted them at Freedom Camp

(FC) for about 4 days. On their return, they transported a group of three
hundred ZIPRA recruits to Boma Luso which was to be the first camp
to train ZPRA in Angola (Retired Brigadier General Abel Mazinyane in
Sunday News 12–18 April 2015).
After this initial visit, the Cubans became a permanent part of the
armed struggle. The Cubans came to Nampundwe Transit Camp to col-
lect more recruits who travelled to Angola in Soviet-built KRUZ trucks.
At one time, Soviet President Podgorny visited Angola—a move that
raised alarm in Western political and military circles (Retired Brigadier
General Abel Mazinyane in Sunday News 12–18 April 2015). The trainee
pilots only graduated in 1980 long after the Rhodesian constitutional
impasse had been resolved at Lancaster House in December 1979. The
resolution of the Rhodesian constitutional question nullified the Turning
Point strategy. The heavy weapons in north-western Zambia only rolled
on over the Victoria Falls Bridge en route to the Gwayi Assembly Point
after independence(Nyathi 2014b: 140). The Mig 17 jet trainees com-
pleted the course in October 1980. After arrival in Lusaka in Zambia,
they proceeded to Chitungwiza outside Salisbury where some ZPRA
demobilized cadres were encamped. From there, some of the trained
cadres joined the Zimbabwe Air Force a part of the Zimbabwe Defence
Forces. It was all over and yet the total destruction of the ZAPU political
and military infrastructure lay ahead, in the post-independence era. The
Cold War threat would only be removed when a Soviet-backed ZAPU
party and its political infrastructure was completely destroyed (Nyathi
2014b).
Conclusion
In the Cold War, contestations playing out in Zimbabwe the Soviet
Union and its allies lost out. Outright military victory was curtailed. A
negotiated settlement forestalled the military solution that had been pur-
sued by the Soviets and their allies. Even soon after the Lancaster House
talks had been successfully concluded the Soviet Union continued to
supply weapons to ZAPU. The Patriotic Front with co-leaders Joshua
Nkomo and Robert Mugabe was abandoned in order to isolate ZAPU,
its leader Joshua Nkomo, its fighters and supporters. Josiah Magama
Tongogara, the ZANLA commander who was gunning for a Joshua
Nkomo-led Patriotic Front that was billed to take charge died before he
got back to Zimbabwe following the ceasefire.
ZAPU, which had been one of the authentic liberation movements
during the struggle, lost the general elections and became the first and
only authentic liberation movement not to form a government after
independence. Instead, ZAPU was invited by ZANU to be part of the
government, a cleverly designed strategy to allow the party to relax only
to be attacked when ZANU had entrenched itself. The South Africans
worked overdrive to drive a wedge between the two former liberation
movements. Umkhonto we Sizwe, the armed wing of the ANC, was
never allowed to establish military camps in Zimbabwe, a further success
by the West in checkmating a Soviet-backed liberation movement. As it
would turn out, both Oliver Tambo and Chris Hani did not become part
of the post-struggle government. MK was demobilized. Once again, the
West had the upper hand.
In Zimbabwe, the Soviets were shunned, thus becoming the last
country to open a diplomatic mission in Salisbury (Harare). A lot of
development funding was poured by the West into Zimbabwe as part of
ZIMCOD. Ironically, the West which provided only humanitarian assis-
tance and not military support was now the beneficiary of the independ-
ence of Zimbabwe. The military arsenal that the Soviets had supplied
to ZPRA was confiscated and became part of the Zimbabwean Defence
Forces arsenal. Some heavy weapons had been at Gwayi Assembly Point
while others from Mashumbi Pools Assembly Point were taken to
Cranborne Army Barracks (Nyathi 2014b: 222). The Soviets were out of
the picture as the British Military Advisory Team, BMAT, took charge of
the integration exercise when the Zimbabwe National Army was estab-
lished from the three erstwhile antagonistic military outfits. White privi-
leges were entrenched and their representatives continued to occupy
seats in Parliament—a bicameral legislature. Their seats were safe for the
next 10 years.
The issue regarding the Cold War was not over as long as ZAPU was
in existence as a political party harbouring the desire to one day become
the ruling party in Zimbabwe. Who would vouch that they would not
invite their war time backers? It was thus in the interests of their political
rivals ZANU-PF, South Africa and the West to have ZAPU and its fight-
ing arm ZPRA completely dismantled, weakened and finally absorbed
into ZANU-PF. The military campaigns against it from 1981 till Unity
170 P. Nyathi
Accord on 22 December 1987 were calculated to achieve just that. The

West, only keen to outmanoeuvre and elbow out the Soviets, watched
nonchalantly amid deafening silence. Thus, both the timing of the
Lancaster House talks and the post-independence political and military
activities were a continuation of the same design to uproot the Soviets
from southern Africa against the background of the Cold War contesta-
tions among the world powers led by the Soviet Union on the one hand
and the USA on the other.
References
Interview with Mpofu Marshall. 2015, November 16. Bulawayo, Zimbabwe.
Interview with Nyathi Roma. 2015, May, 22. Bulawayo, Zimbabwe.
Interview with Nyathi Roma. 2015, October 19. Ndlovu Moffat MN, Mnkandla
Strike, Bulawayo, Zimbabwe.
Interview with Nyathi Nelson. 2015, October 19. Bulawayo, Zimbabwe.
Macmillan, H. (2013). The lusaka years: The ANC in exile in Zambia 1963–1994.
Auckland Park: Jacana Media.
Mpofu, J. M. (2014). My life in the struggle for the liberation of Zimbabwe.
Bloomington: Author House.
Ndlovu, A. (2014). Zimbabwe struggle: The delayed revolution. An autobiography.
Bulawayo: Amagugu Publishers.
Nkomo, J. M. (2001). The story of my life. Harare: Sapes Books.
Nyathi, D. N. (2014a). Starting businesses in Zambia and aiding the liberation
struggle. Bulawayo: Amagugu Publishers.
Nyathi, P. (2014b). The story of a ZPRA cadre: Nicholas Macala Dube ‘Ben
Mvelase’ an autobiography. Bulawayo: Amagugu Publishers.
Sunday News 5–11 July 2015: Retired Brigadier General Abel Mazinyane.
Sunday News 12–18 July 2015 Saul Gwakuba Ndlovu: Dr Nkomo Undeterred
by Dr Parirenyatwa’s Death.
Sunday News 19–25 April 2015: Saul Gwakuba Ndlovu Rhodesian Regime
Desperate-Detain Nkomo.
Sunday News 24–30 May 2015: Saul Gwakuba Ndlovu How the OAU Came
into Being.
PART II
Legacy, Diplomacy, Political Philosophy

and Fatherhood
CHAPTER 7
Joshua Nkomo: Nationalist Diplomat,

‘Father of the Nation’ or ‘Enemy of the
State’
Timothy Scarnecchia
Introduction
The most difficult task for historians of Zimbabwean nationalist politi-
cal history and diplomacy is avoiding a ‘presentist’ view of history, that
is, to avoid using the past to justify what will happen in later periods.
The rise of Mugabe’s ZANU to power after 1980, and the longevity of
ZANU’s control of the state since then, makes it difficult to not focus
on the moments where it seems Mugabe and others in ZANU’s leader-
ship managed to surface as the most successful of the two main nation-
alist parties. A more honest history, however, needs to remember that
historical actors were not able to read the future, so it is important to
remember that their individual and collective actions at a given time,
or year, or event, cannot be neatly put together to explain the present.
Political history almost inevitably leads to a sort of triumphant story of
political ascendancy of individuals and parties, and such histories have
always been used to teach school children why they should give thanks
T. Scarnecchia (*) 
University of Kent, Canterbury, USA

174 T. Scarnecchia
and praise to their ‘founding fathers’ (hardly ever ‘founding mothers’)

and respect the status quo as the result of hard-fought battles against
British settler colonialism and later the forces of imperialism and South
African apartheid influences. If one wants to move away from these tri-
umphant or perhaps ‘patriotic’ histories that most all of us grew up with,
it is important to look at the roles of others, especially others in political
parties that also made extensive individual and collective efforts to fight a
liberation war, negotiate with numerous regional and international inter-
ests, and deliver at negotiated independent Zimbabwe in April 1980.
This chapter attempts such a counter-narrative by examining the role of
Joshua Nkomo as a diplomat.
Much is known about Nkomo’s role in the early 1960s as the leader
of the National Democratic Party (NDP) and then after the banning
of the NDP of the Zimbabwe African People’s Union (ZAPU) up
to the time of his lengthy detention by the Rhodesians who believed
that by removing him and many of the other leaders of ZAPU and the
rival Zimbabwe African National Union, they would be able to thwart
the efforts of African nationalists to successfully wage a campaign for
majority rule government in Rhodesia (Sibanda 2005; Msindo 2012;
Mlambo 2014; Scarnecchia 2008). Less has been written by histori-
ans about the extensive diplomatic work Nkomo engaged in after his
release from detention in 1974, as part of a détente process initiated by
both Zambian President Kenneth Kaunda and South African President
Vorster. The idea was the UDI Government of Rhodesia, an illegal
regime under sanctions from Britain and most other nations, was increas-
ing an impediment to economic and political stability, so the time had
come for direct negotiations between Prime Minister Ian Smith and
Joshua Nkomo, the then recognised leader of ZAPU and the national-
ist movement. These talks were carried out very dramatically in a train
car on a bridge overlooking the Victoria Falls held on 26 August 1975.
The results were less dramatic than the view. No side was willing to
accept the offered conditions, and the talks fell through. The détente
period did, however, produce major shifts in the war as many of the old
guard leadership were released from detention and made their way out of
Rhodesia to better work with the external military and party leadership.
ZAPU/ZIPRA was based in Lusaka, Zambia, and ZANU/ZANLA was
based in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. The geography of the war reflected
the Frontline State President’ (FLSPs) preferences than for who they
would like to see take over an independent Zimbabwe. For the FLSP and
7 JOSHUA NKOMO: NATIONALIST DIPLOMAT… 175
the liberation forces themselves, it was only a matter of time before the
Rhodesian would be military defeated and they assumed their own lib-
eration movement would come to power in Zimbabwe. This, of course,
took longer than these groups imagined, but as noted at the beginning
of this chapter, the diplomacy of this crucial period needs to be exam-
ined as it happened, not with our knowledge that it would take another
5 years to achieve their goal.
The next key influence in the diplomatic process came from out-
side the region, that is, the Cold War interests of the USA in Southern
Africa starting in 1975 but especially strong in 1976. The reason for
this was the successful defence by Soviet military aid and Cuban sol-
diers of the MPLA takeover of Angola in 1975. The USA believed that
they, along with the Chinese, the Tanzanians, the South Africans, the
Zairians and the Zambians, could effectively thwart any Communist
government from coming to power after the Portuguese announced
the Independence of Angola and Mozambique in 1975. The ‘loss’
of Angola, from the Western powers perspective on the Cold War in
Africa, especially to the large numbers of Cuban soldiers who effectively
defeated the two Western- and Chinese-backed rebel groups (FNLA
and UNITA), meant that Rhodesia would become the focus of much of
American Cold War interests from 1976 to 1979.
This new interest from the USA presented an important diplomatic
opportunity to both Joshua Nkomo and Robert Mugabe. Both leaders
of rival nationalist movements took different strategies to take advan-
tage of the opportunity American interest presented. For Mugabe,
he and Tekere had crossed the border into Mozambique in 1975 in
order to try and make contact with the ZANLA fighting forces there as
Mozambican Independence had opened up this extremely long border
with Rhodesia for ZANLA’s fighters to infiltrate and fight in Rhodesia.
Mugabe was not exactly welcomed by the guerrilla forces and leader-
ship, as they themselves were caught up in serious internal conflicts fol-
lowing the assassination of Herbert Chitepo, the ZANU leader who had
led the war effort before his death. At the same time, President Nyerere
had requested Mozambique’s leader, Samora Machel, to make sure that
Mugabe and Tekere, as representatives of what were then viewed as the
‘old guard’ leadership of ZANU, were not able to influence the ongo-
ing consolidation of power over what Nyerere termed the ‘third force’,
that is, a younger generation of Zimbabwean fighters who he hoped
would evolve beyond the internal factionalism within ZANU and who
176 T. Scarnecchia
could effectively wage a war against the Rhodesians. This new force was
primarily made up of former ZANLA fighters who were not involved
in the internal leadership fights and also the groups of leftists known as
ZIPA, led by Wilfred Mhanda. Nyerere and Machel thought in 1975 and
early 1976 that this younger group would succeed where the old guard
and the leaders caught up in the controversy of Chitepo’s assassination
and imprisoned by President Kaunda in Zambia, had failed. All of this
background information on ZANU and ZANLA is important to keep in
mind for the impact it would have on Nkomo’s diplomatic strategies and
outcomes at the end of 1976.
Joshua Nkomo took a different approach to the diplomacy of 1975
and 1976. Unlike Mugabe, he was the recognised leader of the national-
ist movement from the perspective of both sides of the Cold War. He
had managed through his connections developed in the early 1960s to
receive training and military weapons for ZIPRA from the Soviet Union
and important Eastern bloc countries that were willing to invest in the
liberation wars of Southern Africa, most notably Yugoslavia and Bulgaria.
The Organization of African Unity (OAU)’s liberation committee had
managed to provide additional aid to both ZIPRA and ZANLA, but the
Liberation Committee was very concerned, especially after the failures
to defeat the MPLA in Angola, that Rhodesia would become another
Angola if the two competing liberation armies and their political par-
ties could not somehow find a way to cooperate their efforts. This cre-
ated a heightened urgency in 1976 to try and bring ZANU and ZAPU,
ZANLA and ZIPRA, to some sort of compromise towards unity. It was,
however, a very difficult task as ZANLA and ZANU were in the midst
of their own internal conflicts. There was no clear leader of ZANU until
late in 1976. For Mugabe to emerge as the clear leader took the con-
tingency of American and Frontline Pressures to forge a United front,
what became known as the ‘Patriotic Front’ by the two parties before the
Geneva talks in October–November 1976.
Before describing how Nkomo and Mugabe faired at that otherwise
unsuccessful conference, it is necessary to back up and see why Nkomo
especially felt confident that he would be the first leader of an inde-
pendent Zimbabwe, and that it would happen with a relatively short
period of time. The reason for this was that the Americans entered the
Rhodesian crisis diplomatically with a quick strike and agenda, not really
fully understanding what they were getting themselves into. The reason
they wanted to act quickly in 1976 was to stave off any more Cuban
and Soviet interventions into Southern Africa via Rhodesia, and, in the
case of Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, because should Cuba and the
Soviets decide to get involved more heavily in the conflict as they had in
Angola, the USA knew that they could not be seen defending Ian Smith
and white minority rule against African liberation forces. The Americans
understood that global sentiments had shifted and that the Soviet Union
had successfully used America’s own racial segregation and oppression
as a powerful ideological tool in Africa. Castro and the Cuban revolu-
tion also used race effectively in their ideological support for African lib-
eration movements fighting against minority white states in Southern
Africa. Given Kissinger’s need to act quickly, he used the many tools
available to America, the most important being the offer of development
and food aid to the FLSPs, in order to guarantee their cooperation in
delivering what was supposed to be a unified Zimbabwean liberation
movement at the Geneva talks. Kissinger also had to enlist the support of
South African President Vorster to help pressure and convince Ian Smith
to accept majority rule in 2 years time as the precondition for negotia-
tions. The South Africans, particularly after the international condemna-
tion of the apartheid regime after the June 1976 Soweto uprisings and
the brutal repression used against students, were willing to work with
Kissinger in order to receive much needed diplomatic attention and rec-
ognition from the Americans (Miller 2016). Based on two trips to Africa
in 1976, Kissinger engaged in his famous ‘shuttle diplomacy’ to try and
broker a negotiated settlement between Smith and the Patriotic Front.
As he would tell many of the key actors in his meetings, Kissinger was
not really concerned with who ended up in power in Zimbabwe, only
that the USA would start in motion an agreement that would preclude
Soviet and Cuban intervention. Additionally, if the Soviets and Cubans
did get involved because the Smith regime refused to compromise, he
wanted to make it clear to all involved that USA would not come to the
defence of Smith and his illegal UDI regime.
Nkomo met briefly with Kissinger in April 1976 in Lusaka after
President Kaunda and Kissinger met. The transcript of their meeting is
very brief. All it really reveals is that Kissinger wanted to tell Nkomo that
the USA was behind him and wanted to see him as the first President
of Zimbabwe. Nkomo was not exactly enthusiastic about the prospect,
however, as he had already known Smith to back out of any promises
in the past, and knew that Smith had a habit of using negotiations to
stall progress towards majority rule and to build up Rhodesian defences.
178 T. Scarnecchia
Before Geneva, Nkomo was the only Zimbabwean political leader

the Americans considered a viable candidate to lead the country after
Smith’s regime surrendered power or collapsed. The Americans knew
of Mugabe, and he had been visited by an American Congressional
Representative, Steven Solarz, but the Kissinger team made no effort
to meet with Mugabe and left the leadership question up to the FLSPs.
As it would turn out, the Geneva conference greatly enhanced Robert
Mugabe’s international profile, to Nkomo’s dismay.
There is not sufficient space to outline all that happened at Geneva
between Nkomo and Mugabe, but it was clear that Mugabe and ZANU,
in particular, were not eager to reach a settlement at Geneva. Instead,
Mugabe managed to come out stronger from the conference almost by
accident. The main issue remained Nyerere’s hopes to create the ‘Third
Force’, or the ‘boys with the guns’, as he referred to them to Kissinger.
ZIPA and Mhanda were to be that force but just before Geneva Nyerere
realised that they were not, in his opinion, really up to the task of repre-
senting the interests of Zimbabwe on the world stage. What happened
though at Geneva was that President Kaunda, and his key advisor Mark
Chona, worked with the British to release the ZANLA leadership that
was imprisoned in Zambia to the conference to help show solidarity with
the newly formed Patriotic Front. The Tanzanians also arranged to send
some of the ZIPA leaders, including Wilfred Mhanda, to the confer-
ence as well. Once at the conference, both the ZANLA leaders, and in
particular Josiah Tongogara, and the ZIPA leaders expressed their sup-
port for Mugabe as the proper political leader of the ZANU half of the
Patriotic Front. The support shown to Mugabe was, however, not recip-
rocated for the ZIPA leaders, as when they returned from Geneva they
were seen as a liability to the reconstituted ZANLA leadership and to
Mugabe’s new role as leader of the movement. Nyerere and Machel sup-
ported Mugabe’s and ZANLA’s efforts to arrest and imprison the ZIPA
leaders, many of whom would spend the rest of the war years incarcer-
ated in Mozambique (Mhanda 2011; Moore 2012).
After Geneva, it is interesting to contemplate what kept Nkomo and
Mugabe together in the Patriotic Front (PF) if it had generally been
established for the purposes of the Geneva conference. The main incen-
tive remained FLSP pressure, and the threat to cut off future OAU
Liberation Committee approved military funds, should one of the
leaders decide to leave the PF. The war intensified after Geneva, and
this increased the burdens on the two main host countries, Zambia
for ZIPRA and Mozambique for ZANLA. The USA continued in the
Jimmy Carter Administration to supply what foreign aid and food aid
it could to both countries. The late 1970s would be difficult years for
both countries, and President Kaunda in particular had to open bor-
ders with Rhodesia in order to have access to South African markets and
trade. This was a difficult decision given that the Rhodesian special forces
and air force increasingly raided into Zambia and Mozambique to hit
ZIPRA and ZANLA forces, but also choosing to hit refugee camps as
well as part of a very brutal war where terror tactics were used by the
Rhodesians and increasingly by the guerrilla fighters who were compet-
ing for the hearts and minds of Zimbabweans. The Catholic Committee
for Justice and Peace (CCJP) commissioned an important book in 1975,
entitled the ‘Man in the Middle’ which chronicles the brutality of the
Rhodesian counter-insurgency tactics used by the Rhodesian forces.
They also chronicle the terror used by the Zimbabwean nationalists as
well, making life extremely tough and dire for Zimbabwe’s rural popula-
tion, the men, women and children, caught in the middle (CCJP 1975).
Through all of this, Nkomo in particular, but also Mugabe, continued
to engage with the British and Americans on the diplomatic front. After
Geneva, the Americans and British put forward the Anglo-American plan
(AAP) with the hopes that an idea of an ‘all parties’ conference could
still be held to continue negotiations for a transition away from minor-
ity rule, the creation of a new constitution and a necessary ceasefire. The
years 1977–1979 would be difficult years for all sides, and the diplo-
macy was set back by Ian Smith’s attempts to achieve what the South
Africans also hoped to achieve in Namibia, that is, to create a ‘puppet’
African government that would be elected by a wider franchise but that
would exclude the liberation forces outside of the country. Smith went
forward with his plans by negotiating with the UANC leader Bishop
Abel Muzorewa, former ZANU leader Reverend Ndabaningi Sithole
and Chief Jeremiah Chirau. These three African leaders would make
up, along with Smith, the Executive Committee of what would become
known as the internal settlement government.
Nkomo, for his part, lobbied extensively in the West against this
outrageous affront to the notion of majority rule that Smith and his
Executive Committee were putting forward. International diplomacy
became intensified, however, because the existence of the internal set-
tlement offered the possibility that the British and the Americans would
recognise that government and lift sanctions against the Rhodesian
180 T. Scarnecchia
economy, making it then easier for the Rhodesians to fight the war.
International condemnation of the internal settlement was quite strong,
particularly from the OAU, at the UN and in the Commonwealth. All
three important organisations continued to demand the inclusion of the
PF in any future negotiated settlement. The Americans and the British,
however, had their periods of doubt, and much of Nkomo’s strongest
examples of skilful diplomacy came during this period.
Just as the Americans had got involved in the Rhodesia crisis in
1975–1976 in order to limit the possibilities of ‘another Angola’ in
Rhodesia, the threat of such Cuban and Soviet intervention contin-
ued to drive American involvement in the next 3 years. In April 1978,
a key American Cold War leader, National Security Advisor, Zbigniew
Brezezinski, was quoted as saying ‘that Rhodesia is one of the world’s
most dangerous trouble spots. If a peace settlement isn’t reached,
he warned, it will open the door to Soviet-Cuban support’ (Anderson
1978). The Cold War tension over Rhodesia found the USA and the UK
working together to keep the negotiations with the PF going. One has
to remember that these negotiations were primarily influenced by the
ongoing war between the Rhodesians and the PF’s two armies. Neither
side managed to gain a decisive advantage over the other in these years,
but the war was extremely costly in terms of lives and spending for all
sides. The Rhodesians continued to survive sanctions because of South
Africa’s contravention of sanctions to provide oil as well as direct military
assistance. Rhodesia’s air superiority and use of fighter jets and helicop-
ters gave them an important advantage over ZIPRA and ZANLA, and
the host countries of Zambia and Mozambique constantly complained
to the Americans and British that they needed military aid in the form
of air defence in order to deter future attacks. This type of technology
was not forthcoming, which added to the pressure to end the conflict
from the American perspective as it was known that the Soviets were
willing and capable of supplying anti-aircraft weapons to the Zambians
and Mozambicans. In fact, in late 1978, the ZIPRA forces would use
Soviet-made anti-aircraft weapons to shoot down the Air Rhodesian
planes. Before getting to this, however, it is important to examine how
Nkomo’s diplomacy navigated the difficult waters of international and
regional pressures.
The main dilemma for Nkomo remained the lack of movement on
unity between ZAPU and ZANU on the questions of merging their
military forces and merging their political leadership. The latter seemed
out of the question, so Nkomo hoped to approach Josia Tongogara to

help merge the two military wings under one leadership. The problem
remained that Mugabe was completely unwilling to concede any of his
power over ZANU and ZANLA knowing that without complete and
unitary support from Tongogara and ZANLA, his tenuous hold over the
political wing of ZANU would be once again called into question. In
fact, in early 1978, after returning from the Malta talks with the British
and Americans, Mugabe once again found his leadership challenged
by a faction within ZANLA who challenged the authoritarian leader-
ship within ZANU and ZANLA. Tongogara and Machel once again
suppressed the rebellion, but as Stephan Stedman argues, ‘The cost to
Mugabe…was that his power rested on the shoulders of Machel and
Tongogara’ (Stedman 143).
Another major factor that needed to be contained was the develop-
ment first announced in November 1977 and formally launched on 3
March 1978 that of the internal settlement between Smith, Muzorewa,
Sithole and Chirau discussed above. The British, in particular, espe-
cially their Foreign Secretary, David Owen, expressed interest in using
the internal settlement as a new basis for negotiations. The Americans,
including Secretary of State Cyrus Vance and especially UN Ambassador
Andrew Young, were much more critical of the internal settlement
and joined the OAU, the UN and the Commonwealth in denouncing
the internal settlement as an attempt by Smith and the minority white
regime to put a ‘black face’ on their continued minority rule. Nkomo
and Mugabe were both furious with the African leaders who had joined
Smith and promised to carry out the war against Muzorewa and the rest
of these black leaders. The main difference, however, which remained a
consistent difference between Nkomo and Mugabe in their diplomatic
strategies, was that Nkomo did not rule out negotiating with Smith in
these years. He hoped to negotiate a settlement that would allow Smith
to surrender. He and President Kaunda had, of course, a history of
direct talks with Smith from the Victoria Falls talks and also Kaunda’s
own efforts in 1977 to talk directly with Smith. In 1978, British Foreign
Secretary David Owen worked with Nigerian Foreign Minister Joeseph
Garba and Kaunda to organise a direct negotiation between Nkomo and
Smith in Lusaka. The details of the meeting were kept from Nyerere and
Mugabe given their previous objections to such direct talks outside the
framework of the FLSP and AAP framework.
182 T. Scarnecchia
The meeting took place on 14 August 1978, with only Nkomo, Smith
and Garba present. Lots have been written about the meeting by all the
participants, and the main concern in all the analyses has been whether
or not Nkomo was willing to accept a role for himself without Mugabe if
Smith agreed to surrender power to the Patriotic Front. Nkomo, Garba
and even Smith have all related that Nkomo was adamant that Mugabe
needed to be part of any settlement that he could not negotiate a deal
separately for himself. This is an important point to emphasise, as it is
really a key element to clear up as this secret meeting was used against
Nkomo to portray him as a ‘sell-out’ who was willing to give up on the
Patriotic Front in order to obtain the leadership of a new Zimbabwe.
The evidence clearly points out that Nkomo resisted any attempts by
Owen and Smith to have him join the internal settlement without
Mugabe. The reality is that Nigeria became quite involved in the pro-
cess to the extent that after the first meeting, Garba had Mugabe flown
from Maputo to Lusaka to discuss the need to hold a second meeting
with Nkomo, Mugabe and Smith. Mugabe refused and was then sent to
Lagos by Nigerian military plane to have a stern talking to by General
Obasanjo. According to Garba, Obasanjo pressed Mugabe to accept a
secondary role in the political leadership of the PF under Nkomo’s lead-
ership, and in return, ZANLA’s Tongogara would be selected to lead the
combined liberation army with ZIPRA taking a secondary role. Mugabe
apparently accepted this possibility but on return to Dar and Maputo,
he changed his mind. Garba was therefore completely incensed when
he found out that Nyerere had moved against future talks (Scarnecchia
2017).
Generally, the fallout of that meeting was less serious at the time than
it would become after Independence when the campaign to detract from
Nkomo’s positive contributions to the creation of Zimbabwe would
get into full swing. Both Nyerere and Machel were much more upset
with David Owen and the British for trying to short-circuit the FLSP
and Nyerere’s prominence as the de facto leader of the FLSPs. The strat-
egy was also detrimental for Nkomo in terms of American support. If
anything, the Americans grew more strongly in favour of Mugabe’s posi-
tion in the PF after the Owen-Garba-Kaunda efforts to promote Nkomo
as the leader of the PF. Tongogara, who had apparently offered some
hope to Nkomo that he would be willing to merge the two armies
under his leadership, became increasingly vocal on the separation of
ZANLA and ZIPRA in their efforts. Following the criticisms of the
direct talks with Smith, it became increasingly clear that the PF would
remain unified in name only for the remainder of the negotiations.
In September 1978, Nkomo approved the shooting down of the
Rhodesian Airlines Viscount plane under the rationale that these civil-
ian planes were used to transport troops. The Rhodesians retaliated by
attacks on ZAPU camps in Zambia. A second Viscount was shot down,
this time because ZIPRA apparently had intelligence that Rhodesian
General Peter Walls was scheduled to fly on the plane that was shot
down but he had changed his flight plans (Nkomo 167). The inter-
national outcry against the killing of Rhodesian civilians on that flight
angered Nkomo, who pointed out in his press conferences the hypoc-
risy of international condemnation and sympathy when it came to the
killing of whites versus the killings of black in the camps by Rhodesian
forces. The British diplomats in Ethiopia described Nkomo’s response
to questions about the ZIPRA attack on the plane, while he along with
Mugabe was attending an International Solidarity conference hosted by
the Mengistu regime in September 1978:
Nkomo described the outcry over 48 white victims, when hundreds of

thousands of Africans were killed, jailed, humiliated and deprived of their
basic human rights as ‘simple racist hypocrisy.’ He said, ‘We live in an era
where racism is religion. This is the legacy of Britain.’ Smith’s vow to liq-
uidate ZAPU after this incident was a re-declaration of war to which the
answer was war to the end. He claimed that the Front controlled certain
areas within Salisbury itself, let alone rural areas under the control of
ZIPRA. (FCO 1978)
From September 1978 until the Lancaster House talks (10 September
to 15 December 1979), many combatants and civilians would be
killed, injured and tortured. It is interesting to consider what the cost
was for the intransigence of Mugabe and ZANLA over the negotia-
tions with Smith. Was it worth holding out for an indeterminate time
in order to increase their chances of coming to power instead of com-
ing to power in a coalition with Nkomo? These are difficult questions
but worth considering to avoid the linear argument promoted by ZANU
that Nkomo’s attempts at negotiations were always within a framework
of ‘sell-out’ politics that was so prevalent—and unfortunately still pre-
sent—in Zimbabwean politics. One could equally ask what it would
have meant for Nkomo to concede the leadership role to Mugabe in
184 T. Scarnecchia
August 1978 in order to break the deadlock and to enter direct talks for
a transitional government?
Such questions are always only academic, as the historical actors did
not know how much more time the war would take, nor how much
more suffering their lack of unity and cooperation would cause. The
one certainty, however, is that the Cold War helped to continue the war
much longer than it otherwise might have lasted. Having read exten-
sively in the archive records from the British, the Americans and the
South Africans, it seems plausible that while the British were the most
in favour of Nkomo as the next leader, the Americans and the South
Africans remained less convinced of Nkomo given his long relationship
with the Soviet Union and the possibilities this presented for Soviet, and
in the case of South Africa, African National Congress (ANC)’s presence
in an independent Zimbabwe. The irony here, of course, is that Nkomo
was always portrayed as the more ‘moderate’ of the two PF leaders,
but his Cold War support from the Soviets and the links between the
South African ANC and ZIPRA, both in terms of training and fighting
in Rhodesia, made ZANU and ZANLA less of a threat. For the South
Africans, they continued to prefer the internal settlement as the best
option, but they also understood quite soon after the official creation of
Zimbabwe/Rhodesia in April 1979 that Bishop Muzorewa and the other
African leaders were not capable of translating their will to lead into an
effective African government that could bring the war to an end. At this
conjuncture, in 1979, international diplomacy again played a key role.
The biggest question in 1979 was whether or not the Americans and
the British would accept the results of the April elections and recognise
Bishop Muzorewa’s government. The consequences of such recognition
would have been enormous in terms of lifting sanctions and making it
easier for the new government to fight the war. Conservative elements
in both the UK and the USA lobbied their respective governments to
recognise the new government. President Jimmy Carter and recently
elected Conservative Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher therefore both
had big decisions to make. As Andy DeRoche and Nancy Mitchell have
shown, the decision was not an easy one for Carter (DeRoche 2016;
Mitchell 2016). Cold War imperatives still outweighed Carter’s pro-
clivity to respect the PF’s claims as the only true representatives of the
Zimbabwean people. There was great pressure on Carter to accept the
internal settlement in order to bolster the new government, but there
was also the keen awareness that both sides of the PF were committed
to continue the war if this happened. Here, Nkomo and Mugabe were
both adamant of their combined commitment to continue fighting.
The personal hatred for Muzorewa and Sithole for ordering attacks on
ZIPRA and ZANLA bases in Zambia and Mozambique made any pos-
sible direct negotiations impossible by 1979. In addition, Muzorewa
and Sithole had been training their own personal armies inside
Zimbabwe/Rhodesia, their auxiliaries, who were then the target of dis-
dain and attacks by the PF.
The key event that is often cited to be the ‘turning point’ in Margaret
Thatcher’s decision to not recognise the internal settlement was the
Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) held in
Lusaka in early August 1979. As DeRoche explains, Kenneth Kaunda
played a major role, along with Australian Prime Minister Malcolm
Fraser, to convince the new British Prime Minister that it would be in
Britain’s best interest to withhold recognition of the Muzorewa gov-
ernment and press for a negotiated settlement under British authority
(DeRoche 2016). The success of this diplomacy opened the door rather
wide and quickly for a constitutional conference under British leader-
ship that would bring the PF in direct negotiation with the Smith and
the new Muzorewa government. The subsequent Lancaster House talks
offered Nkomo and Mugabe another opportunity to negotiate together
for the future of an independent Zimbabwe. Unlike in the Geneva talks
3 years previously, Nkomo had no illusions of Mugabe’s increased power
at the level of international diplomacy. Nkomo and Mugabe pushed
forward together to deal with what was by any measure a very prede-
termined effort by British diplomat Lord Carrington to push for the
approval of a constitution that would protect white Rhodesian political,
economic and importantly land rights in exchange for the re-establish-
ment of British rule under Governor Lord Soames who would return the
country to legality and provide conditions for the demobilisation of the
liberation forces and the first majority rule elections. It was a tall task
and one the British tackled with a drive to get it all done as quickly as
possible. The most interesting elements of the process are the diplomatic
intrigue over British promises to the Rhodesians, particularly General
Peter Walls and to the South Africans, that they would speed up the
time between Lord Soames taking over and the election to help Bishop
Muzorewa’s chances of winning the first election. The PF, of course,
asked for more time to both demobilise their forces and run an election
campaign. The compromise did not please either side, but throughout
186 T. Scarnecchia
the Lancaster talks, the British continued to tell the Rhodesians and
South Africans that they were doing everything possible to guarantee a
Muzorewa victory.
Nkomo’s lifelong dream of becoming the leader of independent
Zimbabwe faded as the Lancaster House Agreement was negotiated and
signed. He held onto the idea that perhaps Mugabe and others in ZANU
would agree to contest the election together as a united Patriotic Front,
but given the years of acrimonious relations, the chances of this actu-
ally happening were very slim. Nkomo writes somewhat dramatically in
his autobiography of how he thought all along that Mugabe and ZANU
would campaign together with him and ZAPU, but this was really not
much of a possibility as Mugabe and ZANU knew well before Lancaster
House that they had the votes they needed to win a majority. There
was still talk by the British, South Africans and Rhodesians throughout
Lancaster of attempting to split Nkomo off from Mugabe and the PF,
but this also was never truly a viable alternative. Throughout the cam-
paign, Nkomo and his supporters complained of the intimidation of their
campaigners in areas under ZANU and UANC (Muzorewa) control. But
in the end, the complaints were strongest from Muzorewa’s campaign
who felt that the intimidation and violence used by ZANU support-
ers prohibited their ability to mobilise votes in their favours. The more
likely reason for Muzorewa’s poor showing was the knowledge that rural
and urban Zimbabwean voters had that if Muzorewa was elected again,
the war would continue and there was no guarantee that the war would
end with Bishop Muzorewa in control. The aggressive use of Rhodesian
troops and the UANC auxiliaries since April 1979 had only added to the
mistrust most voters had in Muzorewa to bring the war to an end.
Post-Independence
The transition to Zimbabwe was a bitter-sweet moment for Nkomo.
He had done so much to hold the liberation movement together over
the past 20 some years and had worked tirelessly for the purpose of a
real majority rule transition away from Smith’s illegal regime. All the
same, his longtime opponent, since the 1963 creation of ZANU, was
now the Prime Minister of Zimbabwe and now Joshua Nkomo found
himself having to serve in a Government that was far from sympathetic
to him. There was, of course, a recognition among most of the ZANU
insiders that Nkomo deserved praise and respect for his years of efforts.
However, as time went on and the ZANU insiders around Mugabe,

and including Mugabe himself, became more confident in their role as
leaders of a sovereign nation, the respect shown to Nkomo grew thin
and then turned into outright hatred and abuse. As Nkomo describes in
his autobiography, he was not accepted as part of the ZANU govern-
ment and was only allowed to stay in a ministerial position out of respect
for his past and his needed role in integrating former ZAPU and ex-
ZIPRA soldiers into either the Zimbabwean National Army or civilian
life. Nkomo’s efforts were crucial, along with those of ZIPRA leaders
Dumiso Dabengwa and ZNA Lieutenant General Lookout Masuku in
helping try and smooth out the very tense relations between ex-ZIPRA
and ex-ZANLA during the demobilisation and re-integration pro-
cess. The most crucial period came in 1981 when former ZIPRA and
former ZANLA soldiers engaged in pitched battles at the barracks near
Bulawayo and also at barracks near Harare. Nkomo had to intervene
to ask his former ZIPRA soldiers and leadership to cooperate with the
government. One of the consequences of this conflict and the process
of de-arming the two sides are that large arms caches were stored on
ZAPU-owned farms and cooperatives. This storing of weapons in case
of future conflicts between former ZIPRA and ZANLA forces would
become the ‘smoking gun’ that Mugabe’s ZANU government would use
against Nkomo, Dabengwa and Masuku in 1982. The latter two were
arrested and charged with treason for the arms caches, and Nkomo was
removed from his ministerial position but remained a member of parlia-
ment. Both Masuku and Dabengwa were eventually cleared of charges,
but much like the Smith regime in the 1960s, they were both immedi-
ately re-arrested and held without charges. Masuku would tragically die
in April 1986, a month after his official release from detention (Todd
2008: 147–166). Nkomo, for his part, stayed in Zimbabwe until it was
increasingly clear to him that the ZANU-controlled police were after
him in February 1983; after his driver and two others ‘were shot dead
in cold blood at his house’, he left the country for Botswana (Todd
2008: 57). From Botswana, he left for London. The diplomatic record
on Nkomo’s flight to London is revealing for the ways a government
that had invested so much into the creation of Zimbabwe could now
so carefully avoid offering him any assistance for fear of offending their
new ally, Robert Mugabe, the leader they had tried their best, just a few
years previously, to keep out of power. Even maverick businessman Tiny
Rowland, under pressure from ZANU, refused to continue to support
188 T. Scarnecchia
his old friend Nkomo in London, so Nkomo had to rely on ZAPU con-
tacts in London.
Throughout this period, ZANU increasingly blamed Nkomo for
the dissident problem in Zimbabwe. Given that many of the dissidents
were ex-ZIPRA, and some invoked Nkomo as their leader and reason
for fighting, the ZANU leadership constantly complained that the dis-
sidents must have been directed somehow by Nkomo, a claim Nkomo
repeatedly denied. However bad tensions were in 1982, they could not
prepare Nkomo and ZAPU members for the tragic events of Operation
Gukurahundi in January 1983. The ZNA’s 5th Brigade had been
trained for a one-year period in bases in the eastern highlands by the
North Koreans. Originally discussed as a potential ‘presidential guard’
for Mugabe, the 5th Brigade was made up of ChiShona-speaking sol-
diers who were clearly under instructions to ‘discipline’ those who sup-
ported ZAPU in the Matabeleland and Midlands Provinces, the areas
where ZAPU still maintained electoral support to the disdain of Mugabe
and others in ZANU who wanted to promote a ‘one-party state’ that
would do away with parliamentary opposition. Nkomo and his ZAPU
party leadership soon found themselves inundated with testimonies of
5th Brigade killings, torture and rape of civilians thought to be sup-
porting ‘ZAPU dissidents’. The state crimes committed by the 5th
Brigade in the first few months of 1983 were well documented, and
despite attempts by ZANU-PF to limit access to the region by for-
eign journalists, the story did reach the wider world (CCJP 1997). As
Judith Todd explains, Nkomo ‘had returned home from exile in August
1983 to pre-empt moves to expel him from parliament’ (Todd 2008:
89). From Zimbabwe, he continued to contact the media and inter-
national diplomats to complain against the poor treatment of himself
and ZAPU by the ZANU government. Nkomo himself did his best to
get the word out to the international media once he realised that the
Zimbabwean state was giving him a cold shoulder, including Mugabe,
and would not listen to his and other’s demands that the 5th Brigade
be withdrawn and the killings and torture brought to a stop. Nkomo,
still a member of parliament, effectively used his parliamentary immunity
to criticise Operation Gukurahundi in parliament. Before making such
presentations, he would alert the foreign media and international diplo-
mats to make sure they were present to hear his reports. These interven-
tions further enraged Mugabe and the others in ZANU’s leadership. A
particular enemy of Nkomo was Minister Enos Nkala who, as himself a
Ndebele, was one of the more vocal in his criticisms of Nkomo. Mugabe
and Nkomo both blamed Nkomo for dissident violence and made it clear
to ZAPU supporters that continued support for ZAPU would bring on
further destruction and suffering, often expressed in such biblical terms
(Scarnecchia 2012). There is no space here to explore the different
phases of the Gukurahundi, but Shari Eppel, who has spent many years
exploring the human costs of this particular state crime, has suggested
that the Gukurahundi would take on different strategies from its first
phase in 1983 all the way until 1987 when Nkomo finally did concede
power to ZANU to sign the unity accords of 1987 (Eppel quoted in
Scarnecchia 2015; Eppel 2005). Throughout this period, Nkomo con-
tinued to inform foreign diplomats, important non-governmental agen-
cies and the foreign media of the serious plight his supporters suffered at
the hands of ZANU-PF.
Conclusion
It is tempting to follow Nkomo’s own argument in his autobiography
that consistently paints him as a victim of circumstances that he heroi-
cally fought against with a moral uprightness that matched the nastiness
of his opponents, that is, of course, the trope of heroic nationalist, anti-
imperialist autobiography since the writings of Jawaharlal Nehru, Kwame
Nkrumah, Jomo Kenyatta, etc. And in this way, his own vision of his life
and work in the service of creating an African majority rule government
is a very heroic story. But as with any political biography by a key actor,
much of the book is also about creating a myth and legend around his
role. Interestingly, the book itself was released and serialised in the press
in 1984, during the Gukurahundi period and a key time in Mugabe’s
attempts to keep foreign aid and support even though the extent of
Gukurahundi abuses was widely known. The Gukurahundi, while so dev-
astating to the people of the Matabeleland and the Midland Provinces,
and to so many ZAPU politicians and supporters throughout Zimbabwe,
also would become Mugabe’s Achilles heel in terms of his own politi-
cal career and his historical legacy. As many diplomats pointed out, it
was Mugabe’s own pre-Gukurahundi personal campaign against Nkomo
that would eventually contribute to the extremely costly and tragic deci-
sion to deploy the 5th Brigade in Operation Gukurahundi. M. K. Ewan,
the new British High Commissioner in Harare in 1983, wrote candidly
190 T. Scarnecchia
at the end of his first year, putting the blame for Zimbabwe’s problems
squarely on Mugabe’s shoulders:
The root of much of the trouble has lain in a combination of arrogance

and arbitrariness which has characterized Mugabe’s increasingly autocratic
style of leadership. Early in the year [1983] he was faced with growing
armed dissidence in Matabeleland, caused largely by his own ineptitude
the previous year [1982] in precipitating an unnecessary showdown with
Joshua Nkomo’s largely Matabeleland-based ZAPU. His response was to
send in the 5th Brigade, a cowardly and ill-disciplined Shona unit ‘trained’
by the North Koreans. Instead of engaging the dissidents, they tried to re-
establish governmental authority through a campaign of murderous intimi-
dation of local villagers. (Ewan 1984)
Some 35 years after the Gukurahundi began, there are many still waiting
for justice from the Zimbabwean government. ZANU-PF still remains in
power as well, so the chances for justice for the victims and their families
remain slim at the time of writing. What new diplomatic history can help
to revel is that the backward-looking ‘patriotic history’ that continues to
paint Joshua Nkomo in a negative light can and should be revised. His
role was obviously not always as selfless as he projected in his autobiogra-
phy, but it is also increasingly plausible to argue that he did not ‘sell-out’
the nationalist cause for his own personal gain. As more and more docu-
ments become available for this period, it is clear that Nkomo contrib-
uted extensively to the diplomatic success of the PF in the years between
1976 and 1979, and at times when Mugabe and ZANU were showing
their characteristic intransigence, which at times was a convenient way
to mask internal party weaknesses, Nkomo was often the only leader the
Americans and the British could find to continue serious diplomacy and
conversations in order to move the process forward.
Nkomo’s contributions to the creation of Zimbabwe certainly do still
warrant the name ‘Father of Zimbabwe’, even well beyond those years
when he was first seen in those terms by Zimbabweans. The tragic period
of the early 1980s demonstrated again his ability to rise above challenges
and the violence directed against him, much like in the early 1960s when
he bravely faced up to an embittered state structure that wanted Nkomo
and ZAPU removed from the political scene. To his credit and skills as a
diplomat, Nkomo did not let this happen, even after years of abuse and
detention. Scholars today need to approach their research and writing
with their eyes wide open to ways that will counter the ‘patriotic history’
of the past 15 years or so. It was natural for that ZANU-PF support-
ers would want to promote their contributions and downplay those of
ZAPU, but the historical record does not bear out some of the extreme
criticisms usually cast against Nkomo and others in ZAPU as the nation-
alists fought for majority rule. More work still needs to be done on the
contributions of Nkomo and ZAPU as such work can contribute to a
more balanced understanding of the personal efforts of Joshua Nkomo
towards the formation of the Zimbabwean state.
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CHAPTER 8
Joshua Nkomo: The Trial of a

Philosopher of Liberation
William Jethro Mpofu
Introduction
To participate in the thinking and writing about the political thought
and historical legacy of Joshua Nkomo is to engage in both the accept-
ance and rejection of some already passed verdicts. The political life and
historical times of Joshua Nkomo are marked by contesting verdicts
of affirmation and those of negation. On the category of affirmation,
Joshua Nkomo is ‘Father Zimbabwe’, a founding patriarch of the nation
of Zimbabwe (Nkomo 1984) and ‘Chibwechitedza’ (a small slippery
rock) that defines an elusive revolutionary who severally cheated death
(Nkomo 1984: 71) until he matured into ‘Umdala Wethu’ (our dear old
man) whose life is annually commemorated. On the category of nega-
tion, Joshua Nkomo became ‘father of the dissidents’ as he was accused
of leading bandits that sought to overthrow a legitimate government
(Nkomo 1984: 230). His life and that of his family was endangered as
the government of Robert Mugabe unleashed a force to hunt him down
and to punish his supporters. Nkomo also became an inconvenient
W.J. Mpofu (*) 
University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa

194 W.J. Mpofu
and costly hero whose hatred or fear of war prevented him from using
military and violent means in defending his party and supporters that
became targets of ethnic cleansing and genocide.
This chapter departs from the observation that both the affirmations
and negations of the political figure of Joshua Nkomo tend to cloud
rather than illuminate his status as a political theorist and philosopher
of liberation whose ethics of revolutionary struggle privileged dialogue
and the preservation of life against war and its costs to humanity. As sig-
nified in ‘Father Zimbabwe’ and ‘Umdala Wethu’ (our dear old man),
Joshua Nkomo is represented in language and signature that defines a
ceremonial, symbolic and saintly octogenarian and not the compelling
revolutionary thinker that he actually was. As ‘Chibwechitedza’ (the
small slippery rock), Nkomo is portrayed as more of a dodgy trickster,
some kind of a MacGyver and a James Bond figure and not a principled
thinker and revolutionary who was prepared to die for freedom. That
Nkomo was an effeminate coward who feared the revolutionary uses of
violence and bloodshed as Dinizulu Macaphulana vividly argues ignores
that Joshua Nkomo, out of philosophical principle, not the convenience
of safety and his personal preservation, thought that war was unneces-
sary, human beings needed to embrace dialogue as a means of conflict
resolution (Nkomo 1984: 1).
Away from the caricatures of affirmation and negation that accom-
pany the multiplicity of narratives on Joshua Nkomo, this chapter
argues that Joshua Nkomo was neither a messianic legend nor a cow-
ardly opportunist. Joshua Nkomo was in actuality a political thinker
and philosopher of liberation who was formed and shaped by con-
crete historical experiences and political conditions of colonialism
under which he was socialized, educated and trained. Philosophers
of liberation as described by Enrique Dussel (1985) are men and
women of flesh, blood and bone whose intellectual and social sensi-
tivity, love for life and freedom compel them to rebel against domi-
nation of any form. The vocation of the philosophers of liberation is
not only to humanize and liberate the dehumanized victims of oppres-
sion such as colonized peoples, but it is also to humanize and liberate
the oppressors such as the colonizers who are entangled in the inhu-
man condition of being racist haters and exploiters. In the liberatory
philosophical vision of Joshua Nkomo, it was not enough to liberate
black Zimbabweans from Rhodesian colonialism, it was also important
8 JOSHUA NKOMO: THE TRIAL OF A PHILOSOPHER OF LIBERATION 195
to integrate the white Rhodesians themselves into the Zimbabwean

nation as full citizens.
From here, this chapter proceeds to delineate the intellectual and
political formation of Joshua Nkomo by examining the social and his-
torical conditions that produced him and his thought. This chapter
delves into the thinking and political activism of Joshua Nkomo as a
philosopher of liberation. An examination of Joshua Nkomo’s theo-
logical thinking follows before an exposition of his politics of liberation
that privileged the preservation of the self and others, including political
opponents.
Political and Intellectual Formation of Nkomo

Before the present chapter explores the political thinking and philosophy
of liberation of Joshua Nkomo, it is important to examine the historical
conditions and social experiences that conditioned him and shaped his
mental universe. Political thinkers do not produce their thoughts outside
the historical environment and social conditions that surround them.
Immediate political conditions tend to mark their stamp on the bodies
and consciousness of thinkers.
Nyongolo, Joshua Nkomo’s father was born in 1880 and his
mother in 1885 which means that his parents were toddlers when
Cecil John Rhodes landed in what was to be called Rhodesia. What
his parents passed on to Joshua Nkomo is an archive of memories
carried in stories of colonial conquest and the resistance to it. Born
on 19 June 1917, Joshua Nkomo entered a world where black peo-
ple had become effectively engulfed in subjection to the British
Empire alongside fresh memories of what life had been before con-
quest. Inside the engulfing envelope of conquest and colonial-
ism, Joshua Nkomo’s parents became Christians under the London
Missionary Society (Nkomo 1984: 8). Christianity provided the
privilege of missionary education that catapulted Nyongolo to the
position of school teacher and Christian preacher. The Christian
Bible, alongside the oral narratives of conquest and resistance to
it became part of the socialization in the Nkomo family (Nkomo
1984: 10). By his mother, Joshua Nkomo was tutored to be a trust-
ing and also trustworthy child in what in his later life made him
196 W.J. Mpofu
vulnerable to being betrayed and beguiled in the dirty game of

power politics (Nkomo 1984: 8).
Educated colonial subjects such as Nyongolo not only enjoyed
privileges that colonial modernity offered but also endured the acute
experience of exclusion and marginality from full citizenship. In the
observation of Xolela Mangcu (2008: 9) following readings of cul-
tural historian Ntongela Masilela, enlightened colonial subjects used
their education and Christianity ‘as political and cultural facilitators of
entrance into European modernity’ and the opportunities that it occa-
sioned. For that reason, besides being a teacher and a Christian minis-
ter, Nyongolo excelled in the cultivation of crops and cattle ranching
(Nkomo 1984: 9). The privilege of selling his farm produce and boasting
at some point a herd of one thousand cattle turned into pain when colo-
nial regulations required natives to reduce the number of their cattle and
to move their homesteads to less productive landscapes.
By its imperial nature, colonialism tends to turn its supposed ben-
eficiaries amongst the natives into victims and injured subjects (Dussel
2008b: 489). On a daily basis, Joshua Nkomo as a toddler witnessed
the reduction of and dehumanization of his father by the same system
that on the outside looked like an organization of life that benefited and
developed him and his family:
Father was the greatest man in the world. But there were people who
treated him disrespectfully. When he met one of the people on the road, he
would take off his hat and stand aside, but they would not take their hats
in return; at best they would nod their heads and pass on, barely noticing
him, these were the pale people, the Europeans. (Nkomo 1984: 16)
The way the European conquerors treated his father who was supposed
to be an important man in society pressed it upon Joshua Nkomo that
the modern colonial world was an asymmetrical organization of life. The
semblance of privileges that his family enjoyed in the community came
with a price of not fully belonging to the conquerors and also being dis-
tanced from those that had been conquered and did not enjoy any of
the privileges. As a toddler attending primary school, Joshua Nkomo was
embarrassed by the privilege of putting on shiny Khakhi shorts amongst
a multitude of other children who put on animal skins and clothes made
out of grass and tree leaves (Nkomo 1984: 11). To forge a sense of
belonging to the crowd of the colonized, he would hide his shorts and
wear animal skins.
For Nkomo (1984: 17) the punitive modern colonial world began to
be even more hellish when ‘the white farmers began to demand that the
residents’ amongst blacks ‘work free of payment on their land, in lieu
of rent’ and the areas available for arable farming by Africans were cut
down. For black people to pay rent for land that a few decades back was
considered theirs was a taxing experience. This experience was even more
demeaning when blacks had to pay tax to the colonial administration.
The black people were sensitized of the nature of colonialism that meant
maximum profit for the colonizer and minimum to no benefit for the
colonized (Memmi 1974: 48). Under such punitive historical condi-
tions, the marginalized and exploited natives begin to imagine ‘an alter-
native history that emerges from the experience of the victims: The ideas
of those who have been invaded and dominated and who have not had
the chance to express themselves’ (Dussel 2008b: 492). Joshua Nkomo
began to question the truth of Christianity as a religion of love, peace
and happiness. In his view, ‘that there is a God I devoutly believe- but a
God of all mankind, not just for a selected people’ (Nkomo 1984: 11).
The peace and love that the Christian God seemed to dispense had been
isolated to the colonizers and kept away from the toiling black masses,
to Nkomo there must have been something wrong with such a sectional
and partisan God who permits another race to oppress another.
Now that the religion and modern knowledge of the colonizer did
not have answers to the strong questions of life that confronted the col-
onized, the colonized had to seek answers elsewhere in their own his-
tory and social experiences. Not only did Joshua Nkomo steal out of his
Christian father’s homestead to join ceremonies of traditional African
religion in the villages (Nkomo 1984: 12) but he also took an interest in
the history and the traditions of the indigenous peoples of the surround-
ing villages. In the communities of the colonized:
Most people stuck to their traditional religion, which the white people
mistakenly described as ancestor worship; in fact the African people of
what is now called Zimbabwe worship almighty God who is a spirit, with
whom they communicate through their ancestors. (Nkomo 1984: 10)
As a form of spiritual and epistemic resistance to the punitive new world,

the colonized stuck to their traditions and sought to draw answers from
their indigenous knowledge for the pressing historical questions that
the modern colonial world presented. For Joshua Nkomo, this involved
a form of rebellion in shape of going behind the back of his father a
198 W.J. Mpofu
Christian preacher to join African traditional worship in the surround-

ing communities. ‘The (re)turn to epistemological positions informed
by indigenous knowledge systems, although not a panacea for the total
manifestations of this situation’, of liberation it ‘does offer the possibil-
ity for creating a critical space for knowledge (re)production in the heart
of dominant global knowledge circuits as well as serve as a challenge and
corrective to the epistemic hegemony of the North’ (Corey 2011: 105).
Colonialism was not going to be dethroned by the simple gestures of
returning to the religion and traditions of the past, but the gestures of
return constituted meaningful resistance and negotiations of emanci-
pated spaces within the engulfing envelope of coloniality.
Colonial conditions were themselves an effectively politicizing and
radicalizing experience that turned victims into active opponents of the
system. ‘Politics cannot be separated from ontology, the political and the
ontological are inseparable’ in the view of Percy Mabogo More (2012:
39) and ‘philosophy must interrogate the problem of being’ if it is to
understand politics. In that view, colonial conditions helped to produce
thinkers that questioned and challenged colonialism as Nkomo was to.
In his commitment and dedication to the religion of his people, Joshua
Nkomo had to be forcefully removed by his father from the lessons that
he was receiving to become a traditional African healer (Nkomo 1984:
21). His father, in line with his Christianity and modernity intended to
send him to a Christian mission boarding school.
Beside Christianity that conditioned the spiritual universe of the colo-
nized and sought to shape them into manageable colonial subjects, the
colonial education system as designed by Christian missionaries had an
interest in producing young natives into functionaries of coloniality.
As Nkomo was sent into a Christian mission boarding school, he was
to encounter the colonizing effects of colonial education. In actuality,
‘there is no such thing as a neutral education process. Education either
functions as an instrument that is used to facilitate the integration of the
younger generation into the logic of the present system’ and in the pro-
cess ‘bring about conformity to it’ (Richard Shaul in Paulo Freire 1993:
16). Ngugi wa Thiongo who did not only go through Christian mission
education but has also studied and written on it observes that this educa-
tion was part of the paraphernalia of the modern colonial universe that
sought to change the life of the colonized forever in the interests of the
colonizer:
In order to make economic and political occupation complete and effec-

tive, the colonizer tried also to control the cultural environment- edu-
cation, religion, language, literature, songs and dances, every form of
expressive practices—hoping in this way to control a peoples values, their
world outlook and hence their images and definition of self. (Ngugi wa
Thiong’o 1997: 8)
This kind of education meant to shepherd the mind and the imagina-
tion of the colonized away from themselves, their past and independent
future into the colonial envelope in which they would be sealed forever.
In being taught arithmetic and carpentry in which he excelled at the
boarding school (Nkomo 1984: 24), Nkomo was not being developed
into an independent thinker or a free citizen but a manageable colonial
subject who would function profitably in the interest of the colonial
administration. It was out of his radicalization and rebelliousness after
school that he was dismissed from his job for demanding equal pay and
same working conditions with white employees (Nkomo 1984: 27).
Nkomo became one of the few Africans who came out of mission edu-
cation untamed and even more politicized and radicalized. In spite of
the domesticating effects of colonial and missionary education, Nkomo
had to argue later that ‘from my earliest youth I thirsted for freedom’,
and ‘when I became a man, I understood that I could not be free while
my country and its people were subject to a government in which they
had no say’ (Nkomo 1984: 1). The privileges of modernity in the family
environment and calming effects of mission education could not remove
the discontent that Nkomo had about life under colonialism.
After mission education, the higher education that Nkomo earned
involved travel to and stay in another country, South Africa. Travel,
stay and education in another country tend to open up the world to a
curious mind and expose one to different people and experiences that
are enriching, and can be further radicalizing and politicizing. Kwame
Nkrumah (1964: 1) believes that the ‘ten years’ that he ‘spent in the
United States of America represents a crucial period in the development
of my philosophical conscience’. In South Africa, Joshua Nkomo studied
and qualified in social work. Added to the study of social work, South
Africa exposed Joshua Nkomo to the vagaries of Afrikaner apartheid that
intensified in 1948 (Nkomo 1984: 37). Apartheid was not going with-
out resistance, Joshua Nkomo had the privilege to attend mass rallies
and meeting of anti-apartheid radicals of the African National Congress
200 W.J. Mpofu
where political speeches were delivered and radical political literature

was circulated (Nkomo 1984: 35). In this volatile and charged political
environment in South Africa, Joshua Nkomo made enriching friendships
with many black and white people who left him with the deep impres-
sion that besides artificial political barriers, white people and black people
were after all the same, human beings (Nkomo 1984: 33).
As he arrived back in Rhodesia to work as a social worker at the
Rhodesia National Railways in Bulawayo, in 1948, Nkomo had a deeper
understanding of colonialism, apartheid and the need for resistance to
coloniality. Soon enough, he became the President of the African Railways
Employees Association (Nkomo 1984: 44). This position exposed him to
the conditions and experiences under which the poor black workers came
as part of the agonizing colonial environment. Nkomo was pained by the
way employees were treated as beggars, being given the food that they
earned in form of weekly rations of groceries instead of being paid their
due wages (Nkomo 1984: 43). Later in life, the experience of prison,
where Joshua Nkomo was jailed for more than a decade by the colonial
administration for his political ideas and activities also became a ‘school’ in
which Nkomo read and thought in depth about life under colonialism and
the aspirations of liberation for black people (Nkomo 1984: 124).
Nkomo’s Philosophy of Liberation

That Nkomo was formed by his life experiences, traditional socializa-
tion and education into a deep thinker on the condition of the colonized
and the need for their freedom can scarcely be disputed. What can be
discussed is what the content of his thinking was. This chapter advances
the argument that of the many types of political thinkers and philoso-
phers, Joshua Nkomo became a philosopher of liberation. Philosophers
of liberation are not just those political thinkers and theorists who apply
themselves to thinking about liberation but they think about a certain
defined type of liberation. In other words, not all liberation thinkers are
philosophers of liberation. Argentinean theologian and philosopher of
liberation Enrique Dussel attempted to flesh out the unique qualities of
philosophers of liberation that separate them from many other thinkers
on politics and freedom.
To start with, Enrique Dussel distinguished the philosophy of
Liberation from the extended family of other philosophies in that it is
philosophy that has no time for luxuries. The philosophy of liberation
is that philosophy that ponders on human problems, and especially the

problem of power and its uses for domination and oppression in such
imperial adventures as slavery and colonialism:
Philosophy, when it is really philosophy and not sophistry or ideol-

ogy, does not ponder philosophy. It does not ponder philosophical texts,
except as pedagogical propaedeutic to provide itself with interpretive cat-
egories. Philosophy ponders the nonphilosophical; the reality. But because
it involves reflection on its own reality, it sets out from what already is,
from its own world, its own system, its own space. The philosophy that
has emerged from a periphery has always done so in response to a need to
situate itself with regard to a center—in total exteriority. (Dussel 1985: 03)
In other words, philosophers and liberation thinkers such as Nkomo had

no time to debate what philosophy should be or did they spend time
exploring philosophical classics. Nkomo had to engage philosophically
with the real challenges of the colonized in practice not in theory, and in
thinking about colonialism and the need for liberation he thought from
his personal experience and the existential experience of his family and
community. Nkomo thought and spoke of liberation not from a lecture
hall or seminar room but from amongst the colonized in their exteriority
and marginality from power.
In describing the thinking Jomo Kenyatta who was his student, British
anthropologist Bronislaw Malinowski noted that Kenyatta had a compel-
ling view of the world. Malinowski observed that what made Kenyatta a
competent philosopher was that he spoke from direct experience of colo-
nialism using the tools of his European education and training. In the
view of Bronislaw Malinowski (1938: 1), ‘an African who looks at things
from the tribal point of view and at the same time from that of western
civilization experiences the tragedy of the modern world in an especially
acute manner’. Similar to Kenyatta, Nkomo was passionately rooted in
the indigenous knowledge, religion and spirituality of his people, while
at the same time, he imbibed European learning and observed the lives
and thinking of European peoples. In fleshing out the category of phi-
losophers of liberation, Dussel described them as:
Distant thinkers, those who had a perspective of the center from the
periphery, those who had to define themselves in the presence of an
already established image of the human person and in the presence of
202 W.J. Mpofu
uncivilized fellow humans, the newcomers, the ones who hope because
they are already outside, these are those who have a clear mind for ponder-
ing reality. They have nothing to hide. How can they hide domination if
they undergo it? How would their philosophy be an ideological ontology if
they praxis is of liberation from the centre they are opposing? Philosophical
intelligence is never so truthful, clean, and precise as when it starts from
oppression and does not have to defend any privileges, because it has
none.’ (Dussel 1985: 04)
These thinkers from oppressed, colonized and exploited corners of the

world experienced the suffering of their people directly but also had the
privilege to understand the knowledge and ways of the European oppres-
sors. Counting himself amongst the philosophers of liberation from his
experiences as a political exile in Mexico, Enrique Dussel noted that
philosophers of liberation were ‘those of us who are able to effectively
combine proficiency in our own regional tradition within the South, with
the necessary familiarity with the latest achievements of European or US
philosophy’ (Dussel 2013: 16). Frantz Fanon (2001: 169) described this
species of thinkers as native intellectuals who use their modern educa-
tion to intellectualize from amongst their people as a kind of vanguard
thinkers who assure their people that their culture is not backwards and
that colonialism is crime against their humanity. Organic intellectuals as
vanguard thinkers from amongst their people tend to have their own
problematics that come with eliticism. Peter Ekeh described these privi-
leged and elite political thinkers as ‘the second public’ that was created
by colonialism. Because of their education and dalliance with modernity
they see themselves as equals to Europeans in thought and being, on the
other hand they tend to consider themselves as superior to their own
people and therefore as ideal candidates to rule over them, leading to
tyrannical tendencies and a multiplicity of complexes such as a sense of
entitlement to power (Ekeh 1975: 102).
Philosophers of liberation are different from the native intellectuals that
Frantz Fanon describes, or the second public that Peter Ekeh elucidates
on. Philosophers of liberation are even different from the organic intellec-
tuals that are valorized by Antonio Gramsci. The politics of eliticism and
vanguardism that native intellectuals, the second public and the organic
intellectuals practice espouses politics as the ‘will to power’ that Friedrich
Nietzsche (1968a) emphasizes. In this paradigm of politics, power is
understood as domination and not liberation. Enrique Dussel (2008a: 3)
argues that the ‘will to power’ has corrupted the noble vocation of politics
and turned it into a corrupt profession and a dirty game that fetishized
power and domination. The philosophy of liberation that Dussel defends
prefers the ‘will to live’ that looks down upon domination, war and vio-
lence while it privileges liberation and the preservation of life.
As defined by Dussel, the philosophy of liberation trains itself against
all types and forms of domination in the world to such an extent that it
becomes a planetary way of thinking about liberation. Slaves in the plan-
tations, the colonial subjects in the colonies and exiles in their camps can
all invoke the philosophy of liberation as their language of life:
The Philosophy of Liberation that I practice, not only in Latin America,

but also regarding all types of oppression on the planet (of women, the
discriminated races, the exploited classes, the marginalized poor, the
impoverished countries, the old and homeless exiled and buried in shelters
and asylums, the local religions, the homeless and orphaned children (a
lost generation) of inhospitable cities, the systems destroyed by capital and
the market… in short, the immense majority of humanity), begins a dia-
logue with the hegemonic European-North American philosophical com-
munity. (Dussel 1996: vii)
Instead of privileging war and bloodletting, the philosophy of liberation

centres dialogue with the political thinking of the oppressor. The phi-
losophers of liberation seek to challenge the thinking about politics and
power, the will to power, that the oppressor espouses. As a philosopher
of liberation, Nkomo took the trouble to engage in dialogue and nego-
tiations with Ian Smith the leader of the colonial regime in Rhodesia:
In talking to Smith I took a big personal risk […] I am still criticized for
trying to negotiate with Smith. I hated what the man personally stood
for. I longed for majority rule in Zimbabwe and justice for my people.
I wanted those things with as little killing as possible between the white
people who had an equal right to live in the new nation of Zimbabwe.
(Nkomo 1984: 158)
While the fetishism of power and will to power that Dussel condemns
privileges a nihilistic approach to conflict and centres war, the philosophy
of liberation prefers dialogue that preserves the life of both the oppressor
and the oppressed, and humanizes both of them. Even after independ-
ence when his life, that of his family and supporters was threatened while
204 W.J. Mpofu
thousands of members of ZAPU were massacred, Nkomo resisted the

temptation to retaliate in kind. With ZIPRA, an able, trained, disciplined
and equipped army Joshua Nkomo could have easily used military means
to engage with his opponent but he insisted on keeping the peace, ‘my
family and my friends were threatened, my passport was impounded, my
speeches calling for unity and justice were methodically suppressed’ by
his enemies ‘but still the ruling party could not provoke me to disloyalty
toward a nation I had struggled to liberate’ (Nkomo 1984: 1). Nkomo’s
response to attacks and violence appear clinically to be a form of coward-
ice that avoids war even if it is justified. However, the understanding of
philosophy of liberation is that war is unnecessary expenditure of human
life and happiness (Nkomo 1984: 1). Defending this kind of messianic
political thinking that borders on turning the other cheek to oppression,
Paulo Freire notes that the oppressed from their position of being the
exploited and the dominated, the dehumanized are the ones who must
defend the thinking that seeks to liberate both themselves and their
oppressors. Otherwise, ‘who are better prepared than the oppressed to
better understand the terrible significance of an oppressive society?’ and
‘who suffers the effects of oppression more than the oppressed? Who can
better understand the necessity of liberation?’ (Freire 1993: 27). The
oppressed in their subjugation think and speak from a position of privi-
lege in terms of the philosophy of liberation.
In persuasively addressing himself to the King, Lorenzo de Medici of
ancient Florence in Italy, Niccolo Machiavelli noted that political think-
ers are comparable to the surveyors of land. To understand mountains
surveyors position themselves on low ground and to study low ground
they climb mountains:
Just as men who are sketching the landscape put themselves down in the
plain to study the nature of the mountains and the highlands, and to
study the low-lying land they put themselves high on the mountains, so
to comprehend fully the nature of the people, one must be a prince, and
to comprehend fully the nature of princes one must be an ordinary citizen.
(Machiavelli 1961: 1)
In a strong way, as a philosopher of liberation, Nkomo emerged from

the low ground amongst his colonized people as one of them. He also
emerged from the high ground as an educated political thinker and
activist who could debate and engage the European colonizers in their
language and their logic. Philosophers of liberation are that species of

political thinkers who use the intellectual and philosophical tools of
modernity to attempt to answer the strong questions that modernity and
coloniality have created. For that reason, the philosophers of liberation
can be a problem to the colonial oppressor as much as they can be to the
colonized peoples. In the case of Joshua Nkomo, the philosopher of lib-
eration is a product of colonialism that uses the education that he bene-
fited from modernity to demolish coloniality and seeks to set afoot a new
liberated humanity shared by both the former oppressor and the former
oppressed.
Philosophy of Liberation and the Theo-Politics

of Nkomo
In his defence of what he called the ‘theology of liberation’, Gustavo

Gutierrez noted that theology creates a meeting point between religious
faith and scientific reasoning. Theology, as an understanding of God and
religion, seeks to help religious faith to take into account the workings of
the world and therefore remain relevant in the world. One of the theo-
logical problems that Nkomo had with the Christian religion as preached
by Christian missionaries and native preachers such as his father was that
Christianity seemed to justify colonialism and racism and that it partic-
ipated in the erasure of the traditions, history and the memory of the
colonized. When Nkomo visited England for the first time, he was struck
by the fact that Christianity there sat well with ancestral memories. It was
not the same in Rhodesia where natives were forced to abandon tradi-
tions and memories of their ancestors:
I began to think about Christianity and power. At home becoming a

Christian meant giving up our own old ways to follow white clergyman
and a white Christ. Our religion, in which we approached God through
our ancestors and the history of our people, was said to be primitive and
backward. But here in England the ancestral tombs in the churches signi-
fied the continuity of the nation, and I could not see what was so different
about that. (Nkomo 1984: 52)
Nkomo thought theologically when he made the observation that

Christianity maintained rather than challenged colonial and racial organi-
zations of power. The Christianity in the Rhodesian colony demanded
206 W.J. Mpofu
forgetfulness of history and ancestry, while in the British metropolis it

reinforced remembrance of ancestral memories. In that way, Christianity
took sides with the colonizer and participated in the peripherization of
the spirituality and indigenous knowledge of the colonized. Nkomo did
not only think in terms of the theology of liberation but he also acted
in those terms when he visited the Mwali or the Mlimu shrine at Dula
to consult the traditional God about colonialism and the liberation of
his people (Nkomo 1984: 13). The question endlessly worried Joshua
Nkomo that in the first place, ‘Christian religion seeks life after death for
the individual, while our African religion seeks rain, health and peace in
the world for all mankind’ (Nkomo 1984: 15). Theology of liberation
and philosophy of liberation have their meeting point in the political and
theological thinking of Nkomo whose target for political liberation and
spiritual salvation is the whole of ‘mankind’ not one chosen race.
In questioning the uses of Christianity in colonization and the raciali-
zation of God, Nkomo was doing a lot of things including defending
indigenous knowledge and native spiritualities. Colonialism had a keen
interest in erasing native memory, distorting indigenous history and
silencing local wisdoms and philosophies. In that rebellion, where an
educated and supposedly civilized and Christianized native goes back
to the traditional shrines of his people to seek guidance on liberation,
Nkomo was resurrecting the buried spiritual and epistemic wisdom of his
people. According to Frantz Fanon, it is in the nature of native intel-
lectuals to go back and assure their people that their gods were not dead
and that their knowledge is knowledge amongst other knowledge in the
world and not inferior:
Perhaps unconsciously, the native intellectuals, since they could not stand
wonderstruck before the history of today’s barbarity, decided to go back
farther and to delve deeper down; and let us make no mistake, it was
with the greatest delight that they discovered that there was nothing to
be ashamed of in the past, but rather dignity, glory and solemnity. (Fanon
2001: 169)
The native intellectuals that Fanon describes seek to give dignity to

the past and bring new life to spiritualities that slavery and colonialism
sought to demonize. Condemned religions and silenced knowledge are
given new currency by the confident native intellectual who has the cour-
age to tell his people that the white man lies when he says their ancestors
are demons. Michael Foucault describes the knowledge that slavery and
colonialism sought to silence as subjugated knowledge whose reappear-
ance is revolutionary:
Blocks of historical knowledges: naïve knowledges, insufficiently elaborated

knowledges, hierarchically inferior knowledges, knowledges that are below
the required level of erudition or scientificity. And thanks to the appear-
ance of these knowledges from below, of these unqualified or disqualified
knowledges. (Foucault 1997: 7)
While Christianity as the religion of the oppressor is presented as a reli-

gion of civilization that carries a living God of human salvation, the
reappearance of Mwali or Mlimu as the living God who answers the exis-
tential and spiritual questions of the colonised provides for a rupture and
a titanic disturbance of the imperial and colonial order of things. To wor-
ship Mwali or Mlimu is to delink from a colonial spirit and assert the
existence of another universe where the oppressor is invited. The search
for liberation from colonialism entails reordering the universe that the
colonizer or the enslaver constructs for the colonized. For Joshua
Nkomo, the beginning of liberation is the refusal of given gods and
received knowledge that sustained the colonial universe that must now
be overturned. C.L.R. James (1989: 18) shows how, under the leader-
ship of Toussaint L’Ouverture, the rebellious slaves of San Domingo
invoked their long forgotten gods and sang what were called Negro
Spirituals, abandoning the disciplining and domestication Christian
hymns that the master had given them. The native intellectuals and phi-
losophers of liberation borrow what they can use and reject what they do
not need, or what disables liberation from the colonial master’s knowl-
edge and spiritual system.
Nkomo’s Politics of Liberation

In the compelling observation of Chantal Mouffe (2005: 2), politics
naturally entails conflict and antagonism. The dream of a world without
enemies is a dream in futility in this world where human beings com-
pete for scarce resources and do not worship the same God and tend
to think differently. For that reason, Chantal Mouffe (2005: 3) states
that the role of ‘the political’ as a way of thinking about life, power
and politics is to ensure that natural political conflict and antagonism
208 W.J. Mpofu
do not degenerate into violence, but remains at the level of agonism,

where people agree to disagree, to become opponents and not enemies
that must destroy each other. In the realm of the political that Mouffe
describes political opponents and disputants become adversaries that
recognize each other’s legitimacy and right to exist. In many ways, in
the struggle against settler colonialism and later against the domina-
tion and violence of the Zimbabwean post-independence government
of Robert Mugabe, Joshua Nkomo exhibited a philosophy of liberation
and politics of liberation that recognized the humanity and legitimacy
of his bitter opponents.
At a certain point, Joshua Nkomo was declared a public enemy in
Zimbabwe and his political party ZAPU treated as an enemy organiza-
tion that needed to be crushed. Publicly, Robert Mugabe declared that
Nkomo, ‘the father of Zimbabwe had become the father of dissidents’
(Nkomo 1984: 230). Nkomo admits that nothing had prepared him
for persecution by a black government. When Robert Mugabe publicly
stated that ‘ZAPU and its leader Joshua Nkomo are like a Cobra in a
house’ and the only way to ‘effectively deal with a snake is to strike and
destroy its head’ (Nkomo 1984: 2). Nkomo realized that he was yet to
live the life of a hunted animal and fugitive in a country that he dedi-
cated his life to liberating (Nkomo 1984: 4).
Even as he had a ready and loyal army in the shape of ZIPRA, the
reaction to persecution that Nkomo gave was in the form of communica-
tion. From his exile in England, Nkomo wrote several letters to Mugabe
appealing for respect for the constitution, peace and justice for himself
and his supporters:
It is a well-known fact that in Zimbabwe today, there more peo-

ple detained without trial than in fascist South Africa. Most of the peo-
ple are also without formal detention orders and the next of kin have no
idea as to whether they are alive or dead. These people are not enemies
of Zimbabwe, peasant men, women as well as young men and women
who only happen to be caught, in a conflict the government itself created.
(Nkomo 1983: 9)
Reacting to attacks and to persecution of himself and his supporters with

communication had the appearance of cowardice, but to Nkomo vio-
lence and war were not only a weapon of the last resort but were also
unnecessary expenditure of life. In the world of ‘the political’ and that of
the philosophy of liberation, communication and dialogue are considered

a potent weapon of engagement:
he Philosophy of Liberation affirms decisively and unequivocally the com-

municative, strategic, and liberating importance of ‘reason.’ It commits
itself to the reconstruction of a critical philosophical discourse that departs
from the ‘Exteriority’ and assumes a practico-political ‘responsibility’ in the
“clarification” of the liberating praxis of the oppressed. (Dussel 1996: ix–x)
Pleading his case and that of his people, clarifying his position and chal-
lenging the accusations against him were for Nkomo a means of strug-
gle. Most of his supporters and sympathizers took this dedication of
Nkomo to dialogue as cowardice and even irresponsibility that exposed
him and his supporters to helpless victimhood. Dinizulu Macaphulana
(2010) understood Nkomo’s dialogic engagement with his persecutors
as ‘costly heroism’ that wasted time on communication when armed
response was justified and needed. Talking to opponents, black or white,
was not enjoyable but it was a responsibility and a duty that Nkomo was
willing to suffer (Nkomo 1984: 158). In his commitment to dialogue
as opposed to physical combat, Nkomo found himself taking the painful
risk of seeking audiences with his enemies and swallowing his pride to
propose peace when an active war of liberation was raging.
Liberation, in the political thinking of Nkomo, should not have been
allowed to cost many lives on either side of the divide in the conflict.
The opponent, black or white, was a legitimate human being whose life
should also be preserved. The white colonial settlers, even after being
defeated, had a right to full citizenship in the liberated country that
Nkomo imagined. In the thickness of the liberation struggle, Ian Smith
approached Joshua Nkomo with an offer that could have seen the colo-
nial regime transfer power to Nkomo and his party (Nkomo 1984: 189).
Instead of taking advantage of this political opportunity, Nkomo insisted
that Mugabe, his political rival should be part of the deal, an insistence
that shocked and amazed Ian Smith. For Nkomo, politics was not a dirty
game of foul play and opportunistic tricks but a vocation that privileged
ethical conduct and fairness.
When Mugabe’s leadership of his own political party was challenged
and disputed, Nkomo mediated to ensure that Mugabe held a firm grip
and control of his party (Nkomo 1984: 160) a move that can be under-
stood as the unexpected task of preserving one’s enemy and that is not
210 W.J. Mpofu
expected from an astute politician. Further to that magnanimity, Nkomo

spent time negotiating that his opponents should be released from prison
(Nkomo 1984: 160). Later, when these opponents that Nkomo helped
to preserve came to power they threatened his life and that of his fam-
ily, but still, Nkomo would not be provoked into imagining any form of
retaliation (Nkomo 1984: 1).
Conclusion
The names of ‘Father Zimbabwe’, ‘Chibwechitedza’ and ‘Umdala
Wethu’ (our dear old man) describe only but a part of what Nkomo
was. Even the description of Nkomo as cowardly does not capture the
philosophical explanation to why Nkomo opposed war and privileged
dialogue with opponents and adversaries. This chapter has under-
stood Nkomo as a philosopher of liberation whose deep thinking was
shaped by concrete historical and social conditions under colonialism
in Rhodesia. Nkomo’s rootedness in his people’s traditions and reli-
gion, combined with his modern mission education gave him a rounded
view of life that allowed him to question racism and colonialism from
an empowered and privileged position. Exposure to modernity and to
African traditions gives the thinker a larger and much more compelling
view of the world and an acute sense of justice.
That larger and much more compelling view of life and the world
gave to Nkomo a passion that enabled him to question Christianity and
to propose another view of God as a God of mankind and not of one
chosen race of Europeans. In Joshua Nkomo, the theology and philoso-
phy of liberation combined to produce a fighter who sought to liberate
himself, his people and the colonial oppressor who was imprisoned in the
dehumanizing condition of being an oppressor. For Nkomo, the ideal
country that has been liberated is the one where the government does
not fear it people and has no uses for violence and coercion as the peo-
ple themselves do not fear their government and protect it. Violence is
a resort by those who are not liberated but live in fear of even their own
people (Nkomo 1983).
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Dussel, E. (1996). The underside of modernity: Apel, Ricoeur, Rorty, Taylor and
the philosophy of liberation. Atlantic Highlands, NJ: Humanities Press.
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sophical anti-discourse of modernity. Tabula Rasa, 9, 153–198.
Dussel, E. (2008b). Twenty theses on politics. Durham and London: Duke
University Press.
Dussel, E. (2013). Agenda for South-south philosophical dialogue. Human
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development. London: Heinemann.
CHAPTER 9
Unearthing the Legacy of ‘Father

Zimbabwe’: A Decolonial Imaginary
Blessed Ngwenya
Introduction
The contest between two approaches in African political philosophy of
liberation, violence versus non-violence, has polarised many Africans
between optimism and hopelessness in the process, defining relation-
ships between friend and foe. These two approaches are contradictory
responses to black subordination, and they have significantly shaped
African political thought and leadership. This chapter re-examines some
of the key assumptions of Joshua Nkomo, one of the leading African
nationalist figures of the twentieth century’s political thought, as shown
mainly in speeches, autobiography and other writings. I also want to
show how his philosophy of non-violence and practice can be unearthed
in ways that make it meaningful, valuable and relevant for contemporary
political thought. Using the decolonial epistemic perspective I therefore
argue, Nkomo was a decolonial humanist symbol of the paradigm of
peace. The article demonstrates how Joshua Nkomo refused to succumb
to the logic of violence of coloniality which was reproduced in African
B. Ngwenya (*) 

214 B. Ngwenya
subjectivities and entrapped many an African movement who could not

shed it off even after ‘liberation’. Nkomo, despite engaging in ‘reptil-
ian violence’, remained a steadfast champion of dialogue by condemning
violence as a process that dehumanised people, dehumanising both the
colonial master and the subject. In his speeches, Nkomo realised that the
brutal colonial system did not only need liberation for blacks but for the
whites too, something fellow nationalists did not appreciate. Therefore, a
nuanced account of Joshua Nkomo calls for an interconnected approach.
Consequently, an even-handed explanation recognises that, among other
factors, Nkomo drew his thoughts from the positions he occupied in
colonial Rhodesia. I hope to provoke a new reading of Nkomo by high-
lighting his seldom-discussed side of non-violence.
However, to project Nkomo in the paradigm of peace when he led
the longest and bloody liberation struggle in Africa, twenty years, pre-
sents us with a fundamental paradox. The paradox is here a man who
speaks peace but wages a war that claims tens of thousands of life, not
to mention downing a civilian aeroplane. This paradox will be addressed
in the third section. The discussion in this section will be founded upon
Nkomo’s more telling and instructive words that disclose his tepid posi-
tion on war and violence. In his autobiography Nkomo: The Story of My
Life, he projects two important arguments which in the surface might
even appear contradictory, but in reality are complementary.
Our war of independence was longer and more cruel than any yet fought
in Africa, because it was unnecessary.
He continues to say:
The war was necessary, and I do not regret my part in it….the price of
freedom can never be too high. (Nkomo 1984: 11)
The gist of the argument here, Nkomo, was against the war and at the
same time in opposition to the domination of one group by another. A
more helpful stance is when he was responding to a condescending ques-
tion by the Duke of Devonshire:
Mr Nkomo, you must realise that Southern Rhodesia has a complicated

advanced economy…we could not possibly hand it over to be run by
untrained hands….Nkomo directly answered. “If development in Southern
9 UNEARTHING THE LEGACY OF ‘FATHER ZIMBABWE’ … 215
Africa is an obstacle to political freedom of the black people there, then we

shall have to destroy that development’. (Nkomo 1984: 99)
The above quote gives rise to a number of sub-questions and responses

that will guide the discussion in the chapter, such as: How can a conflict
of interest between the coloniser and colonised be reconciled without
resulting in bloodshed? In the conflict between coloniser and colonised,
how can there be a class of Ubermenschen (supermen) as propounded by
Nietzsche without a profound and corresponding belief in the existence
of the Hitlerian Untermenschen (subhumans)? (Rosen 1995). Where
does morality lie when both the Ubermenschen and the Untermenschen
believe themselves to be right? What knowledges inform the rightness of
action of the respective groups?
This chapter posits that most human suffering wrought by violence
and war has largely been informed by a Western canon of thought
that naturalises violence. And these pro-violence epistemologies seek
to silence alternative perspectives, such as traditional and humanistic
enlightenment, projecting those who pursue the alternative as absurd,
remote and naive. At the heart of modernity is a powerful theme of vio-
lence and war, I argue. I also add that the pro-violence epistemologies
remain the dominant influence in the contemporary world, such that
the epistemologies even interpellate ideologies that drive many a libera-
tion movement. Despite the fact that I use the decolonial epistemic lens,
my method is also historical; using some standard nodes in the devel-
opment of Western civilisation, notions of violence in particular, I trace
and unearth an alternative world through foregrounding the ideology
that informed Nkomo’s worldview, a paradigm of peace. Consequently,
through the argument, it becomes apparent that there are two encom-
passing but diametrically opposed conceptions to the continued exist-
ence of humanity. One is a largely violent attitude rooted in the struggle
to dominate others driven by a will to power, which is associated with
the belief in the survival of the strong through total war and annihila-
tion of the weak (Kaufman 1968: 460). The will to power, I argue, does
not exalt; instead, it debases the human condition. The other one is the
struggle for decolonial humanism, which can be framed as the will to
live. The will to live communicates a serious concern for the well-being
of all. The accretion of tension between the two is one of the greatest
problems faced by the modern world in general and those pursuing liber-
ation in African in particular. An illustration of the divide between these
216 B. Ngwenya
fundamentally different ways of thinking about humanity will be holding

the centre of this discussion.
In what follows, I explore the various ways in which Nkomo lived
and articulated his humanist perspectives that move against the para-
digm of war. I contrast his perspectives with views that locate human-
ity in the degenerate will to power perspective which forms the
bulk of the following section. My chapter is divided into three sec-
tions. To understand Nkomo’s position, I begin with an inquiry into
Western thought and the foundational tenets of violence. The second
section explores decolonial thought and its anti-violence thread. In
the final section, I weave in Nkomo, and in the process, I trace his
thoughts as reflected by his autobiography, speeches and what others
said about him.
The Will to Power and the Reproduction of 

African Subjectivity
Nelson Maldonado-Torres has argued that ‘European modernity
is the naturalisation of the death ethic of war through colonialism,
race, and particular modalities of gender differentiation’ (Maldonado-
Torres 2008: 4). Violence and war have a place of pride in the
Western history that in African history. While every society has dif-
ferent gradations of violence, its deep roots of universalisation are
found deep within the Western canon of thought which has gener-
ally permeated modernity. The pervasion of particularistic thought
cascaded from Western epistemology which claimed to be universal
(Grosfoguel 2007a: 214). The underlying message in this episteme is
that violence is inescapable. This inclination to violence in Western
thought can be traced to various events in history, but three stand
out, namely the crusades, slavery and colonialism. The three events
are in turn informed by two successive and interlinked ideological
strands.
The tightly braided, twofold ideological strands can be traced on
a continuum, the Spanish-Portuguese ego conquiro (I conquer there-
fore I am) to Rene Descartes’ cogito ego sum (I think therefore I am).
With regard to the first ideological strand, philosopher Enrique Dussel
points out that the conquest of the Americas by Spanish-Portuguese
hoards was the imposition of the first modern will to power on
indigenous populations (Dussel 2000: 471). It therefore follows that ego

conquiro was the logical development of the principles that gave birth
to Descartes’ cogito ego sum, I think therefore I am. In a nutshell, the
English or French enlightenment was built on the Spanish plunder and
conquest; hence, the two cannot be separated. Dussel adds that ‘given its
secondary and mythical negative content, modernity can be read as the
justification of an irrational praxis of violence’ (Dussel 2000: 472). In a
nutshell, Europe’s social, political, economic and epistemological devel-
opment was based on the conquest. It therefore should not be a sur-
prise that Europe’s philosophers would go on to invent varying epistemic
excuses for violence to protect their plunder. Western philosophers, rang-
ing from Descartes to Nietzsche, have promoted the idea that violence is
natural and inescapable.
The focus on Descartes’ work is in Europe, but its message is uni-
versal. It is a message that calls for genocide, ethnocentrism, epistemi-
cide and the normalisation of violence. The emphasis on his work is
justified because he is the founder of the Western philosophy that places
man above nature and God. Maldonado-Torres untangles the intricate
link between cogito ego sum and ontology. He uncovers this Cartesian
formulation by breaking it into two. First, he says ‘I think’ can mean
that others do not think, or do not think properly, and ‘therefore I am’
means others are not, lack being, should not exist or are dispensable
(Maldonado-Torres 2007: 252). Maldonado-Torres’s articulation finds
substance in Nkomo’s discussion with the Duke of Devonshire in the
introductory section. The Duke’s idea of untrained hands is Manichean
scepticism. It doubts not only the ability of Nkomo and his race but
also their humanity too. Nkomo is quick to recognise this scepticism
and gives a direct response, which can be interpreted as: if you think
the untrained hands are not human, then we will fight so that you real-
ise we are human too. The Duke’s arrogance sees no bounds because
he totally excludes Nkomo from issues of governance. Watered-down
Untermenschenism would only advocate for the secession of power to the
‘non-human’ where it applies a firm eye on the subject as one who would
watch over a child but the Duke outrightly dismisses the whole idea of
freedom and self-rule by the Untermenschen in the form of Nkomo. It is
such a position from the Ubermenschen that leaves the humanist Nkomo
in a quandary and resolutely says: ‘if whites persist in handling us the way
they are doing, they must not be surprised if one day we pay them back
in their own coin’ (Nkomo 1984: 55). Two other Western scholars stand
218 B. Ngwenya
tall in propounding violence and the scepticism of the humanity of oth-

ers in their works. They are Friedrich Hegel and Friederich Nietzsche.
Hegel is one scholar who epitomises Maldonado-Torres’s assertion
that the naturalisation of war is the darkest side of Western modernity
and it defines the relationship between those who appear to be naturally
selected to survive and those who are dispensable (Maldonado-Torres
2008: xii). Despite many arguments to his defence, Hegel is indisputa-
bly the father of modern racism (Tibebu 2011; Popper 1950; Kaufmann
1968). Tibebu makes an interesting dissection on Hegel which chimes
well with the Lewis R. Gordon’s idea of epistemic closure. Gordon bas-
ing his ideas on Du Bois’ human social science points out that as black
is by definition non-human, therefore epistemic closure means black
is all that is needed to be known about a black person, nothing more,
whereas epistemic openness implies that more can be known about a
person, especially when they are white (Gordon 2000: 88). Tibebu uses
this illustration to question Hegel’s generalised view that supports slav-
ery when it comes to the people of Africa by stating that ‘for Hegel, if
you have seen one African you have seen them all’ (Tibebu 2011: 199).
Tibebu acknowledges that Hegel’s Phenomenology is against biologi-
cal racism, but does not absolve him from his later works that justify the
violent enslavement of Africans. If the demeaning and dehumanisation
of the African life by Hegel can find any parallel in Nkomo’s life, it will
be in the shunter’s utterances when Nkomo’s 6-month-old son Themba
passed on and was due for burial. The shunter with all his insolence
yelled, ‘so where is this dead animal’ (Nkomo 1984: 61). Nkomo says in
his autobiography, ‘until I wrote this down today I have never allowed
anyone, even my wife, to know that this happened when our first son
died’ (1984: 61). If Hegel’s racism is disputed, Nietzsche’s racism and
violence cannot be defended.
Nietzsche has vigorously argued that war is not only part of human
nature but also the natural state of things in support of Thomas
Hobbes’s Bellium omnium contra omnes (the war of all against all). The
contention here is that before man entered, society was in a state of war
against everyone. This view has undercurrents of superior and inferior.
The inferior, the savage and barbarian have not entered society, and his
elimination is defensible. The view is coupled with the elimination of
God as the European man occupies the summit of humanity. The state of
affairs where war and death are naturalised explains Nietzsche’s concept
of Ubermenschen (superman). The superman embodies all the virtues
that exemplify the will to power since he is ‘beyond good and evil’. The
will to dominate is realised when the Ubermenschen finally has the power,
and in his drive to dominate the world, he regards others as sub-human
that can be subjugated and exterminated whenever possible. The exter-
mination of the Herero in Namibia, the Tasmanians or the Australian
Aborigines who until 1967 were classified as flora and fauna attests to the
sub-humanisation of the ‘other’ informed by these particularistic knowl-
edges (Anderson and Perrin 2008: 152). Largely, the claim about human
nature or the naturalisation of violence seeks to maintain the status quo.
That answers the question, Cui Bono? Who benefits? One who is already
established has the ammunition to maintain the status quo; consequently,
any reform is opposed on the ground that it is impossible, while mask-
ing the intention to consolidate power. In this light, Ian Smith faced by
the onslaught from guerrilla movements vehemently asserted that never
will a black man rule Rhodesia in a thousand years. Paradoxically, Ian
Smith as the coloniser is the one who was supposed to exercise the will
to power; however, it appears the black movements too did the same to
the shock of everyone including Joshua Nkomo.
‘Nothing in my life’, wrote Nkomo, ‘had prepared me for persecution
at the hands of a government led by black Africans’ (1984: 01). While
the case of black on black oppression is problematic and embarrassing,
Jean-Paul Satre has a plausible explanation for it. In his preface to Frantz
Fanon’s Wretched of the Earth, Satre explains that ‘the European can-
not recognise his own cruelty turned against himself, his own settler’s
savagery, which the coloniser has absorbed through every pore and for
which there is no cure’ (Fanon 1991). According to Satre, the root of
the colonised violence lays at the coloniser’s door. Peter Godwin sus-
tains Satre’s position when it comes to events in Zimbabwe where the
Mugabe regime, soon after independence, committed gross inhumane
acts, ranging from genocide, rape, foetuses slit off mother’s wombs and
plunder in an extreme case of will to power. Godwin aptly sums it up:
And yet in many ways, the war to which I was returning in 1976 was
precisely what radicalised a generation of the black Zimbabwean leader-
ship and created Smith’s nemesis, Robert Mugabe, elevating him to the
rank of a liberation hero, who set about cultivating an almost messianic
status. And in many respects Mugabe’s methods now mirror those of his
old oppressor. This is part of Smith’s legacy. As is the model of one-party
rule, and the useful levers of repression he bequeathed: the draconian
220 B. Ngwenya
Emergency Powers - still relied upon by Mugabe to conduct his own

oppressive minority rule. If Ian Smith had shown more historical imagina-
tion, then more of his own people might still live in a place they once con-
sidered home. (Godwin 2007: 6)
Godwin’s description is evidence to the fact that violence has become

deeply entrenched and overwhelmingly enduring part of modernity
with the same degenerative consequences on both the dominant and
dominated. The fact that humanity fails to consider other alternatives to
conflict, violence or war is a testimony to the effectiveness of our sociali-
sation. An entrapment of an African liberator finds the self in violence
in the type of liberation where no one wins but everyone is in a los-
ing cause because violence begets violence. David Coltart, a lawyer and
former Zimbabwean cabinet minister, interprets the degeneration in a
causal link with history by highlighting that ‘Robert Mugabe and ZANU
PF practise politics of the 1960s….we still suffer from the legacy of war,
we need reconciliation’ (Coltart 2015b: 15). Such outcomes of violence
should in one way or another foster a rethink of Africa in general and
the nation as it should be understood that the anti-violence paradigm has
been propounded by luminaries like Joshua Nkomo who were not iso-
lated in their pursuit but had leading lights like Luther King Jnr., Nelson
Mandela and Mohandas Gandhi.
Nkomo’s Pursuit of the Will to Live

Philosophers of liberation have one cross-cutting theme, that is, a seri-
ous concern for the well-being of all. Unlike the will to power which is
driven by the Western canon of thought, which seeks to purge those who
are different and weak through military and cultural dominance by pro-
moting the superiority of one ethnic group over another, the philosophy
of liberation is antithesis to such. Instead, the philosophy of liberation
which is determined by the will to live encourages mutualism and symbi-
osis. It discourages the drive to dominate others, vindictiveness, propaga-
tion of negative group stereotypes and overstated estimate of individuals’
own importance.
It has to be made clear that Nkomo, by fighting colonisation, was not
only fighting for freedom from the shackles of the master but he was
fighting to be human. He was fighting both colonialism and colonial-
ity. The two are different but interrelated. Colonialism denotes a political
and economic relationship in which a sovereignty of a nation or a peo-

ple rests on the power of another nation, but coloniality refers to long-
standing patterns of power that emerged as a result of colonialism and
it survives colonialism (Maldonado-Torres 2007). What sustains colo-
niality is the knowledges that produce colonialism in the first place and
knowledges that promote the will to power. It therefore follows that
knowledges from the dominated should inform liberation. Maldonado-
Torres says that ‘colonisation and racism are also conceptions that
promote or are complicit with dehumanisation, violence and war’ (2008:
06). In response to colonialism, violence, racism and coloniality, the
decoloniality episteme is a liberating perspective that emanates from and
aids the search for humanity by colonised people.
Decoloniality is a critical and liberating project emanating from the
underside of modernity, and it is concerned with unveiling coloniality
as a negative side of modernity while also seeking to take forward the
decolonisation project which it considers to be incomplete (Ndlovu-
Gatsheni 2013a). Grosfoguel (2007a: 212) adds that decoloniality is not
an ‘essentialist, fundamentalist, anti-European critique, it is a perspec-
tive that is critical of both Eurocentric and third world fundamentalisms,
colonialisms and nationalisms’. Decoloniality as a theoretical framework
and method goes a long way in not only helping us understand Joshua
Nkomo but also decoding anti-colonial African movements’ multifarious
experiences and challenges in their pursuit of liberation. It is therefore
from a decolonial standpoint that we can understand Nkomo as thinking
from the underside and in search for his own humanity and that of oth-
ers in the peripheral side of modernity who are struggling to shed off its
straitjacket of racism that masquerades as deliverance.
Walter Mignolo (2007: 200) looks closely at how modernity and
its racial categorisations operate. He points out that ‘modernity is pre-
sented as the rhetoric of salvation; it hides coloniality, which is the logic
of exploitation and oppression’. Enrique Dussel even unpacks Mignolo’s
articulations further by rejecting the idea that modernity’s project was to
civilise the backward and therefore the consequences of death and slavery
and inevitable. Dussel declares that:
[I]f one aims at overcoming modernity, it becomes necessary to deny the

denial of the myth of modernity from an ethics of responsibility. Thus,
the other denied and victimized side of modernity must first be unveiled
as “innocent”: it is the “innocent victims” of ritual sacrifice that in the
222 B. Ngwenya
self-realization of their innocence cast modernity as guilty of a sacrificial

and conquering violence—that is, of a constitutive, originally, essential vio-
lence. (Dussel 2000: 18)
The trajectory we have traced up until now, from our recognition of

modernity as a crisis to our analysis of the first articulations of a new
imperial form of sovereignty, has allowed to understand transforma-
tions of the constitution of the world order. Furthermore, we have not
yet been able to give any coherent indication of what type of political
subjectivities might contest and overthrow the forces of empire. Let us
therefore descend into the hidden abode of production to see the figures
at work by exploring ideas of liberation and where we locate Nkomo in
these ideas.
Liberation discussions cannot be easily extricated from notions of
development. Development has various definitions but has largely been
associated with economic growth and increase in wealth (Gustavo 1988:
245). A perspective that views development in a purely economic sense is
not only found wanting but fails to consider social process and by default
reinforces the hierarchical status quo which continues to theorise devel-
opment from the vantage point of the capitalist Global North, instead
of considering the Global South on its own terms, terms that include
economic, social, political and cultural aspects. Gustavo Guiterrez gives
a humanistic face to development, ‘it is building a world where every
man, regardless of race, religion, or nationality can live a fully human life,
free of the servitude that comes from other men and from the incom-
pletely mastered world about him’ (Gustavo 1988: 247). The correlation
between this definition of development and liberation is in that when this
kind of development is finally realised, man becomes a creative subject
as he seizes the reins of his own destiny, directing it towards a society
where he will be free of every kind of slavery (Gustavo 1988: 247). In
this light, liberation denotes a situation where humanity marches towards
a society in which man will be free of every servitude and master his own
destiny (Gustavo 1988: 250). Liberation therefore centres on humanity;
it liberates both the oppressor and oppressed. Here we are not talking
about Hellenic humanity which privileges the Western man as human
while questioning the humanity of other people.
Harking back to Ian Smith and the Duke of the refusal to hand over
power or to listen to Nkomo as the leader of the nationalist move-
ment is influenced by this economics centred form of development.
Development thought that thrives on dehumanisation and the q uestion

of other people’s ability to think so as to handle complex economic
systems is colonial. Nkomo is not oblivious of this clash of knowledges.
In fact, he is aware that it is the same knowledges that influences some
of his comrades in the nationalist movement such that what happens
post-independence, violence, tribalism, genocide and oppression is a
reproduction and manifestation of the Western knowledges that found
an oasis within the hungry for power comrades. Nkomo points out:
White experts on Rhodesia […] missionaries, government employees,

academics loyal to successive regimes had for a long time emphasised and
exaggerated tribal differences as a way of dividing people[…]now their
work was bearing fruit through students at universities abroad who felt the
need to create some artificial loyalty to a group, and they chose tribal dif-
ferences as a means of rallying that loyalty. (Nkomo 1984: 65)
Concerning students based abroad, Nkomo, in his statement, makes an

interesting connection to the knowledges that inform them. He is aware
of the inner workings of coloniality where divide and rule typified by the
idea of the noble savage poses a threat to students’ worldview. He links
their knowledges to the white experts whom he blames for exaggerating
tribal differences. Nkomo does not deny that the differences are there,
but his concern is how they are magnified for the divisive reasons. This
is an interesting analogue by Nkomo. He is very practical in his assess-
ment, and he further maintains that by spending so much time abroad,
the students have become detached to the realities (this can be read as
knowledges) at home. Nkomo is also prophetic in his assessment; he
poses a serious question on students’ position. In most of his speeches,
he always refers to students or young people as the one that will unearth
the truth. Therefore, if those students are promoting tribal loyalties, then
Nkomo is also questioning the students’ astuteness; if they are to sub-
ordinate themselves to knowledges that detach them from the reality at
home, Nkomo poses a serious question on the Zimbabwean academy
and he is indirectly questioning the future of the Zimbabwean academy.
In this case, he is circuitously saying the Zimbabwean academy will be
hostage to and an ideological tool of the tribal affinity that gets power.
At this point, he doubts the moral validity of the idea of Zimbabwe as it
is built on the very same foundations that he spent most of his life fight-
ing against. In a nutshell, according to Nkomo, owing to what it was
224 B. Ngwenya
premised on, the idea of post-1980 Zimbabwe was colonial, Western and
European. Nkomo’s premise is supported by Anibal Quijano who gives
an intricate illustration on how the Western canon gets infused into the
worldview of nationalists movements:
The colonisers also imposed a mystified image of their own patterns of

producing knowledges and meaning, at first placed these patterns far out
of reach of the dominated, later they taught them in a partial and selective
way, in order to co-opt some of the dominated into their own power insti-
tutions. the European culture was seductive, it gave access to power, after
all, repression, the main instrument of all power is its seduction. (Quijano
2007: 169)
The question posed at this juncture is: who is Joshua Nkomo and what
knowledges produces a philosopher of the liberation of his kind. Is it
the family, school, religion, travels or other forces? It cannot be denied
that subjectivity is a constant and continuous process. Therefore, what
are Nkomo’s production processes of subjectivity or what acted on him?
Why would a decolonial humanist, a will to live proponent resort to
violence?
Nkomo as a Humanist

On Saturday 12 April 1986, Nkomo delivered a timeless speech at the
funeral of General Lookout Masuku who died on his hospital bed at
the hands of a ZANU PF regime. The speech has remained a sufficient
barometer to where Zimbabwe has come from since independence. The
central theme of the speech is twofold: first, he forces his audience to
gauge the gap between the ideals of liberation and the reality of violence
before them. Second, the speech gives Nkomo’s audience a window to
his beliefs and dialogical idea of the political. However, the underlying
puzzle to Nkomo is the dualisms and incongruities that mark the easy
assimilation of the victorious liberation movements into the dominant
paradigm of war which is characterised by the complete dominance of
the other; yet on the other hand they wear the liberator’s mantle with
pride. Nkomo scorns this attitude in his speech:
We are enveloped in the politics of hate. The amount of hate that is being
preached today in this country is frightful. What Zimbabwe fought for was
peace, progress, love, respect, justice, equality, not the opposite […] our
country cannot progress on fear and false accusations which are founded
simply on the love of power[…] let us be clear about it, we are seeing
racism in reverse under false mirror of correcting imbalances from the
past[…]. Life has become harsher than ever before. People are referred to
as squatters. I hate the word. I do not hate the person. When people were
moved under imperialism certain facilities like water were provided. But
under us? Nothing! You cannot build a country by firing people’s homes.
No country can live by slogans, pasi (down with) this and pasi that. When
you are ruling you should never say pasi to anyone. If there is something
wrong with someone you must try to uplift him, not oppress him. We can-
not condemn other people and then do things even worse than they did
[…] We cannot go on this way. (Nkomo quoted in Todd 2007: 164)
In this respect, it is interesting to observe how at this point Nkomo

notices the emerging biformity that characterises liberation movements.
In his speech, he makes a juxtaposition between the economic and
the social and humanity-driven kind of development. That is, the lib-
erators in power now mete out destruction on development in its two
forms: first, the infrastructural development, which he acknowledges
that the imperialists provided; second, he speaks of the humanist form
of development which both the imperialists and the new regime had
no respect for. The new regime, to Nkomo, is even worse off because
it goes about firing people’s homes and oppressing other. In his speech,
Nkomo addresses a third key issue, that of racism. It must be pointed
out that the new regime’s convictions about liberty are far divorced from
Nkomo’s ones. Nkomo rejects reverse racism, that is, in the guise of cor-
recting past imbalances by the post-independence regime.
In Judith Todd’s Through the Darkness: A Life in Zimbabwe (2007),
the regime’s perspective of race is made clear. Todd is shocked and irri-
tated by a senior minister in the new regime’s cabinet, Didymus Mutasa’s
rationale when he brazenly says in his Black Behind Bars book: ‘It t is
surprising that Judith Todd and Peter Niesewand, those young whites
who opposed the regime, were born and brought up in Rhodesia, maybe
they are opposed to Afrikaner domination’ (Todd 2007: 119). These
are the form of binaries that conjure images of race and places liberation
movements to be a different side of the same coin of the dominant and
dehumanising paradigm of war. They are a classic example of, ‘you have
had your turn but now the shoe is on our feet’. Joshua Nkomo is far
removed from this implacable, hostile and polarising concept of liberty.
226 B. Ngwenya
This can be supported by tracing the nationalist leader at his lowest ebb
during his time in prison. After an event where there is a fight which cul-
minates in a shootout between the nationalists in prison, a white prison
warden comes to Nkomo and voices his concerns:
[A]fter the violence, Nkomo I am very sad today, and I come to you today
as a leader of these people, I am guarding you here not because it is a
pleasure but because it is my job…we know that in the end you will suc-
ceed and you will run this country. But after the violence last night I won-
der whether after all this suffering you will be able to work together. If you
cannot work together it is not just you the black people who will suffer.
We whites too will suffer. (Nkomo 1984: 134)
The warden’s perspective gives us another gaze into white Rhodesians’

point of view. Not all white Rhodesians were racist, and not all were sub-
scribing to the Smith regime’s violent position. What is, however, impor-
tant here is Nkomo’s reaction when he appealed to the warden not to
abandon the country:
I told him violence like that does happen, it is not the end of the world….
it would be a tragedy if he left, he was exactly the sort of person we wanted
to stay with us after independence, for we were fighting not against white
people but against an oppressive system, oppressive not only to those who
are oppressed but to the oppressors too. (Nkomo 1984: 134)
Nkomo does not hesitate to point out the contributions by the differ-
ent races, the coloured (mixed race), Indian and whites including the
international community, in the struggle against the oppressive system.
A 1976 BBC interview reinforces Nkomo’s consistency, ‘this country has
been ruled by a minority white community for 85 years. When we say
majority rule we mean that the majority of the people as a whole not
excluding white people, all the people together must have a constitution
that gives them the right to choose a government they want, together as
a people not just black people’ (Nkomo’s BBC interview: 1976). Despite
his hope for a triumphant humanity, despondence can be discerned
from Nkomo when his uncanny love for humanity enables him to see
beyond his country when he hopes for a better future for other coun-
tries still engaged in their own liberation struggles: ‘I hope this is not a
fore-runnerof things to happen in Namibia and South Africa when they
attain their independence’ (Todd 2007: 95).
So if, Nkomo was such a humanist committed to universal human

equality and detested the domination of one group by another why then
would he choose a bloody path for liberation? In Nkomo: The Story of my
Life (1984), the intent to secure a non-violent means of liberation can be
seen where Nkomo says, ‘I had been trying for 20 years to talk to suc-
cessive governments about independence for they people but they would
never talk to us […] two days after coming into power Smith threw me
and my colleagues into prison and never spoke to us…we were driven to
fighting by his actions’ (Nkomo 1984: 148). It must be noted that there
is no day or single speech where Nkomo is found glorifying war. If any-
thing, his utterances are either in regret or he states the reasons for war
and how it could have been avoided, unlike nationalists like Mugabe who
have boasted in the past that they have degrees in violence. For exam-
ple, in protesting his people’s exclusion from complete Rhodesian citi-
zenship, Nkomo lays the blame for violence on Smith and the liberation
movements’ door, ‘Smith bears the personal responsibility for five more
terrible years of war, during which chances of reconciliation between
black and white became fewer by the day’ (Nkomo 1984: 157). When
it comes to liberation movements, he emphasises that ‘our lack of unity
prolonged the war for another 6 years and led to many tens of thousands
of deaths’ (Nkomo 1984: 152). Before we discuss the compromise on
his principles and original intent, it will be important to take a cursory
glance at what may contextually shape the man, his strengths and weak-
nesses.
In Nkomo’s autobiography, four key occurrences are indicative of
Nkomo’s discursive political formation. What is remarkable is how
they work together to shape his evolution, which is somehow consist-
ent. These are Nkomo in the family, Nkomo in the community, Nkomo
in South Africa and Nkomo in prison. It is these four aspects that drive
his consistency, and he does not divert from the philosophies that they
impart on him until the end. Nkomo’s formative years are largely influ-
enced by Christianity, a religion well entrenched in his family. His father
is a London Missionary Society preacher. He is also a teacher, farmer and
trader. Nkomo acknowledges that the Bible teachings from his mother
had a great impact on him, particularly coming from someone he loved
so much. His attachment was due to the fact that he was a sickly child.
His sickness, he says, exposed him to a traditional man from a differ-
ent tribal group called Mathimulana Nyathi who taught him traditional
medicine. His fondness for the man whom he wanted to be like when
228 B. Ngwenya
he grew up could have planted early seeds of understanding diver-

sity for the young Nkomo, a Matabeleland native and Mathimulana a
Mashonaland native. Nkomo also benefitted from folk tales that are tra-
ditionally passed down orally from generation to generation (Nkomo
1984: 12). But, an important reading from this text is two-pronged.
First, for some thinkers in the theory of liberation state that the source
of critical insight into modernity comes from indigenous cultural tradi-
tions, while others come from the fusion between Christianity and tradi-
tional knowledges (Gustavo 1988). Nkomo has the experience of both
from his upbringing. Second, Nkomo’s sickly nature as a baby keeps him
closer to his mother and does not cope with other games that other boys
play. A closer scrutiny reveals someone on the margins both as a weak-
ling and also as a mother’s boy as he says it himself. Nkomo points out
at two things that he inherits from this state of affairs. First, he says he
has always lacked confidence; second, because of the motherly love and
trust, he has always been trusting in all his dealings only to find out late
that he has been betrayed (Nkomo 1984: 08). Nkomo is forced to speak
from the underside from the onset despite the fact that he comes from
an affluent family by the era’s standards.
The community level introduces us to the early radicalisation of
Nkomo. Nkomo finds himself in a quandary. At the community level,
he encounters whiteness which awakens him from his dogmatic slumber.
Nkomo meets modernity in all its character at a very young age. First,
he realises that the fertile land they were moved from in the Matopos
had been forcefully claimed by the white man; second, his father’s, a
respected man, greetings are not returned by white men. Third, people
are not only forced to work for free on the white man’s land, but also
forced to reduce their livestock and pay hut tax. Fourth and final, the
face of modernity which foregrounds salvation but hides its dark side
manifests itself to a young Nkomo when white people give them canned
food; while it is an act of charity, they leave the tins open for ants and
dust to fall into them (Nkomo 1984: 20). Nkomo said it seemed an
insult and emphasises that it is such action that leaves a mark on a child’s
mind (Nkomo 1984: 20). This, it appears, contributed immensely to the
radicalisation of Nkomo. At times, radicalisation is a result of unintended
subjectivation or an uncomfortable clash with a worldview. Nkomo, for-
tunately, did not wish to kill the white man; instead, he wanted to save
both the white man and his people from the position of a fallen man.
It must be, however, acknowledged that for others, the experience
of subjugation, dispossession, marginality or dehumanisation differs and

the stimuli may call for a different reaction. For others, conformity could
be the choice, for others revenge and for others using the same coin to
pay both their own and their oppressors.
Third, is Nkomo’s education in South Africa had two key lessons for
him. As a social worker in 1947, he got exposed to all social ills that
black people in South Africa faced as a consequence of modernity. People
had no jobs neither did they have land to farm on, a shocking scenario
for Nkomo with all his rural background. His human-centric nature
always got the better of him just as it did all his political life, he says, ‘I
offered my sympathy, although the theory was that social workers should
not get emotionally attached in their clients’ problems’ (Nkomo 1984:
36). As it turned out, Nkomo arranged the adoption of abandoned
children in African families. Another lesson was from Mrs Hoskins the
widower who treated him like a son and even paid his tuition, ‘I got
to know people from other countries as well as facts about those coun-
tries, yet I do not think any lesson was so important as the one Mrs
Hoskin taught me: that white people too were human beings, if you
could somehow get through the barriers that society erected to stop us
being friends’ (Nkomo 1984: 37). Nkomo began to understand that the
racial barriers were not natural just as he realised that the class barriers in
Durban were not natural but man-made too.
The final traceable event, which is also a turning point for Nkomo,
was his imprisonment. After a long stretch with little varying success in
the struggle for equality, Nkomo was finally thrown into prison. After all
avenues had been exhausted, solutions pointed to the struggle and he was
not oblivious to the consequences of war, ‘I knew all too well that fierce
fighting would mean grave problems at the end of the war’ (Nkomo
1984: 159). It is a decision that went on to haunt Nkomo (1984: 159)
despite his utterances that ‘the war was necessary, and I do not regret my
part in it, the price for freedom can never be too high’. A cursory read-
ing of this statement could be found to be contradictory with his other
statement mentioned earlier that our war of independence was longer
and more cruel than any yet fought in Africa, because it was unneces-
sary. The former must be read in light with the fact that dialogue had
failed for twenty years and finally prison sufficed, Nkomo says, we had no
alternative but to take up arms. A more succinct explanation: ‘Of course
I would have preferred the peaceful road to freedom that was open to
practically all the other former British colonies in Africa. It had been just
230 B. Ngwenya
possible that British intervention, or pressure from the outside world or

even an outbreak of common sense among the settler community, might
have created a hope of African advancement by peaceful means. But it
was not to be. Were forced to fight’ (Nkomo 1984: 98). Consequently,
after an unsuccessful attempt to lobby for peaceful change, Nkomo led an
armed struggle. And it is such a decision that leads to the question why
and when does a humanist decide to use violence?
Nkomo’s endorsement of violence is what Frank Kirkland (1999:
297) calls ‘temperate revolutionism’ which expresses how one adopts
violence, a form of self-defensive violence, which shows that the
oppressed should be under self-control when engaged in violence pur-
suant to the acquisition of freedom. Frantz Fanon calls this a reptilian
violence, which denotes how a cornered reptile can unleash any form of
violence to free itself. Nkomo in his book endorses this notion several
times, and this type of violence is offset against the dehumanising colo-
nial violence which is supremacist in form. Savage, brutish, unbridled
and intemperate colonial violence is therefore positioned in a divergent
manner from reptilian violence. Even luminaries of passive resistance
were faced with more resistance and formulated other aggressive strate-
gies such as Mahatma Gandhi’s satyagraha (truth force) in their bid for
freedom. There is, however, a risk that ‘temperate revolutionism’ or rep-
tilian violence can degenerate into colonial violence.
As such, Nkomo’s inclination to dialogue lost him many friends
within the nationalist movement whose comrades even split to form a
new party using peaceful dialogue as an excuse for ethnic reasons. In
his book A Lifetime of Struggle, Edgar Tekere a member of the splin-
ter group that formed ZANU buttresses this notion, ‘I was suspicious
of Nkomo, afraid of being betrayed by him, and when ZANU finally
disengaged itself from Nkomo, it became a much more vigorous and
confrontational party. Nkomo was too moderate a leader for a war situa-
tion’ (Tekere 2007: 151). Sabelo J Ndlovu-Gatsheni (2008: 85) quotes
Ndabaningi Sithole the first leader of ZANU who said ‘we wanted more
confrontational politics, Nkomo and others that remained with him were
more cautious’. It is, however, the same Sithole, who after independ-
ence, like most of his comrades came to comprehend Nkomo’s stance
and went on to say, ‘our government and the people of Zimbabwe must
be praised for conferring on this man, the highest honour, acclaim and
acknowledgements as Father Zimbabwe, at long last, for there is no one
so deserving as Joshua Nkomo’ (Ndlovu-Gatsheni 2008a: 85).
Nevertheless, Nkomo was aware that many had taken his pursuit for
peaceful means as a weakness, ‘I am still criticised for trying to negoti-
ate with Smith. I hated what the man personally stood for. I longed for
a majority rule in Zimbabwe and justice for my people. I wanted those
things with as little killing as possible’ (Nkomo 1984: 158). His choice
of peace and dialogue stance over violence is something that has haunted
him even after his death. During and after the genocide, most of his sup-
porters are still bitter that he did not choose to fight despite having what
was deemed the strongest guerrilla army in the form of ZIPRA. This
has widely been mistaken for naivety; however, history has proven him
right that violence begets violence, and the genocide has been declared a
genocide and not war by the genocide watch in 2010. To judge Nkomo
fairly, it is also important to trace the reasons why he got into the strug-
gle in the first place, which were to liberate both the oppressor and the
oppressed, ‘it was an attitude of mind as demeaning to the rulers as to
those who were ruled it had to be changed and nobody was going to
change it except ourselves’ (Nkomo 1984: 46).
Nkomo, as I conclude, remains a giant located in the paradigm of
peace that many have began to understand long after his death. Even the
wrath over the downed civilian Viscount appears to be misdirected, as
he explained in his autobiography that ‘it was not our policy to shoot
down civilian airliners, if we wanted to we could have done so more
often, it was a tragic mistake, I felt it personally’ (Nkomo 1984: 166).
Nkomo’s simple stance, a human-centric one, continues to elude many
people, even the first Prime Minister Mugabe who appeared to have
seen the country on tribal affinities was surprised at how Nkomo chose
to stand for member of parliament hundreds of kilometres away from
his own province (Todd 2007: 120). Ian Smith was another leader who
never understood Nkomo. After being turned down by the nationalist
on other means to topple, Mugabe says grudgingly in his autobiogra-
phy entitled The Great Betrayal: Memoirs of Ian Douglas Smith, ‘Nkomo
did not have the stomach for the kind of plan we had in mind. History
seemed to prove that he was born a loser […] on a number of occasions
when opportunities presented themselves, he had hesitated and lost out,
lacking the leadership qualities to make a positive decision’ (Smith 1997:
352). He gives two examples, ‘I pointed out that our security informa-
tion indicated that the ZANLA forces of Mugabe had penetrated deep
into Matabeleland territory, and I questioned why he did not insist on
maintaining the demarcation between Matabeleland and Mashonaland
232 B. Ngwenya
[…] he replied that as they were fighting for the same cause there was no
problem’ (Smith 1997: 352). A second one, ‘I urged him to support my
plan for a confederation which would decentralise power and enable the
Matabeles to control those affairs that had special relevance to their his-
tory, culture, traditions and language…he replied, people should under-
stand and accept that he was not only the leader of the Matabeles but of
all the people in the country’ (Nkomo 1997: 353).
Perhaps, Nkomo could be construed as naive or born a loser and
probably conscious of it. This is demonstrated by his assessment or self-
projection on his friend Michael Scott, of whom he says: ‘I say without
any critical intention towards people whose goodwill and sincerity can-
not possibly be in doubt, but their kindness was sometimes overwhelm-
ing to the point where it became a distraction […] Michael Scott was
so deep in his commitment to the welfare of others such that he had
forgotten his own welfare […] I said to him one day “if you do not look
after yourself you won’t be able to look after the people you are commit-
ted to help”’ (Nkomo 1984: 82). This is a message that Nkomo should
have probably said to himself; however, he was beyond self-seeking
and the will to power as demonstrated by the logo he had for his elec-
tions, a soldier carrying a baby with a crossing garden pick and a hoe
and two mealies on either side of the soldier. The image promoted prin-
ciples of work, advocating for non-violence, in larger terms symbolised
a divorce from injustice and violence of coloniality but also hard work
and self-sufficiency, values that do not only guide future generations
but sustain them too. In the end, it is enlightening how he advocates
for pluriversality when he says no religion has absolute truth: ‘as I have
grown older I have remained a religious man, but not so much specifi-
cally a Christian. That there is a God I devoutly believe […] but a God
of all mankind, not just of a selected people’ (Nkomo 1984: 11). It is
his stance on diversity of religions that makes him receptive and also
reveals his abhorrence of violence when he visits the traditional shrine,
where he has an encounter of non-violence from the oracle: ‘You son
of Nyongolo (Nkomo) […] what do you want from me. What do you
want me to do for you? How do you expect me to accomplish it? When
I told King Lobengula not to fight against his cousins who were coming
into the land […] but Lobengula ignored my instructions and he fought
against his cousins…he was compelled by some of his chiefs who wanted
to destroy him, he listened to them and not to me’ (Nkomo 1984: 14).
Three lessons, key lessons, are drawn from the oracle about Nkomo,
the idea of non-violence, humanity where Europeans are cousins and

acknowledgement of history and the benefit of hindsight.
The main thrust of the chapter has been the idea of the legacy
of Father Zimbabwe, Joshua Nkomo as a decolonial thinker. I have
explored how his will to live position differed from that of both his colo-
nial masters and fellow liberation comrades. I did not intend to insinuate
that comrades in arms should not have differences in thought or per-
spective. My interest was in excavating and defining the knowledges that
inform the obverse ideological positions they occupy.
Conclusion
This chapter has presented an underlying argument that dissecting the
complexity and ambiguity of Zimbabwe is dissecting the complexity of
Africa and the idea of liberation. The chapter has demonstrated how the
paradigm of peace upheld by Joshua Nkomo sharpened and triggered
cleavages within the nationalist movement where many were driven by
the will to power in contrast to his will to live position. While the chapter
makes it clear that his views were coloured by the positions from which
they were formed, particularly the traditional and Christian background,
they nevertheless remain applicable today. Accordingly, excavating
Nkomo’s ideas offers a crucial hidden window into the past and high-
lights current historical and political misrepresentations and inclinations
to violence by the Zimbabwean polity. The state has failed to detach
itself from its violent past and the people continue to live in fear of their
own government as highlighted by Nkomo. Consequently, if the pre-
sent dilemma for the reconstitution of the political were no more than a
mystification occasioned by everyday disputes over conflicting principles
and philosophies of pedestrian nature, one could view the tussle between
the will to live and the will to power existing with a somewhat relaxed
attitude. These relate directly to issues of life and death. Therefore, they
cannot be postponed or relegated to the unscheduled future or wait
for time to conceal or cure them. These are pressing problems that will
invigorate the thinking from the underside of modernity which is fac-
ing a barrage from modernity’s intoxicating atmosphere of violence.
Re-imagining and re-inventing the future is important, returning to the
source and unearthing where our predecessors came from such as Joshua
Nkomo is important in undoing Nietzschean, Machiavellian, European,
Westernised and colonial, exhibiting all manifestations of dominance,
234 B. Ngwenya
plunder, genocide, rape and survival of the fittest idea of Africa in gen-
eral and Zimbabwe in particular. Consequently, to resurrect Nkomo is to
challenge the entire narrative of the West as the driving force of human
progress and enlightenment. Instead, the West becomes a symbol of
dominance and plunder. Edison Zvobgo sums it up well: ‘It is true that
all of us die but some truly don’t die. It will never be possible for Joshua
Nkomo’s name to vanish from our history’ (quoted in Ndlovu-Gatsheni
2008: 83).
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CHAPTER 10
Making Sense of Joshua Nkomo’s Political

Behaviour: A Sociogenic Approach
Morgan Ndlovu
Introduction
The figure of Joshua Nkomo remains a subject of controversy and
contestation within the historiographical landscape of Zimbabwe and
Africa in general. Thus, the depictions of Joshua Nkomo within the
Zimbabwean and African historiography range from his portrayal as a
terrorist, liberation hero, nation-builder, father of dissidents, sell-out,
coward and ‘father Zimbabwe’; all which reveal that Nkomo’s political
behaviour is subject to not only different interpretations but also misun-
derstanding across time, space and people. In this chapter, I seek not to
provide a supposedly correct interpretation of the meaning of Nkomo
within the Zimbabwean and/or African political discourse, as that would
be an exercise in futility, but to lay a foundation on which we can make
sense of some of the meanings of Nkomo’s political behaviour. Thus, this
chapter is a socio-genetic analysis of Nkomo’s political mind as produced
within a particular sociocultural background.
M. Ndlovu (*) 

238 M. Ndlovu
Contradictory Representations of Nkomo

The meanings of Joshua Nkomo’s political behaviour and leadership
style within the Zimbabwean and African political history can be under-
stood as inventions of Nkomo through a process of both self-represen-
tation and representation by others. These inventions can neither be
treated as entirely false nor true, but they can best be taken re-imagina-
tions of the ‘actual’ lived experiences of Nkomo’s leadership from dif-
ferent ideological standpoints. Thus, as Carolyn Hamilton (1998) has
eloquently argued in her book, Terrific Majesty: The Powers of Shaka Zulu
and the Limits of Historical Invention, there is always a material basis
behind ‘historical inventions’ and ‘regimes of truths’ of prominent politi-
cal figures such as Shaka Zulu; hence, we cannot ignore their political
representations in our search to understand meanings behind their politi-
cal actions and behaviour. It is, however, the responsibility of the analysts
to sift through a corpus of representations that are ‘regimes of truth’ to
obtain the actual raw materials on which another plausible interpreta-
tion of reality about a particular political figure can be developed. This
new interpretation itself does not pronounce an ‘end of history’ about
that particular political figure, but merely expands the knowledge base
from which the political actions and behaviour of that historical figure
can further be examined and understood. In this chapter, I seek not only
to provide another interpretation of Nkomo’s political actions, behaviour
and leadership style but also to articulate a robust method of reading the
genesis of his political mind.
The political figure, Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo launched his political
career around 1948 when he became an active participant in the trade
union politics of the then Rhodesian Railways in Bulawayo. It was in the
1950s and early 1960s that Nkomo first rose into prominence among
the anti-colonial nationalist movements in Rhodesia where he became
the leader of prominent nationalist movements such as the Southern
Rhodesia African National Congress (SRANC), the National Democratic
Party (NDP) and the Zimbabwe African People Union (ZAPU). As a
prominent leader of these early nationalist movements, Nkomo became
the originator of the Zimbabwean liberation struggle. It was, indeed, his
popularity as a fearless and cunning anti-colonial figure in the early day
of nationalist movements that earned him the nickname, Chibwechitedza
(‘the slippery stone’ in Shona) to symbolize his evasion skills against
colonial repression. However, this positive representation of Nkomo
10 MAKING SENSE OF JOSHUA NKOMO’S POLITICAL BEHAVIOUR … 239
was short-lived as his political career took a turn with the split of ZAPU
in 1963. The split, which resulted in the formation of the Shona-
dominated Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU) versus the
Ndebele-dominated ZAPU, inaugurated a period whereby the figure of
Nkomo was represented by ZANU politicians as weak, inconsistent and
indecisive. Nkomo was portrayed by his ZANU detractors as a coward
who was not willing to embrace confrontational politics (Shamuyarira
1966), yet those who supported him remained convinced of him as a lib-
eration struggle stalwart.
While the controversy around the figure of Nkomo in the Zimbabwean
political historiography began in the heydays of colonialism, particularly in
the formative years of the liberation struggle against the Rhodesian gov-
ernment, this controversy further heighted after Zimbabwe gained inde-
pendence in 1980. The first controversial representation of Nkomo within
an independent Zimbabwe came from ZANU-PF politicians who won
the national elections on 18 April 1980 and then followed by Nkomo’s
supporters in Matabeleland and Midlands who were persecuted and vic-
timized by the ZANU-PF-led government. Thus, despite the fact that
ZANU-PF and PF-ZAPU together formed a Government of National
Unity (GNU) after the former won the national elections in 1980,
Nkomo came to be portrayed as the ‘father of dissidents’—a figure that
represented him as a leader of disgruntled members of a vanquished party
who sought to remove a ZANU-PF-led government from power by force.
The motivation behind the projection of Nkomo as a rebellious father
of dissidents by ZANU-PF, according to Ndlovu-Gatsheni and Willems
(2010), could have stemmed from the desire by the ZANU-PF leader
and the newly elected Zimbabwean prime minister, Robert Mugabe,
to create a one-party state. Robert Mugabe, who was then the prime
minister of the newly formed postcolonial ZANU-PF-led government,
used the pretext of ‘arms cache’ by the ex-ZIPRA members—an armed
wing of PF-ZAPU during the liberation struggle—to portray Nkomo as
a leader of a tribal party that sought to dethrone a legitimately elected
ZANU-PF government. Mugabe then deployed a North Korea-trained
army unit known as the Fifth Brigade under the pretext of hunting down
dissidents in Matabeleland and Midlands provinces thereby resulting in
the death of an estimated 20,000 mostly Ndebele-speaking civilian sup-
porters of Nkomo.
The carnage that was inflicted by the Fifth Brigade on the peo-
ple of Midlands and Matabeleland provinces enabled another portrayal
240 M. Ndlovu
of Nkomo as an indecisive and cowardly leader, now not by his

detractors in the ZANU-PF political formation but by those who
were his supporters. These supporters who were brutalized by
Mugabe’s tribal army felt that Nkomo did not do enough to pro-
tect them as their leader but instead skipped the country to find
safe haven in London while leaving them being brutalized by Fifth
Brigade. In addition, there were those who felt Nkomo was a naïve
leader who disarmed his highly trained ZIPRA army during the
integration of ZIPRA and ZANLA forces thereby laying ground
for Mugabe’s Fifth Brigade to brutalize them without any form of
resistance.
Perhaps, the last coherent and dominant strand of Nkomo’s rep-
resentation as a political figure within Zimbabwean and/or African
history is that of Nkomo as ‘Father Zimbabwe’ which ensued after
the signing of Unity Accord on 22 December 1987. Though Nkomo
began representing himself as ‘Father Zimbabwe’ prior to Unity
Accord through his autobiography, Nkomo: The Story of My Life
(1984), to counter the negative portrayals by ZANU-PF as a ‘father
of dissidents’, his positive portrayal as a nation-builder rose to prom-
inence after 1987 when he gave into Mugabe’s demand for a one-
party state through the signing of the Unity Accord. The Unity
Accord that was signed by PF-ZAPU and ZANU-PF was widely
interpreted by Nkomo’s supporters as the ‘swallowing’ PF-ZAPU by
ZANU-PF. All the above shows clearly that they have never been any
stable singular interpretation of Nkomo’s political actions and behav-
iour within the political landscape of Zimbabwe, but what has been
always missing in many of Nkomo’s representations is the attempt to
read his political behaviour and actions from a point of departure that
takes into cognizant of the environmental circumstances that pro-
duced his political mind.
Nkomo and His Political Behaviour: Towards a Theory

of a Political Mind
The meaning of Nkomo’s political actions and behaviour can best be

understood from reading his political mind. By his political mind, I mean
his thought system as it was produced by the biological processes within
him and the sociocultural circumstances outside him. Thus, Nkomo as
a person was a product of an internal biological process of being and an
external social process of being that cannot be disassociated from the

broader environmental circumstances that limited his thinking and imag-
inative prowess. This section, therefore, is about what does it mean to
think? This is an important question not only because thinking precedes
action thereby making it obvious that knowing the ‘thought’ behind the
action is a prerequisite of knowing the meaning of that action but also
because the phenomenon of the thinking is complex affair that requires
us to understand what does it mean to be a human being in the first
place. This is not an easy question but the subject of being human has
always been explained by distinguishing being human from being an ani-
mal. Thus, for instance, being human as opposed to being an animal is
well articulated by Clifford Geertz (1973) in his description of human
being as culture-carrying animal. This culture, which becomes a con-
trol mechanism among human beings as they instructively relay it to one
another and from generation to generation, is always subject to conti-
nuity and change; hence, human beings unlike animals have no perma-
nently predictable behavioural pattern throughout their history, but their
behaviours are subject to both stability and transformation. In the quest
to examine the genesis of Nkomo’s political-cum-cultural mind, it is
important to underline that the culture that is thought to have informed
his mindset is not treated as though it was circumscribed and frozen in
time or as completely dynamic and unknowable.
The fact that human beings are ‘culture-carrying’ animals means that
human beings have an advanced pedagogic discourse and practice that
enables them to effectively relay their culture to each other as well as
from one generation to another. Thus, pedagogy among human beings
is an instrument socialization that makes them to teach and learn from
each other thereby making it possible to define themselves primarily as
social beings rather than mainly biological beings. Thus, when we seek
to unpack the sociocultural background that informed Nkomo’s politi-
cal mind, we seek to unmask that which was imparted on him as a way
of life. That being human is primarily social than biological, however,
does not therefore mean that biology is of lesser importance in the con-
stitution of being human, but it simply means it is the sociality in human
beings that enables their brains—a neurological substance—to obtain a
higher-level thinking capacity than that of animals. Thus, even though
it might be correct to characterize the early stages of development in
human beings as primarily biological, human beings tend to be primarily
social in their later stages of their development. The above discussion of
242 M. Ndlovu
what constitute being human is quite important in developing a socio-

genetic theory of Nkomo’s mind simply because it allows us to view his
political behaviour as primarily rooted in his socialization than a prod-
uct of his pre-given innate qualities—a development that may lead to
not only the questioning of his humanity but also the classification of
those of his type as lacking human qualities with dire consequences. This
is even more important to understand in the aftermath of the genocidal
atrocities that were committed against Ndebele supporters of Nkomo
between 1980 and 1987 where a radical doubt on the humanity of
Ndebele people as an ethnic group was expressed through descriptions
such as ‘cockroaches’.
The idea of culture and its centrality to the question of being human
is an idea that has influenced a number of progressive social psychologi-
cal theories of learning that have so far challenged the ‘innatist’ behav-
ioural school of mental discipline for privileging the ‘omni-science of the
soul’ (Jarvis 2006: 91) over the social status of being human thereby
leading to the development of the idea that human intelligence is pre-
given and fixed. This extremism of the reductionist psychological the-
ories about the mind of a human being that manifested themselves as
‘black box psychology’ (Watson 1913, 1929) or ‘ghost in a machine’
(Skinner 1974) was challenged by what became the first and the sec-
ond cognitive revolution whose task was to articulate how the mind of a
human being is a product of both ‘biogenesis’ and ‘socio-genesis’ rather
than one of them. If, indeed, the cognitive revolutions in psychology
were successful in demystifying the myths of ‘brain science’ whose pre-
occupation was to conflate ‘brain’ with the ‘mind’ in its search to estab-
lish ‘how our neural hardware might run our mental software’ (Bruer
2006: 1), then the mind of a human being can neither be attributed to
‘inside-outside’ process nor ‘outside-in’. Instead, the mind of human
being must be thought of as ‘embodied’ in that experience as ‘the locus
of perception of the understanding of the world and the environment’
(Christodoulou (2010: 331) is of primary importance; hence, when we
seek to understand the political mind of a figure such as Nkomo, we seek
to engage in a theory of his embodied cognition. However, in theoriz-
ing his embodied cognition and perception of the world, we are not in
a position to study his internal neurological state of his brain; hence, we
are bound to focus on the socio-genesis of his thinking which we can
access. Thus, by accessing the sociocultural environment that produced
Nkomo’s political behaviour, we gain the privilege of estimating the gap
between the actual development of his innate mind and that of the soci-
ety or culture that groomed him—what Vygotsky (1978) described as a
zone of proximal development. In other word, the socio-genetic theory of
Nkomo’s political mind is a theory of Nkomo’s zone of proximal devel-
opment vis-à-vis his eco-culture or the environment of his sociocultural
experience.
Apart from the psychological and sociological theories about what
constitutes the mind of a human being, Nkomo’s political mind can also
be read through philosophical approaches to the question of the mind.
The history of the philosophical interpretations of the mind is trace-
able to the Cartesian philosophy of the seventeenth century when Rene
Descartes produced an ontological dualism between the mind and the
body. As it will be seen later in the chapter, it was this dualistic notion of
the ‘mind-body compound’ (Heinämaa 2003) that brought about what
we can characterize as anti-Cartesian discourses of the mind. These anti-
Cartesian discourses of the mind are similar to the socio-genetic theory
of the mind that I explained above though they focus more on respond-
ing to the damages that were caused by Descartes’s pronouncement of
the ‘cogito ego sum’, which means, ‘I think therefore I am’. The ‘ego
cogito’ as popularly referred to is a philosophical statement that inau-
gurated ‘a new era of epistemological thinking, wherein everything is
thought to be determined or made intelligible by the workings of the
mind’ (Burns 1982: 63). There are, indeed, many interpretations of the
Descartes’s statement of ‘I think therefore I am’, but the common one is
that Descartes was exercising a Cartesian quest for a secular foundation-
alism, self-consciousness and truth where he concluded that the mind is
far more reliable when it comes to the question establishing ‘trustworthy
foundations’ and ‘states of conviction’ (Philips 1995).
This development reduced the significance of the body in mat-
ters of thought, knowledge and truth mainly because to Descartes the
‘mind object’ became what Philips (1995: 230) described as a ‘per-
verse theorist of the body’. Thus, by reducing the body to a ‘quantity’
than a ‘substantiality of the ‘soul’ (res cogitans) (Dussel 2008), which to
him was the same as the mind, Descartes established the bodily expe-
riences of the material world, its sensations and sense perceptions as
the enemies of the truth. The implication of such a conception of the
‘body mind compound’ became problematic to a number of schol-
ars such as Dussel (2008) who view such a thinking as having inaugu-
rated a situation where it became possible to develop universal social
244 M. Ndlovu
scientific theories that are insensitive to varying socio-historical circum-

stances that determine human behaviour and thought across time and
space. This therefore led to the development of different forms of ‘anti-
Cartesian mediations’ whose objective has been to challenge the ‘epis-
temic solipsism’ that was enabled by the Cartesian dualism of the ego
cogito which privileged the mind over the bodily experiences of the mate-
rial world—experiences that were to lead to deeper understanding about
what constitutes the mind of a human being.
Among a number of earliest theorists in Europe who challenged
Descartes’s rejection of ‘senses’ as forming a reliable basis for knowledge
were the English philosopher, John Locke (1632–1704), the Scottish
philosopher, David Hume (1711–1776), and the German philosopher,
Immanuel Kant (1724–1804). Thus, in contrast to Descartes’s innate
and rational mind, the empiricism of philosophers such as Locke and
Hume stressed that experience plays a primary role ‘in all human under-
standing and knowledge’ (Sedgwick 2001: 12). Thus, for instance, in
his essay entitled An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1690),
Locke argued that all our ideas are derived ultimately from our experi-
ences which mean that ideas are a result of the qualities of our bodies
as they sense the world within which we exist. The Lockean approach
to the question of the body and the mind was followed by Hume in
his thesis on how ‘impressions’ give rise to ‘ideas’. Thus, according to
Sedgwick (2001: 17), Hume argued that ‘All the perceptions of the
human mind resolve themselves into two distinct kinds, which I shall
call IMPRESSIONS and IDEAS’. By impressions, Hume meant percep-
tions that are a direct consequence of sense experience while ideas are
‘the faint images of these [impressions and perceptions] in thinking and
reasoning’. What this means is that Hume, unlike Descartes, developed
a causal hypothesis where experience precedes our thinking or reason-
ing. In the case of seeking to understand Nkomo’s political mind, it is
important that we avoid those dehumanizing reductionist Cartesian
approaches that treated his mind as inherently weak and, therefore, not
deserving to exist. Thus, an anti-Cartesian approach to Nkomo’s political
mind not only restores and rehabilitates Nkomo’s lost humanity but also
provides a sense of justice to Nkomo political mind by locating it within
the sociocultural environment of its cultivation.
In general, though the empiricism of Locke and Hume was affirmed by
Kant when he argued that ‘There can be no doubt that all out knowledge
begins with experience…’, it can be noted that Kant did not take the pri-
macy of experience for granted as evident in his articulation that ‘though
all our knowledge begins with experience, it does not follow that it all
arises out of experience’ (Sedgwick 2001: 27). Thus, in contrast to Locke
and Hume, Kant divided knowledge into a posteriori judgement that is
based on our empirical experiences and a priori judgement that is inde-
pendent of any experience. In other words, the Kantian approach to the
question of the body and the mind sought to depart from the Lockean
notion of human beings as ‘empty cabinets’ that are mere passive recipi-
ents of sense impressions of the world to reconstitute the objectivity
and universality of knowledge that is enabled by a ‘pure intuition’ of the
human mind.
In general, the above anti-Cartesian meditations by Locke, Hume and
Kant are a clear indication that Cartesianism has been a challenge not
only to the theorists of the non-Western world but also to those of the
West. This, however, does not mean that these two categories of theo-
rists engaged the subject of Cartesian thinking in similar terms, but as
it will be explained below, the anti-Cartesian meditations of the non-
Western theorists have tended to focus on the role of Cartesian thinking
in sustaining and perpetuating colonial power relations. Since tribalism,
a microcosm of racism, is behind some of the negative representation
of Nkomo, the anti-Cartesian approaches of the non-Western theorists
are useful to reversing the tribally motivated representations of Nkomo.
Thus, whereas the anti-Cartesian approaches of non-Western theorists
represent a decolonial critique to the challenge of colonialism and rac-
ism in the imagination of the non-Western ‘Other’, the anti-Cartesian
approach to Nkomo’s image represents a non-tribalistic critique to the
challenge of tribalism in the representation of Nkomo as the Ndebele
‘Other’ in Zimbabwe.
A socio-genetic theory about Nkomo’s political mind is also an anti-
Cartesian approach to his thinking that ‘bridges’ his experience and his
‘thought system’ in order to produce a non-reductionist perspective
about his political behaviour. Thus, whereas the anti-Cartesian approach
to Nkomo’s mind ‘bridges’ experience and the mind inside the body of
the person, the Cartesian approach, that was used mainly by his detrac-
tors who did not take his sociocultural experiences seriously when
criticizing his political actions and decisions, simply ‘breaches’ his socio-
cultural background to produce unjustified criticisms. Since Nkomo’s vil-
ifications were mainly tribally motivated, an anti-Cartesian socio-genetic
246 M. Ndlovu
theory of his mind has the potential to produce a decolonial perspective

about Nkomo’s leadership qualities.
Ndebele Culture and Nkomo’s Political Mind

The most important source about Nkomo’s sociocultural background
is his autobiography: Nkomo: The Story of My Life. This is an impor-
tant source not because one can regard it as an accurate reflection of
untainted ‘facts’ about his sociocultural background that shaped his per-
sonality and character but precisely because ‘self-representations’ con-
tain those biases and exaggerations that cannot be obtained from anyone
else other than the narrator himself and people who were with him from
the time he was born. Biases, inventions and exaggerations that ema-
nate from self-representation, like those that emanate from ‘representa-
tions from without’, are subject to limitation by pre-existing knowledge;
hence, they are reliable to a certain extent. In some instances, self-repre-
sentations are even more reliable than representations from without in
that the latter can be ‘ad hoc’ as it can be based on momentous knowl-
edge rather than long-term pre-existing historical knowledge about the
subject being represented. Thus, for instance, many of Nkomo’s detrac-
tors had no prior historical knowledge about his sociocultural experi-
ences when he was a child which may or may not have influenced his
adult behaviour but only knew of Nkomo as an adult thereby failing to
understand the basis of some of his political actions.
Nkomo was Ndebele. He was brought up in Ndebele culture. Born
on 7 June 1917, Nkomo was the third of eight children of his parents
who partly experienced a pre-colonial Ndebele lifestyle and a modern
colonial life style of the British settlers. Thus, as revealed by Nkomo in
his autobiography, his father and mother were born around 1880s and
were teenagers when the final occupation of the Ndebele state took
place in 1897. Though his parents were Christians who also worked for
the London Missionary Society under the British settler government,
Nkomo reveals in his autobiography that they nonetheless remained
believing in traditional doctors. Thus, their belief in traditional healers
was made clear when they took Nkomo to a traditional doctor when he
was a child—a clear indication that they were firmly rooted in Ndebele
culture even though they were Christians. This belief in Ndebele culture
which included the practice of traditional healing by Nkomo’s parents
was imparted on Nkomo during his formative years to the extent that
he ended up attending non-Christian ceremonies and visiting the Mwali

shrine in the Matopos hills. As he reveals it in his autobiography:
Between the ages of eight and fourteen I became much attracted to the
traditional religion of our people. With my friends I would steal away
from home in secret to the ceremonies of our non-Christian neighbours,
joining in the dancing and the singing, and even partaking, despite my
parents’ strict orders, of the food that had been specially prepared for
the ceremony. To me their worship was more lively and attractive, and
seemed more serious, than that I had seen in the Christian church.
(Nkomo 1984: 13)
What we can discern from the above is that Nkomo’s values and beliefs
came to be even more rooted in Ndebele culture than that of his parents
who were partly influenced by Christianity. Thus, it was therefore not
surprising that before he engaged in the nationalist politics against the
minority rule of the Rhodesian white settler government in the 1950s,
he first consulted the Mwali spirit medium at the Matopos hills.
Apart from having been influenced by Ndebele traditional beliefs and
values, Nkomo, like many of his contemporaries, was a product of the
modern colonial education. Thus, for instance, Nkomo studied, among
other professions, social work at the Jan Hofmeyr School of Social
Work in Johannesburg which, after completing his Diploma, landed
him a job as a chief social worker in the Department of African Affairs
of the Rhodesia Railways. It was at the Rhodesia Railways that Nkomo
joined the trade union and became the president of the African Railway
Employees’ Association—a development which he attributes to the expe-
rience of segregation, oppression and dehumanization of black people by
the then white settler government.
While Nkomo’s experiences, during his formative years before he
became a fully fledged political figure, are vast and complex, his politi-
cal mind can be attributed to two cultural systems: Ndebele culture
and colonial modernity. A deeper analysis of how the two cultural
systems affected Nkomo in his formative years reveals that he was
enchanted with the Ndebele traditional beliefs and values but disen-
chanted with colonial modernity. If, indeed, it is correct to character-
ize the behaviour of Nkomo as having been influence positively and
negatively by both Ndebele culture and colonial modernity, respectively,
the question that becomes important therefore is not just that of how
248 M. Ndlovu
did the two sociocultural systems shape Nkomo’s political behaviour but
also that of how does this sociocultural background affect our interpreta-
tion of Nkomo’s behaviour.
The question of how does our knowledge of Nkomo’s sociocultural
background affect our interpretation of his political mind and behaviour,
however, cannot be answered without an understanding how the two
sociocultural systems represent two different civilizational paradigmatic
approaches to politics and life in general. Thus, for instance, Ndebele
culture is a civilizational cultural system that socializes individuals into
what decolonial scholars such as Maldonado-Torres (2008) and Ndlovu-
Gatsheni (2016) characterized as the ‘paradigm of peace’—a paradigm
about life and politics that is different from that of modernity/coloniality
which is predicated on a ‘paradigm of war’. Nkomo as a typical Ndebele
or product of Ndebele culture was not a warmonger. He engaged in
warfare as a last resort and did not intend to live by war as his ideology
and way of life. This is made clear in his autobiography where he pro-
vides a reason why he ended up engaging in the armed liberation against
white minority rule in Rhodesia:
Of course I would have preferred the peaceful road to freedom that was
open to practically all the other former British colonies in Africa. It had
been just possible that British intervention, or pressure from the outside
world, or even an outbreak of common sense among settler community,
might have created a hope of African advancement by peaceful means. But
it was not to be. We were forced to fight. (Nkomo 1984: 98)
The above statement clearly reveals that though Nkomo was forced
to engage in a violent armed struggle against colonial rule, he was
not at peace with violence as a way of life but merely exercised it as a
radical rejection of the ideological violence of the oppressor. Thus,
Nkomo exercised a Fanonian form of ‘counter-violence’ that Mbembe
(2012: 23) views as ‘purely responsive- ad hoc, reptilian and epilectic’
by a ‘hunted man’ who desperately seeks to repel a violent way of life
imposed upon him by a subject who believes that violence is natural way
of life. Given the fact that Nkomo was characterized as docile leader dur-
ing the liberation struggle simply because he preferred peaceful resolu-
tion to the conflict than war, such a characterization of Nkomo’s leader
can be seen as misplaced due to the fact that it was not based on an
understanding of his Ndebele cultural horizon about conflict resolution
that informed his political decisions. Ndebele culture through its prov-
erbs such as induku kayakhi muzi (meaning violence does not sustain a
family) always cautions its subjects against leaning towards violence as
means of achieving peace. Thus, according to Ndebele culture, violence
negates the spirit of nation-building.
As a result of his Ndebele sociocultural background, Nkomo like
many other political figures such as Nelson Mandela whose views about
life and politics were anchored on the paradigm of peace within a global
environment whose logic privileges the paradigm of war suffered the
consequence of being a minority in a world where the majority has been
made to believe that war is natural marker of being human. This per-
verted logic of humanness is a colonial invention of being human that is
meant to justify oppression as a natural order of life yet in reality life did
not begin with the dominance of the Western worldview over other non-
Western knowledges and ways of knowing. It was the German philoso-
pher, Friedrich Nietzsche in his thesis on The Will to Power (1968), who
made it clear that Eurocentric worldview about life and politics is predi-
cated on naturalizing war as a way of life and practicing politics. Thus,
according to Nietzsche (1968: 550), ‘the world is the will to power’;
hence, domination and oppression of one group of human beings by
another group is a natural state of existence. Nkomo, like his contem-
poraries such as Mandela, was against this form of politics of the ‘will to
power’ as they were products of sociocultural systems that viewed politics
as an expression of the ‘will to live’.
The similarities between Nkomo and Mandela in terms of their para-
digmatic horizon about life and politics are not surprising simply because
they were all informed by an Nguni cultural background that includes
Ndebele and Xhosa. The crisis of leaders such as Nkomo and Mandela
who viewed the world through the lenses of the paradigm of peace is not
only that they became the minority in a world where the colonization
of knowledge has succeeded in imparting the paradigm of war into the
minds of the majority of world’s population but also because their poli-
tics was predominantly interpreted from a paradigm of war that equates
the search for peace with naivety. This is why both Nkomo and Mandela
easily attained the label of being ‘sell-outs’ by the majority of those who
observed and judged their politics from the epistemic standpoint of the
paradigm of war. Instead of being a sell-out and coward, Nkomo was a
decolonial humanist who rejected Eurocentric conception of politics as
war but to see Nkomo in this way requires one to be familiar with his
250 M. Ndlovu
sociocultural background and how his sociocultural background paradig-

matically represented a horizon of peace about life and politics.
To conclude, the socio-genesis of Nkomo political mind presents
Nkomo as a great nation-builder whose nationalist politics was predi-
cated on a paradigm of peace but practised in a spatio-historical tem-
porality dominated by a paradigm of war. This made him to be appear
naïve and docile to many of his detractors who observed and judged
his politics from a colonially rooted epistemic standpoint that privileges
violence as a way of life yet when examined from a decolonial epistemic
standpoint that takes seriously the socio-historical experience of the mind
of a human subject, his radical humanism becomes visible. Thus, as an
embodiment of an Ndebele culture that enabled its founder, Mzilikazi to
a build a nation of uMthwakazi out of what was a small group of about
three hundred men and women when he left what is now KwaZulu-
Natal, Nkomo was taught that positive peace and sustainable unity can-
not be achieved through violence as an ideological apparatus.
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20(2), 158–198.
CHAPTER 11
Joshua Nkomo on Land: Exploring His

Vision for Land Reform and Land Use
in Zimbabwe
Rudo Gaidzanwa
Introduction
This chapter delves into Joshua Nkomo’s background and experience
with landholding in a peasant household. This chapter explores Nkomo’s
struggle with colonial employment policies, entrepreneurship and his
ideas about land policies and land reform in an independent Zimbabwe.
Based on Nkomo’s lived experiences with the Zimbabwe African People’s
Union (ZAPU) and Zimbabwe People’s Revolutionary Army (ZIPRA)
initiatives to develop land-based projects and programs for peasants, war
veterans and others, this chapter links Nkomo’s background and expe-
riences to his ideas in the light of Zimbabwe’s actual experience with
land reform in post-independence Zimbabwe. Nkomo’s life experiences
are contextualised in the occupation of Zimbabwe which started around
1890, culminating in colonisation by 1896. Colonisation occurred as a
result of the desire for gold and other minerals which was followed by the
looting of cattle and land and gold claims by the white settler colonists
R. Gaidzanwa (*) 
University of Zimbabwe, Harare, Zimbabwe

254 R. Gaidzanwa
in land held by the Ndebele and Shona peoples. According to Palmer

(1977), Ndebele people’s land was seized by settlers as early as 1893
and those Ndebele who had not been pushed off their land became ten-
ants to settler landlords who demanded rent and hut taxes from them.
Others became wage labourers, while others whose land was alienated
were pushed to Shangani and Gwayi areas, which were characterised by
dry and barren Kalahari soils while the Highveld, which was well watered,
was alienated to the white settlers, instantly turning the indigenous peo-
ple into ‘squatters’ on the land they had previously held (Palmer 1977).
In the Shona-occupied areas, settlers comprising missionaries, miners,
companies and other adventurers seized land of the Shona for specula-
tion in minerals and ‘farming’ labour for exploiting these resources. The
British South Africa Company introduced taxation to force the populace
to work for cash or pay taxes in cattle, grain and gold. Beach (1970)
noted that in most cases, natives’ cattle and grain were grossly under-
valued by over 33%, resulting in over a third of Shona people’s livestock
being seized by force. By 1896, forced labour, taxation and both Shona
and Ndebele land had been alienated to settlers to various degrees. While
forcible occupations of land had alienated both Shona and Ndebele
people, sparking off uprisings against the settlers in 1896, both Shona
and Ndebele people were forced into new modes of coexistence with
the settlers. According to (Palmer 1977), about a third of Shona peo-
ple still lived outside the ‘reserves’ created for them by settlers. The set-
tlers needed reserves to provide labour without generating conflict with
the natives. This was accomplished through wages and taxation, a sys-
tem that affected the Ndebele more acutely since they were on dry, bar-
ren land and had less arable land to work as a means of avoiding wage
labour for the settlers. Shona people, on the other hand, still had some
reserve land to farm as a means of avoiding wage labour for the settlers.
As a result, the settlers in Shona-occupied areas were forced to resort to
recruiting wage labour further afield as far as Malawi, Mozambique and
Zambia. The relative labour scarcity in Shona areas pushed wages higher
than those obtaining in Ndebele areas. Hut taxes doubled in 1904 but
Shona farmers were still able to grow food for the settlers and their
labour until the ‘White Agricultural Policy’ was launched by the British
South Africa Company in 1908.
Palmer (1977) holds that prior to the First World War, there was
no land policy or consensus about the role of reserves in the colony of
11 JOSHUA NKOMO ON LAND: EXPLORING HIS VISION … 255
Southern Rhodesia. However, a series of taxes were imposed on the

native peoples progressively as European immigrants demanded land
for capitalist farming. In 1909, land rent increases on African ‘ten-
ants’ generated more labour working on settler farms, while the mines
also required more labour. Maize and tobacco surpluses were generated
for export from Southern Rhodesia. In 1912, dog taxes were imposed
on Africans to generate more labour for mines, farms and other settler
enterprises. Settler ranches were expanded in Ndebele people’s areas
through the imposition of grazing taxes on Ndebele people, generat-
ing more land and labour for the settlers. Shona farmers competed with
settlers for grazing land, exerting more pressure on the land that both
Shona and settler farmers desired. By 1914, the inexorable pressures on
land of the natives and their intensified taxation impoverished growing
numbers of the Shona and Ndebele peoples. In 1914, a commission pro-
nounced native land holdings ‘excessive’ and proceeded to reduce native
land holdings by five and a half million acres. Those reserves that were
close to transport routes were reduced in size or eradicated to reduce
competition by natives in agriculture. The settler-dominated govern-
ment and society agreed that natives should be wage workers thus ame-
liorating the demand for reserve land which settler farmers desired for
capitalist agriculture. Thus, in many areas, native peoples were dispos-
sessed of their land and relocated to areas without access to transport,
water, capital and other resources. Many native peoples were forced to
undertake wage labour together with subsistence farming although, in
theory, there were provisions for them to purchase land for farming.
However, in practice, settlers thwarted any private property ownership
by the native peoples as a means of minimising competition for labour.
Eventually, in 1925, whites called for racially segregated land holding
which was accomplished through a land commission that approved the
assignment of separate land areas for Europeans (17.4 million acres) and
Africans (6.8 million acres). The rest of the land was for African reserves
and European areas. The provisions of the land commission became
law in 1930 as the Land Apportionment Act through which the settlers
had managed to consolidate their social, economic and political domi-
nation over the African peoples of Zimbabwe. Through land seizures,
which created artificial shortages of land in the reserves while settlers
held more land than they could use, settlers had created a system that
provided them cheap African labour and monopoly over the financing
256 R. Gaidzanwa
of agriculture and transport. Thus, settler agriculture was consolidated

at the expense of the livelihoods of the native peoples. In addition, there
was an effective halt to any future expansion of land holdings by Africans.
In the Native Purchase Areas, where land was held by natives on free-
hold, more than half the land was unsuitable for dry-land cropping and
was situated in remote parts of the country where rail and road trans-
port for marketing agricultural produce were scarce and expensive. Given
the costs of labour, many purchase area farmers could not afford to hire
wage labour and often resorted to polygyny as a labour recruitment and
reproductive strategy. These factors hobbled any opportunities for the
development of a class of black capitalist farmers who could have com-
peted with the settlers.
The reserves became the repository of the bulk of African labour. The
reserves, through the artificial creation of land shortages for the natives,
were overstocked, overgrazed, crowded and most were located on infer-
tile land. Production in the reserves declined as the quality of the land
declined over time. Wage work became the accepted alternative, leading
to migration into towns, mines and white-owned commercial farms by
young men and some women in search of wage work. Wage work ena-
bled men to meet tax obligations, obtain cash for purchasing consumer
goods and agricultural implements. As servicemen were demobilised
from Europe, some of them sought fortunes in Rhodesia, occupying
more state and European land in Rhodesia. Post-war industrialisation
generated demand for more labour in urban areas, resulting in a boom
in the economy and influx control in the towns as labour flooded the
colony of Rhodesia from surrounding territories. It is in this context that
the life and times of Joshua Nkomo will be analysed. Joshua Nkomo
lived through many of the events described in the introduction and also
fought for the independence of the black people of Zimbabwe. His ideas
and approaches to the land question in Zimbabwe were shaped by the
experiences of his youth and adulthood with respect to land alienation
from the native peoples of Zimbabwe.
Nkomo’s Early Experiences with Peasant

Life and Land Use
In his biography (1984), Nkomo recounts the stories he heard about
the killing of natives by Rhodes and his colonists, at random in order
to ensure that natives feared white people. In addition, he refers to the
looting and sharing of natives’ livestock and land between the armed col-
onists after they had subdued the natives. Nkomo recalls how his father,
Nyongolo, a teacher and a farmer who had learned better farming meth-
ods, was so successful that he traded his farm surplus for grain and had
bought a two wheel donkey cart and later a four-wheeled trolley wagon.
Eventually, Nyongolo and his partner, Chief Luposwe’s brother, traded
grain which they sold to white miners and traders, reinvesting the pro-
ceeds in the purchase of more cattle, sheep, goats and donkeys. Since
at that time, before 1914, the natives could till as much land as they
could and rear as many animals as they desired; Nkomo’s family had a
huge herd of over one thousand cattle, over a thousand flock of sheep
and goats and other animals. In addition to the meagre proceeds from
Nyongolo’s teaching, Nkomo’s family was able to live well and became
well-to-do because of their animal husbandry and cropping activities.
The mission taught building, reading, writing, and provided books, chalk
and slates for children to write on and paid the teachers but Nyongolo
also taught his children together with his siblings, Othilia and Stephen,
at home.
Nkomo recalls with sadness and anger, the development of the initia-
tives that displaced black farmers in the wake of the ‘White Agricultural
Policy’ in 1908 and the declaration of his home area at Tshimale near the
mission, a white area, while Nyongolo was studying in South Africa, for
3 years. This resulted in the mission being moved to another place near
Chief Bango’s area near the Matopos. Nkomo also describes how his
uncle, brother to his father, fought in the First World War and how his
uncle fought with the British army in France. The influx of whites into
the colony of Rhodesia, as Zimbabwe was named, gained momentum as
prisoners of war, returning soldiers and other adventurers seeking their
fortunes, came into Zimbabwe. White areas were designated in the well-
watered areas with grass for cattle and other livestock and good soils, for
these settlers, resulting in the movement of the natives off the good land,
pastures and other resources. In addition, forced labour, ‘chibharo’ was
introduced, resulting in the exploitation of black labour with little or no
compensation. Native ‘reserves’ were created to separate the local popu-
lations from the settlers and in the ‘reserves’; the livestock holdings of
the natives were reduced and so were their landholdings. The new clas-
sifications of land did not enable the natives to be freeholders of land but
they became mere occupiers of land with use rights. The white settlers,
by contrast, were given freehold title to their land, making it negotiable
258 R. Gaidzanwa
on the market. Nkomo also notes that Native Commissioners were

appointed to adjudicate and administer all aspects of native life, ranging
from numbers of cattle held, crops grown, numbers of wives married and
other facets of native life.
The inequitable, racially based distribution of land in Rhodesia was
intended to facilitate the procurement of labour for the settler farms
and other enterprises that were developed after the colonisation of
Zimbabwe. The domestic economy of the African rural areas (termed
‘reserves’) was used by the settlers to generate and sustain the repro-
duction of labour throughout the life cycle so that eventualities such
as youth, illness, unemployment and old age of the workers had mini-
mal disruptive effects on colonial agriculture. Thus, the African labour-
ers would be raised in the reserves, attain adulthood and be available for
work in the agriculture, commerce and industry of the colonial economy
and then return to the reserves in cases of illness, unemployment, illness
and death, minimising the costs of their upkeep to colonial employers
(Gaidzanwa 1981). Employees, predominantly male, were employed as
‘single’ workers regardless of their marital statuses and they were paid
survival wages which did not support their wives, children and other
dependents because these dependents fended for themselves in the
reserves. The reserves were therefore reservoirs of cheap labour and
the domestic economies in the reserves did not benefit much from the
accumulation or circulation of incomes and capital since the levels of
extraction and exploitation from labour were very high. Given the mini-
mal investment by capital into the reserve economies, capital was able
to institutionalise cheap labour extraction from the reserves, securing for
capital high levels of accumulation over decades of exploitation of the
native populations.
The Nkomo family first relocated to Mbembeswana, ‘a wild, bushy,
dry, flat land with ravines […] infested with wild animals, hyenas, leop-
ards, lions, wild dogs!’ (Nkomo 1984: 17). Given the ‘impossible’ sit-
uation at Mbembeswana, the Nkomo family moved again, this time to
Malaba’s area, about seventeen kilometres from Mbembeswana. Nkomo
notes that the Native Commissioner came to collect taxes. The native
male was charged one pound per year, and taxes for veterinary ser-
vices were charged. Nyongolo traded maize and did well with Legion
and Antelope Mine customers but decided to move to Bidi where he
got employed as a teacher, though earning very little. Nyongolo sent
his sons, Paul and Joshua, to be schooled in handicrafts, agriculture,
building and other skills at Tsholotsho Government Industrial School

near Nyamandlovu. Joshua became the school bugler and was also
responsible for hoisting the Union Jack every morning and lowering it
every evening. According to Joshua Nkomo, the school was very good
because the teachers adapted existing technologies and developed appro-
priate ones for drilling seed furrows with oxen, enabling peasant farm-
ers to use these technologies since they could not afford to buy tractors
that were used for these purposes by the white farmers who had access to
public state funding and private financing. Nkomo’s vision was to extend
these technologies to peasant farmers in Zimbabwe rather than get-
ting them indebted to banks for expensive technologies which only the
well-financed white farmers could afford. Nkomo was always very clear
that he took after his father who ‘wanted to work on our own account’
(Nkomo 1984: 26).
At the age of 20, after his brother had bought a used bus, Nkomo
ventured into the public transport business after securing a licence to
drive public transport vehicles. He tried his hand at lorry driving for
four pounds a month, while Coloured (mixed race) men earned twelve
pounds a month for the same job. When the 20-year-old Joshua found
about the racial salary disparities, he asked for the twelve pounds a
month given to Coloureds and promptly got sacked for his temerity to
ask for a higher wage. He tried his hand at selling livestock and teach-
ing but soon abandoned all these activities to pursue further education
at Adams College in South Africa since there was no secondary school
for blacks in Rhodesia until 1947. At Adams College, Nkomo learned
Carpentry, Mathematics, Latin, English, Zulu and Physical Science and
earned extra money in Durban making wooden stools with leather seats
to pay his fees. His driver’s licence came in handy since he earned extra
money driving the school secretary. He also earned a diploma in social
work at the Jan Hofmeyr School of Social Work. Nkomo’s rural and
urban social work background enabled him to understand the problems
and challenges faced by the rural and urban poor.
His exposure to white missionaries, white civil servants and colo-
nists, employers, teachers and lecturers exposed him to a variety of
white people beyond the missionaries that many Zimbabwean nation-
alists encountered through their education. In South Africa in particu-
lar, Nkomo learned about the internal differentiation among the white
people as well as the blacks according to their experiences within apart-
heid structures. According to Nkomo, the Boers (Afrikaners originally of
260 R. Gaidzanwa
farming stock) were easier to get on with because most blacks worked
closely with Afrikaner families as farm labourers and, as a result, spoke
Afrikaans more fluently than English. The Afrikaners were also poorer
on balance, than the English settlers who encountered blacks as domestic
and factory workers. However, blacks who worked for whites of English
stock in South Africa were more distant from their employers. Nkomo
noted that most blacks in Johannesburg did not speak English because
of their social and economic distance from the aloof white South Africans
of English stock. In South Africa, Nkomo was exposed to the intricacies
of the politics of the African National Congress, the Afrikaners and the
white South Africans of English stock.
Nkomo also had exposure to different religious practices and beliefs as
well as work practices and situations. In colonial Zimbabwe, his parents
were ardent Methodists while his wife was a devout Roman Catholic.
Nkomo was employed by the railways organisation of the Federation of
Rhodesia and Nyasaland in 1946. In the course of his social work in the
railways, Nkomo was exposed to workers of various cultural, social and
economic backgrounds originating from Nyasaland (Malawi) Northern
Rhodesia (Zambia) and Southern Rhodesia (Zimbabwe), as well as
those from Portuguese East Africa (Mozambique). His social, political
and economic horizons were expanded by his job that necessitated travel
throughout these territories. These experiences stood him in good stead
in his capacity as a nationalist and a trade unionist organising workers to
resist the colonial government’s oppression.
Nkomo had strong feelings and ideas about the need for black peo-
ple to access freehold land rights and own urban land in urban areas in
colonial Zimbabwe. Blacks could only access short term leases on urban
land in urban areas and only in the black townships. Nkomo had set up
business in real estate and insurance sales after leaving his job with the
railways and was keen to access and sell land to black people for urban
housing. He first moved to a ‘superior’ black township, Barbourfields,
but decided to move to Pelandaba, another black area, and build a house
there because Africans were as allowed to build homes on land held on
99 year leases. The strictures on land ownership by blacks prevented the
development of a black middle class in colonial Zimbabwe. In the rural
areas, the Native Land Husbandry Act (1951) did not allow black people
to have freehold rights to land. Thus, the bulk of the blacks could not
use their land in the communal areas as collateral for loans to improve
their agricultural production. Only in the Native Purchase Areas were a
few hundred black people who were former policemen, agricultural dem-
onstrators, teachers and small business people, allowed freehold land
rights. Even there, the Native Purchase Areas as they were called, land
allocated to them was inferior in quality, dry and located on inhospitable
and marginal land not suitable for intensive cropping. Thus, it was not
easy for an African landed class or an urban bourgeoisie to emerge and
consolidate its power through numbers or alliance with other blacks in
urban and rural areas.
What made things worse, according to Nkomo, was the vast
power vested in the Native Commissioners, later known as District
Commissioners, to determine many facets of the lives of black people in
both urban and rural areas. The Native/District Commissioners could
determine the number and type of livestock each African family could
rear, the acreage they could plant with various crops and the kinds of
livelihoods they could pursue. Holleman’s (1968) seminal account of the
relationship between the Chiefs, Councils, Native Commissioners and
the black people is important because it illuminates the sources of fric-
tion arising from power asymmetry between the white state functionaries
and the black traditional authorities and their black subjects. As the col-
ony of Southern Rhodesia absorbed more white settlers, the squeeze on
the lands of black people intensified and the Nkomo family experienced
this squeeze, together with millions of the blacks in the rural and urban
areas of Southern Rhodesia. More black people, like Nyongolo Nkomo’
family, were driven into areas with poorer quality land and lower rainfall.
Nkomo notes that the European Farmers’ Union, as it was called,
argued that as long as African farmers’ agricultural and livestock produc-
tion was not restricted, the white farmers would never be able to sur-
vive or compete with the blacks, arguing that 80% of the commercial
beef in Southern Rhodesia was produced by blacks who had cattle and
good grazing land. Joshua Nkomo noted that the colonial government
declared that it was illegal for black farmers to grow Virginia tobacco,
forcing them to grow Turkish tobacco which was intended for local con-
sumption and not for the export market.
Nkomo argues that these restrictions on black agriculture and entre-
preneurship created the grounds for mobilising black people against
the colonial government. Using these restrictions as grievances, Nkomo
remarks that the nationalist movement in general and Nkomo himself,
as a trained agriculturalist and entrepreneur and son of a dip supervi-
sor, was pushed into opposing the dipping of cattle, the recording of
262 R. Gaidzanwa
the numbers and types of cattle blacks owned for taxation. Black farm-
ers cattle were slaughtered if they went beyond certain limits set by the
white colonial functionaries. This, in the rural areas, people opposed the
digging of contour ridges, (makandiwa), the dipping of cattle because
it was at the dipping points that cattle were assessed and designated for
slaughter if they exceeded the designated numbers. Thus, black rural
poverty was engineered by the white colonial state, and Nkomo was con-
vinced that the white-dominated and racially discriminatory system of
land tenure in both rural and urban areas had to be changed if there was
to be peaceful coexistence between the black and white populations in a
free Zimbabwe.
Nkomo also observed that the major hurdles faced by the black popu-
lation in the colony of Southern Rhodesia were that there was no like-
lihood that any white parliament would ever legislate against racially
discriminatory land laws and practices. Given that a significant propor-
tion of the white parliamentarians, ranging from Winston Field, Garfield
Todd, Ian Smith and others, were farmers who benefitted from the racial
discrimination against black people; they had no interest in undermining
the advantages conferred on them by the racially discriminatory laws of
Southern Rhodesia and eventually, after the demise of the Federation of
Rhodesia and Nyasaland, Rhodesia.
In addition to their individual interests and enterprises in Rhodesia,
the white luminaries of the colonial society had strong links with the
British capitalist establishment. Nkomo points to the land ownership,
mineral interests, manufacturing and services sector of Rhodesia in which
British capitalists were invested in Rhodesia. He cited the example of
Lord Carrington, past director of Rio Tinto Zinc, a company with min-
ing interests in Rhodesia and eventually, Zimbabwe. Lord Carrington
chaired the Lancaster House Conference through which negotiations
of the deal that ushered in the transition to majority rule in 1980, took
place. Nkomo noted that Lord Carrington sympathised with and sup-
ported Ian Smith during the negotiations. Nkomo also pointed to the
desire for an executive Prime Minister and a ceremonial president by
the British, which they got through the negotiations. Nkomo’s ZAPU
wanted a constitution that would allow the Zimbabwe government to
expropriate underutilised land but the British insisted that the Zimbabwe
government had to pay the full market price for the land that was expro-
priated even though the settlers had not paid the full price for the land
they controlled. Nkomo himself would have preferred an arrangement
like the Swynnerton Plan that was crafted for Kenya whereby the British
government would compensate the farmers whose land was expropriated
for black settlement but the British argued that the Rhodesians had been
independent for a long time and Britain could not be held responsible
for paying them.
During the Lancaster House negotiations, Nkomo countered the
British by arguing that the whites were Zimbabweans and there was
a need for the British to fund land reform to Nkomo appreciated the
USA’s help because they argued that they would not use their taxpayers’
money to fund inefficient white landowners and farmers for not utilis-
ing land fully. The Americans argued that if the British were to buy the
land from the whites in Rhodesia, then they (the Americans) were will-
ing to fund its development. However, Nkomo observed that neither the
British nor the Americans were willing to make concrete commitments
about exact sums to be spent on land acquisition. For Nkomo, the prin-
ciple of funding land purchase was critical for moving forward the nego-
tiations. Nkomo asserts that ZAPU/ZIPRA had crafted what he called a
‘turning point’ strategy to decisively end the war by going into full scale
war through their USSR-trained air crews who were to strike Rhodesian
communications and fuel supplies using tanks and armoured personnel
carriers which were to be brought in through the northern border with
Zambia and mount ground strikes through Victoria Falls, seizing air
fields and proceeding into Zimbabwe. Nkomo suspected that the British
had intercepted ZAPU/ZIPRA communications and leaked their plans
to the Rhodesians, resulting in the Rhodesian raids of ZIPRA camps in
Zambia. Nkomo suspected that the British must have used this threat of
assault by ZIPRA from the north through their USSR-trained air crews
to force the Rhodesians into agreeing to a settlement. The Lancaster
House settlement was reached and the issues that were never really
spelled out were those regarding the amounts of money to be availed
and by which parties, to fund land reform and transfer to black farmers.
In any event, after the signing of the Lancaster House settlement,
ZAPU/ZIPRA parted ways with ZANU/ZANLA and the two par-
ties fought the elections separately. Nkomo also noted that Josiah
Tongogara, a force for unity between ZANU and ZAPU, died presum-
ably in a road traffic accident in Mozambique, in December 1979 before
independence on 18th April 1980. The issue of land continued to be
unresolved when independence came. Many demobilised fighters were
of peasant stock and knew no other life except agriculture. They needed
264 R. Gaidzanwa
to be re-absorbed into their communities to resume their lives as best

they could or to have schemes created for them to acquire new skills and
competences necessary for civilian life. Judith Todd describes vividly the
work that she embarked on with the Zimbabwe Project which was set up
to give war veterans start-up capital for various projects, including those
in agriculture which needed large quantities of land as well as others in
the service and commercial sector that only required limited urban and
peri-urban land, offices and other types of resources. The post-independ-
ence era was characterised by lots of activity around land issues relating
to the demobilisation of war veterans, the acquisition of land for resettle-
ment of the war veterans and other people who needed residential, agri-
cultural and commercial land.
Nkomo’s Vision About Land Reorganisation

Nkomo’s vision about land in an independent Zimbabwe was based on
the reorganisation of land in the communal and small- and large-scale
commercial farmers were usually underutilised and needed to be
acquired for use by the small-scale commercial and communal farmers
in such a way that the land would not be degraded as had occurred in
the communal areas. He recognised that communal farmers were impov-
erished and could not afford to adopt and apply the measures that had
been used by the white commercial farmers to develop the land with
state assistance. He also recognised that the post-colonial state did not
have the resources to invest in all the communal farmers to enable them
to improve their farming methods and purchase technologies and inputs
to become commercially successful farmers in the short term. Therefore,
his suggestion was that the state had to acquire land for resettlement
by small farmers as cooperatives or collectives on a non-racial and non-
political basis to make them commercially viable. The cooperatives and/
or collectives would undertake crop and animal husbandry and animals
would be moved from the communal farms into the new areas which
would undertake scientific field and crop husbandry to avoid overstock-
ing. In Nkomo’s model, the state entities responsible for conservation,
extension, water and other development would carry out the necessary
surveys and planning to determine which places would be suitable for
cropping, ranching and settlement and poor areas would be designated
for settling people together, while ranching and agricultural land would
also be located separately from residences. The same processes were
to take place in the commercial farming areas that were under white
control.
Nkomo’s objective was to ensure that communal people recognised
and understood that the way in which they were settled and practicing
their agriculture was wasteful and needed reorganisation. He pointed to
the scattered homes and fields of communal people which wasted space
which could be better utilised for cropping and animal husbandry. He
expected that communal people would have to be mobilised and per-
suaded to agree to bring their homes close to each other as villages,
releasing more land which could be used for ranching and cropping.
Eventually, Nkomo expected that communal land could be reclaimed
and put to good use, avoiding overstocking and enabling herds to
grow. In the long run, Nkomo’s vision was that these reorganised vil-
lages would grow into towns where social services and infrastructures
such as schools, clinics, shops, piped water and electricity would be pro-
vided, becoming nuclei for commerce and industry and creating jobs. In
Nkomo’s view, agricultural land would be consolidated, with each fam-
ily retaining its land portion which, however, would be worked coop-
eratively to maximise and optimise the use of agricultural equipment, the
purchase of farm supplies and inputs such as fertilisers, seed and pesti-
cides. Nkomo also expected that estate farming would be continued as
collective agricultural lands. Nkomo’s vision was informed by the prob-
lems that individual small farmers experienced in accessing agricultural
loans. However, he did not consider the impact that the commercial
farming model had on the peasant and workers’ imaginations. The com-
mercial farm model, based on individual land ownership, became the
model many small farmers aspired to and events in the late 1990s would
show the extent of that model’s hold on the imaginations of the peas-
ants, the dispossessed and the aspiring farmers.
In urban and mining areas, Nkomo’s vision was to induce changes
that would incorporate black people as significant stakeholders in com-
merce and industry so that they went beyond labour provision for exist-
ing white enterprises. Nkomo’s vision was that the black people must
mobilise themselves cooperatively and acquire property in commerce and
industry. He explained that this process was not to be about acquiring
previously white undertakings but creating new ones which could access
loans and create jobs for black people. He noted that many black women
had no jobs, land or other means of subsistence and lived as vendors and
shebeen queens (illegal liquor sellers) and needed particular attention.
266 R. Gaidzanwa
Nkomo suggested the creation of people’s markets which could be run

cooperatively by the people themselves rather than municipalities and
councils in urban areas, as had been the case in colonial Zimbabwe.
The building of people’s capacities was very important to Nkomo who
desired that black people develop pride and confidence in their own
abilities after nearly a century of oppression and undermining of their
confidence in their capacities. The markets that Nkomo discussed were
expected to service and dispose of the produce from the farmers and to
create jobs for the unemployed. The urban, peri-urban and rural coop-
erative production entities would utilise the urban markets as outlets for
the agricultural produce ranging from vegetables, grain, poultry, dairy,
piggery, rabbitry and other farm produce.
Nkomo stressed that for this post-war development to succeed, there
had to be state commitment, involvement of leaders in commerce, par-
ticularly farming, industry, mining and other sectors. Nkomo was of the
view that if there was a concerted effort in reorganising Zimbabwean
society. Increased food production, food exports, and complete rehabili-
tation and recovery of the economy would result.
Nkomo’s and ZAPU/ZIPRA Initiatives Around

Land After Independence
Nkomo and his party ZAPU did not depend solely on the new govern-
ment to determine what was to happen to the ZIPRA veterans. Nkomo
and ZAPU set up NITRAM, a private company, to be the holding entity
for the resettlement schemes for ZIPRA war veterans. ZAPU mobilised
ZIPRA war veterans who had no jobs and training prior to the war, to
pool their demobilisation benefits and pensions to buy farms that were
available in many locations around the country so that the war veter-
ans would be self-sufficient and learn skills to run their own enterprises
rather than depending on the state for handouts. Under these schemes,
over four thousand ZIPRA war veterans contributed Z$50 a month
(then the Zimbabwe dollar was equivalent to just over 1 UK pound)
to buy shares in the enterprises in which they worked. The war veterans
could also incorporate locals into these schemes, creating employment
and developing the skills of war veterans and security for them as share-
holders in the enterprises in which they worked. As Nkomo observed,
these enterprises did not cost the state anything and provided a strong
incentive to the members and shareholders of the enterprises to make a

success of these enterprises. These initiatives provided ample demonstra-
tion of Nkomo’s and ZAPU’s entrepreneurial bent from the beginning
of independence. Nkomo’s experiences as an agriculturalist, a teacher,
a builder, a driver, social worker and real estate entrepreneur gave him
a broad understanding of the possibilities for tapping the resources and
potential in the environment given the reluctance by the British and
Americans to commit themselves to specific figures in a funding plan
for land acquisition in Zimbabwe. According to Nkomo, ZAPU and
some ZIPRA veterans, through their holding company NITRAM, had
acquired various properties around Zimbabwe. According to Nkomo,
NITRAM had four farms and three business enterprises and ZAPU had
two farms and five business enterprises. The farms were used for resettle-
ment, vegetable farming and cattle ranching and the commercial prop-
erties provided jobs skills and training for entrepreneurs, secretaries and
provided health and other services.
ZAPU/ZIPRA properties included the Castle Arms Motel and Nest
Egg and Woody Glen, smallholdings in Bulawayo, Ascot farm in Bulawayo,
Hampton Ranch near Connemara barracks in the Midlands province,
among other enterprises. Ascot Farm grew tomatoes and onions, with
maize as a break crop. Hampton Ranch had 200 cattle. In Harare, the
Snake Park had a motel and entertainment complex and a snake park.
There was a garage and a clothing factory with its own retail outlet in
Harare. There was also a chicken farm which was run by a cooperative of
women. ZAPU had also started a secretarial college and the first of what
was intended to be a chain of rural health clinics. ZAPU had also bought
urban housing which was to be sold to its occupants to give people a leg
up the property ladder and avail them a meaningful stake in their coun-
try’s economy after nearly a century of exclusion. Nkomo was convinced
that these enterprises were important because Prime Minister Mugabe had
confided to him during a private meeting that ‘the official resettlement
schemes were a national disaster’ (Nkomo 1984: 227). Nkomo’s experi-
ences in Europe and parts of Africa had convinced him that dependence
on the state and local authorities disempowered people unnecessarily since
most people have capacities and capabilities to fend for themselves and
their families as long as the state provided sufficient infrastructure. The
$150 per month stipends of the war veterans were viewed by Nkomo as
a basis for investing in and building enterprises that could support the war
268 R. Gaidzanwa
veterans and their families. As Todd observed, ZAPU/ZIPRA were cog-

nisant of the need to invest demobilisation money wisely and war veterans
were to be availed on-the-job training as a means of tackling unemploy-
ment.
Gukurahundi and Disruption of ZAPU’s Land Initiatives

Nkomo’s prescience was uncanny because he had reservations about the
use of force in resolving social and economic issues in Zimbabwe. In his
biography (1984: xiv), Nkomo stated that ‘young people have grown up
knowing nothing but the chaos and disruption […] the focus of their
lives, the false glamour of the gun’.
After his party, ZAPU was accused of sponsoring dissidents; Nkomo
and other ZAPU leaders such as Josiah Chinamano, Joseph Msika, Jini
Ntutha and others were expelled from the government. ZAPU proper-
ties were impounded by the government without compensation and over
ten cooperative members in ZAPU enterprises were killed. In addition,
ZIPRA commanders Dumiso Dabengwa and Lookout Masuku and oth-
ers were jailed. ZIPRA and ZAPU war records, the names of exiles, war
casualties and the injured were confiscated by the state. Nkomo observed
that the names of the war-dead on the ZIPRA side are missing from the
roll of honour at Heroes’ Acre in Harare. The Gukurahundi, a brigade,
named for the first heavy rains that sweep away the chaff, was unleashed
on the populace in Matabeleland and the parts of the Midlands where
ZAPU was active and supported. According to the Catholic Justice and
Peace Commission’s Report (1997), at least 20,000 people were killed
by the Fifth Brigade with collusion by ZANU.
Despite his expulsion from government, Nkomo did not cease his
entrepreneurial activities. He explored joint ventures with players in
the private sector including the manufacture of bottles and containers
to substitute the imported ones. He also ventured into the pharmaceu-
tical sector and the manufacture of blankets and electrical insulators.
However, his initiatives were thwarted through the intimidation, ‘repri-
mand’ and arrest of his potential partners. He sums up the story of his
life up to that point with regret at the situation regarding land. Nkomo
notes that Zimbabwe’s food surplus was, by 1984, produced on only
half of Zimbabwe’s usable land. Half of Zimbabwe’s land was owned
by around six thousand white farmers, while the rest was settled by six
of the seven and a half million black people in Zimbabwe. The inequity
in landholding continued to be a problem because black Zimbabweans

were still marginalised with respect to landholding.
Nkomo noted that white farmers succeeded because of the alloca-
tion of the best land, well watered and well situated, for their ranching
and cropping enterprises, while blacks were shunted into marginal lands
with poor soils. In addition, state investment in irrigation, concessional
farm loans, water and irrigation, road, transport and power resources,
and free technical advice gave the white farmers an added advantage. The
freehold land held by whites could be used as collateral to borrow from
financial institutions, while blacks, the bulk of whom occupied com-
munal land, were unable to use their land as collateral to finance their
operations. White farmers, according to Nkomo, had absolute author-
ity over black workers whose labour they commanded. Blacks had their
livestock culled and sold off cheaply. As black people’s land became
congested through population increase, unemployment and underem-
ployment became rampant. Wasteful land use and scattered settlements
criss-crossed by paths, all contributed to the poor utilisation of land, rais-
ing the costs of provision of safe, piped water, electricity and other ser-
vices. Nkomo was quite scathing about the present settlement patterns
characterised by scattered homes, loose dogs, uncontrolled grazing and
other disorganised and unplanned activities, spaces and practices. The
cutting down of trees for fuel also denuded the soil and facilitated envi-
ronmental degradation. Nkomo suggested the reorganisation of rural
settlements, the construction of paddocks, planning of villages, fields
and other spaces, cultivation and provision of food, water and other ser-
vices. In these initiatives, Nkomo wanted the war veterans, farm workers
and the land-hungry in the communal areas to be availed good technical
advice. Nkomo’s rationale was that good farmers in the communal areas
would also be good neighbours to commercial farmers. It was not clear
how such initiatives would be funded.
Nkomo was cognisant of the plight of the bulk of workers in urban
areas. Most had no houses of their own, working as vendors, part-time
and full-time employees in commercial and service enterprises. Nkomo
felt that these workers had no stake in their communities since they
had no property to defend or invest in as city councils and authorities
were impersonal and not too bothered about crafting plan to include
the urban poor in home ownership schemes. While the urban poor had
no property, they could use as collateral, they remained partly invested
in the communal areas, resulting in split strategies of investment and
270 R. Gaidzanwa
expenditure which depleted their incomes and provided no long-term

pathways out of poverty. Nkomo’s suggestion on collective ownership of
neighbourhood property for the urban poor was not well elaborated and
seems not to take into account the individualisation of household hous-
ing, farmland and other assets, making it difficult to imagine how collec-
tive ownership of neighbourhood property would be operationalised for
the urban poor.
Nkomo’s critique was not confined to the communal areas. He noted
that the commercial farm, while large and profitable, produced low yields
per unit area. The production was based on cheap, exploited labour and
could be increased if their production was intensified, using more labour
on the same unit area. Nkomo suggested intensification of land use on
commercial farms and re-planning land use and settlement on commu-
nal lands. He pointed to the existence of underutilised water resources,
aquifers and dam sites which could be harnessed to improve production
in communal areas.
In the aftermath of the Gukurahundi, ZANU and ZAPU worked out
a settlement resulting in a unity pact in 1987. Since 1985, the state had
acquired land on a willing-buyer-willing–seller basis giving compensation
to the sellers. In addition, the state acquired abandoned and underuti-
lised land and had the right of first refusal to any land that was on the
market. The state continued with some land reorganisation along spe-
cific models, namely models A, B, C and D. However, the bulk of reset-
tlement after independence was along Model A schemes, characterised
by intensive individual arable land allocations and grazing areas. All set-
tlers were allocated residential plots within communal villages where
amenities such as water and vegetable gardens are provided. Farmer
committees elected by settlers were supposed to plan and coordinate all
community activities except production. The farmers had permitted to
cultivate land and de-pasture stock, all at the pleasure of the Minister of
Agriculture.
Model B farms were also set up and these farms were supposed to
be worked communally and with cooperative living. This model was
designed for people with very limited resources through cooperative till-
ing, procurement of credit stock, equipment and marketing produce. All
the land and property as to be held cooperatively with elected manage-
ment committees, making decisions for the collectivities. Labour and
skills were to be contributed and profits to be shared according to agreed
formulae within the cooperatives. Skills which were not available within
these entities were to be sought through the employment of outsiders.

This model was intended for small-scale intensive enterprises such as
community irrigation systems of young people with experience of collec-
tive living and enterprise in the neighbouring countries during the war
of national liberation. However, this model scheme never really took off
and none are known to have survived to date. The other model, namely
C with intensive settlement combined with a centralised estate farm, is
hardly spoken about. Thus, the resettlement that took place in the 1980s
was predominantly along the Model A and this is the model that survives
to date and is known as Minda Mirefu (the long fields). The other mod-
els fell by the wayside and were quietly abandoned.
However, in the 1990s, in the wake of the disagreement between the
British and the ZANU (PF) dominated government in which Nkomo
was incorporated after the Unity Accord, land invasions by war veter-
ans and other landless people took place sporadically, gaining ground
in 1999, when Nkomo died. These invasions were impelled by the slow
pace of land transfers based on white willing sellers of land and willing
black buyers. The perceived slow pace of the land transfers by ZANU
(PF) resulted in the constitutional amendments of the 1990s and these
amendments sought to accelerate land transfers. When the Lancaster
House constitution’s provisions expired in 1990, the government sub-
jected rural land to compulsory acquisition through designation and
compensation to landowners from 1992. This move generated some
resistance with some dispossessed farmers pointing out that the land
was not being allocated to the landless but to cronies and ZANU-PF
functionaries who did not utilise it. Land transfers were very slow and
many involved black elites rather than the black poor and landless (Moyo
1999).The British pointed to the lease of land to black elites, thereby
justifying the slowing down of funding of land transfers. Clare Short,
the British Minister for International Development, argued in 1997
that Britain had no obligation to fund land acquisition in Zimbabwe.
This response by Clare Short was not acceptable to the Zimbabwe gov-
ernment which responded by listing 1471 white-owned commercial
farms for compulsory acquisition through the Fast Track Land Reform
Program. To compound the problems of financing, the Zimbabwe gov-
ernment was confronted with strikes in 1997, 1998 and 1999 on the
back of growing poverty and attempts to raise food prices. Amidst all
the social upheaval, the government gave into war veterans’ demands for
pensions and the unbudgeted payouts to war veterans in 1997 resulted
272 R. Gaidzanwa
in the crash of the Zimbabwe dollar. In addition to the war veterans’

demands, the Zimbabwe government was forced to deal with an emer-
gent civil rights movement comprising students, women, trade unionists
and workers, the landless and business people, all of whom converged
into a strong civil rights movement demanding economic, social and
political reform in Zimbabwe. The strikes of 1997, 1998 and 1999 and
the economic decline since 1990 strengthened the social demands of
the poor and the excluded. The rejection of the government-led draft
constitution in 2000 strengthened the forces of democratisation led by
the Movement for Democratic Change under the leadership of Morgan
Tsvangirai. Under these pressures, the beleaguered Zimbabwe gov-
ernment, angered by the rejection of the proposed 2000 constitutions
requiring Britain to pay for land acquisition, ignored war veterans’ land
occupations and the Fast Track Land Reform process started in earnest.
Under the Fast Track Land Reform program, two resettlement mod-
els, namely the A1 targeting 160,000 landless small farmers and the A2
model, targeting 51000 small-scale medium black farmers were devel-
oped. War veterans dominated the A1 farms as indicated by Matondi
(2012) and Hungwe (2011). However, this strategy backfired badly
because there was no systematic training for resettled farmers. In some
cases, settlement of A1 and A2 farmers took place through state organs
as expected but in other cases, self-settlement occurred and was rati-
fied in retrospect resulting in the de-capitalisation of the former com-
mercial farm areas as farmhouses were looted, infrastructure vandalised
and financing of small- and medium-scale farmers was not systematically
organised and repayment schedules set up. Attempts by the Ministry of
Lands and Agriculture to audit farm ownership failed as the politically
powerful and well-connected multiple farm owners resisted farm audits.
Tobacco farming by small-scale producers in the communal and small-
scale resettlement areas and some large farmers boomed but was accom-
panied by land degradation and deforestation in the absence of reliable
transport by rail to move coal for curing tobacco. Many farmers went
into debt because of insufficient training, financing and state support of
the kind that the white farmers had received before 1980.
In the urban areas, housing the majority remained a major problem
because many urban councils and authorities were not able to provide
affordable housing for the working classes and only the middle classes
could secure mortgages for their own housing through financial insti-
tutions. The shortage of urban housing countrywide resulted in the
jerry-building of rooms on existing homes and houses in many high-

density areas where the poor working classes lived. Working and poor
people built illegal dwellings and work premises on existing premises,
common land, roadsides and any available land. Schlyter (1989) and
Fundire have written about urban housing deprivation especially among
urban women in Zimbabwe. While the focus was placed on rural agri-
cultural land and land reform, there was little being done by the state
to make residential land available especially for women who had precari-
ous land rights in rural Zimbabwe. By 1991, men and women under the
age of 30 were equally represented in rural to urban migration, indicat-
ing the problems in rural Zimbabwe that made rural life unpalatable to
both young men and women. In particular, young rural women could
only look forward to unpaid domestic labour as wives and daughters of
landholders. Both young men and women resisted toil under the control
of male elders who had communal, commercial and resettlement land.
GEMINI survey (1994) showed that the Structural Adjustment pro-
gram had eroded jobs in the formal sector, swelling the informal sector
with young unemployed people, working in vending, shoe repair, sell-
ing cooked and uncooked food, running bars and shebeens (unlicensed
liquor outlets in residential areas) cross-border trade with South Africa,
among many other activities. These activities helped the unemployed and
underemployed to survive the contraction of the formal sector. Urban
poverty became more visible since very little or no affordable land was
availed to the urban poor to support their livelihoods and housing. A
Poverty Assessment Study Survey (2003) indicated that poverty levels in
Zimbabwe had increased from 25% in 1990 to 63% in 2003.
Urban ‘housing co-operatives’ in urban areas emerged as a response
to housing shortages and the desire by urban poor people for hous-
ing of their own. However, the urban housing problems continued as
poverty grew into the new millennium. By 2005, GDP had declined by
40% in the previous 8 years and halved income per head. Two-thirds of
the population lived below the poverty datum line on less than US$1
a day, and unemployment was estimated to be close to 70%. Inflation
stood at 1200%. As a result of growing poverty, at least two million peo-
ple, including many with high-level skills, had left the country, while
Zimbabwe’s share of SADC’s GDP declined from 3.6% in 1996 to
1.4% in 2006. Zimbabwe declined from its position of the second larg-
est economy in SADC to tenth place in 2006 (Games 2006; Hawkins
2006).
274 R. Gaidzanwa
Operation Murambatsvina
In June 2005, in the middle of winter and a drought, the government
of Zimbabwe embarked on Operation Murambatsvina (Remove the
filth) through which the state violently removed poor people from the
cities by demolishing illegal and informal structures and settlements in
the townships, peri-urban areas and in some growth points in rural areas.
The numbers removed are contested with the government of Zimbabwe
claiming that it removed 58,000 people and the United Nation’s fig-
ure pointing to 700,000 (UNDP Report of the Special Envoy of the
Secretary General of UN Anna Tibaijuka 2005). This exercise was remi-
niscent of the colonial state’s forced removals of the native populations
from both rural and urban areas to suit the needs of settlers.
In the central business districts of towns and cities, illegal struc-
tures used as kiosks, stalls in markets and pavements were demolished.
Overcrowded offices used by small businesses were closed down so that
thousands of tailors, seamstresses, import-export and trading enter-
prises were shut down. However, the ‘Murambatsvina’ operation did not
change the situations of the poor because poverty grew faster and the sit-
uations of the poor deteriorated further. Small businesses folded up and
urban rents rose steeply as house seekers chased limited legal housing.
Overcrowding intensified and pensioner/house-owners’ incomes dried
up. The poor were forced to seek more expensive services as the poorer
service providers were driven out of business by the state. The disease
burden increased as the sick, especially those with HIV were dispersed
and untraceable due to ‘Murambatsvina’.
Post-Murambatsvina and the Economic Collapse

After ‘Murambatsvina’, the economic decline of Zimbabwe contin-
ued unabated and culminated in 2008, in the abandonment of the
Zimbabwe dollar. In the general election of 2008, ZANU-PF lost the
election to Morgan Tsvangirai’s Movement for Democratic Change in
what was considered a flawed election characterised by irregularities. In
the run-off that was held because Tsvangirai was said not to have gar-
nered the required 51% of the presidential votes, violence was unleashed
by ZANU-PF and state-related military functionaries on the MDC sup-
porters. Tsvangirai withdrew from the run-off citing violence and in the
subsequent Mbeki-brokered Government of National Unity, Tsvangirai

became Prime Minister and Mugabe remained the President.
The Zimbabwe economy grew by just over 10% during the
Government of National Unity between 2008 and 2012. However, in
2013, ZANU-PF went back into power and the temporary rally of the
economy was reversed. Water and sanitation infrastructure collapsed and
urban drinking water availability declined from 95, 1% in 2012 to less
than 20% in 2015. The situation that ‘Murambatsvina’ sought to address
has resumed in worse form since there are scanty water and sanitation
services delivered by local authorities. Lake Chivero in Harare is heavily
polluted and all over Zimbabwe, shanty settlements, businesses and other
enterprises of the urban poor with no water or sanitation have sprung up
in many urban areas under worse conditions than those that prevailed
in 2005. Unemployment is over 90% in many areas and the majority of
the population is in informal employment as hawkers, vendors and small
business owners. Local authorities are locked in battles with vendors who
sell food, clothes, electronic goods and other wares in the central busi-
ness areas which provide a broader and wealthier customer base than the
impoverished shanties and townships of the poor.
By 2015, the government of Zimbabwe was forced to admit that
commercial farming had collapsed in most farming areas and food relief
for the majority was necessary. The economy deteriorated as power,
transport and other infrastructure decayed. Massive job losses occurred
as de-industrialisation took place. The dreams that Nkomo had for
reconstruction and development after independence never came true.
Conclusion
The developments in post-independence Zimbabwe point to the difficul-
ties of realising the plans that Nkomo had for Zimbabwe. Nkomo him-
self was very ambitious and had plans for land use in rural and urban
Zimbabwe, that could not be realised during as well as after his life-
time. Nkomo had to deal with the schism within the nationalist move-
ment, dating back to the early 1960s. His ZAPU’s rivalry with Mugabe’s
ZANU never was resolved and hobbled the realisation of Nkomo’s plans
for Zimbabwe. Nkomo had broad exposure as a son of a prosperous
peasant farmer, a social worker, an entrepreneur and a politician and was
able to relate to many types of people, ranging from peasants to workers
276 R. Gaidzanwa
and business people in Zimbabwe. Nkomo had ideas about land reform
and reorganisation that were influenced by his exposure the Eastern
Europe and Western countries. However, in independent Zimbabwe, the
handling of the land question after independence has generated prob-
lems and remains unfinished business in both rural and urban Zimbabwe.
Nkomo also had to contend with acting as Mugabe’s junior partner
in the Government of National Unity after 1987 and was not able to
influence the land question in the ways he desired. This chapter has ana-
lysed Nkomo’s thoughts about land reorganisation after independence
in Zimbabwe. It is important to note that Nkomo was quite entrepre-
neurial and embarked on land, farm and property purchases for ZAPU
and ZIPRA and did not wait for the government to fund the resettle-
ment and re-integration of ZIPRA forces after the war. Unfortunately,
these properties were confiscated by the state under Mugabe’s control
and they have never really been properly utilised as intended.
Nkomo’s land-related initiatives included the state-sponsored as well
as the private ones that his party embarked upon given their realisation
that they would not have as much control over the state as ZANU had.
However, the catastrophic decline of agriculture and the economy in the
35 years of ZANU-PF and Mugabe’s rule indicate that there is need to
rethink the use of land in Zimbabwe and to critically examine how peo-
ple of various economic, social and political dispositions desire to use
land. This chapter has also critically examined Nkomo’s ideas about col-
lective use of land under specific circumstances and these ideas proved
to be non-viable, unpopular and difficult to implement. However, the
present economic collapse and the situation with land both rural and
urban, cannot possibly have been what Nkomo intended for Zimbabwe.
It remains for the present generations of activists, scholars, theorists and
citizens to revisit the land issues in Zimbabwe in ways that address the
needs of the majority of Zimbabweans.
References
Beach, D. N. (1970). Afrikaner and Shona settlement in the Enkeldoorn area.
Zambezia, 1(i), 5–34.
Gaidzanwa, R. B. (1981). Promised land: Towards a land policy for Zimbabwe.
Unpublished Masters thesis. Institute of Social Studies, The Hague, The
Netherlands.
Games, D. (2006). A nation in Turmoil: The experience of South African firms

doing business in Zimbabwe. In SAIIA business in Africa report. No. 8.
SAIIA: Johannesburg.
Hawkins, A. (2006, May 4). Still standing: The economic, political and security
situation in Zimbabwe in 2006 and its implications for the SADC region. Paper
Presented at the Institute of Strategic Studies, University of Pretoria.
Holleman. (1968). Chief, council and commissioner. Assern: Van Gorkum and
Co. NV.
Matondi, P. (2012). Zimbabwe’s fast track land reform. London: Zed Books.
Moyo, S. (1999). Land and democracy in Zimbabwe. Monograph series no. 7
(p. 19). Harare: SAPES.
Munyuki-Hungwe, M. (2011). In search of ‘community’ in Zimbabwe’s fast
track resettlement area of Mazowe district. Unpublished Ph.D. thesis. Lund
University.
Native Land Husbandry Act. (1951). Salisbury: Govt. printers.
Palmer, R. (1997). Land and racial domination in Zimbabwe. Berkeley, LA:
University of California Press.
Schlyter, A. (1989). Women householders and housing strategies: The case of
Harare. Zimbabwe. Research Report 26. Nordic African Institute.
CHAPTER 12
Joshua Nkomo on Transitional

Justice in Zimbabwe
Everisto Benyera
Introduction
Throughout his life, Joshua Nkomo as leading political figure in
Zimbabwe before and after independence has undergone various interpre-
tations. To some, he has largely been understood as a pioneering politi-
cal liberator and a conciliatory nation builder—a ‘Father Zimbabwe’.
To those who challenged his leadership, Nkomo was a weak, prevaricat-
ing, moderate and non-committal liberator. This chapter is focused on
Nkomo’s conceptions and contributions to not only political transition but
also transitional justice as a way of achieving full liberation. This chapter
departs from the prevalent reading of Nkomo in terms of power politics
and nationalism and privileges a reading of Nkomo from the terms and
notions of transitional justice that do not place much emphasis on political
power but on healing communities inflicted with decades of human rights
abuses. Thus Nkomo’s views on transitional justice are pertinent given that
he was the leader of the then opposition Patriotic Front-Zimbabwe African
People’s Union (PF-ZAPU) which signed the 1987 Unity Accord with the
E. Benyera (*) 

280 E. Benyera
Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF) thereby

ending one of Zimbabwe’s post-1980 atrocities known as Gukurahundi.
After the Unity Accord, Nkomo accepted the position of Vice-President of
Zimbabwe, a junior position which he shared with Simon Muzenda as co-
Vice President.
What is posited in this chapter is that Nkomo’s views on transi-
tional justice were contrary to those of the government he served as
he opposed such statist mechanisms as amnesties, indemnities and par-
dons in favour of truth telling, reparations, accountability, memorialisa-
tion and indeed institutional reforms. The thesis presented here is that
Nkomo was cognisant of the need to seek accountability for human
rights abuses, especially in the Matabeleland and Midlands Provinces
in post-independence Zimbabwe but was not able to convince new
ZANU-PF on the need of such a trajectory. This explains the cur-
rent hunger for a mode of transitional justice in which the state does
not exempt itself and its agencies but rather favours truth telling and
accountability as a way of according citizens’ full closure and healing.
Devoid of political transition in Zimbabwe, genuine transitional justice
will remain a pipe dream, and a dark cloud will continue to hang over
the country with the accumulated anger and hatred being bequeathed
from generation to generation.
Generally, transitional justice is defined as a set of mechanisms, poli-
cies and instruments used to seek historical accountability for gross
human rights abuses. According to Benyera (2014: 336):
[A]t a different level, it is concerned with the choices, mechanisms, and

the quality of justice implemented by states emerging from episodes
of gross human rights abuses such as, civil wars and totalitarian rule, to
respond to past oppression and injustice while constructing a new future
based on democracy and the rule of law.
The aims of transitional justice are therefore broadly to seek historical

accountability, establish the truth, deter future abuses and shepherd the
post-conflict state into future, that is, characterised by sustainable peace,
enhance reconciliation, restore community relations (social cohesion)
and inter alia.
This chapter is presented in five sections. The first section explores
the need for transitional justice in Zimbabwe; it is followed by a sec-
tion that presents what this chapter considers to be genuine transitional
12 JOSHUA NKOMO ON TRANSITIONAL JUSTICE IN ZIMBABWE 281
justice. The third section presents Nkomo’s views on human rights

abuses. The fourth section is an overview of statist transitional justice
mechanism used in Zimbabwe during the time of Nkomo. This cul-
minates in a section that presents Nkomo’s view on one of the statist
transitional justice mechanisms used during his time, i.e. unity govern-
ments. The fifth section grapples with the notion of attempting transi-
tional justice in the absence of political transition. This section argues
that such an endeavour is complicated by the fact that the political party
accused of committing atrocities in Zimbabwe is still the party in power.
This leads to a discussion on Nkomo’s views on the 1982/1983 geno-
cide, otherwise known as Operation Gukurahundi. As Nkomo was both
Father Zimbabwe and the leading political figure in the most-affected
provinces of Matabeleland North and South and the Midland, his views
on the genocide deserve to be interrogated. This section presents how
Nkomo pursued genuine transitional justice as an exhibit not only of his
belief that genuine transitional justice is a sine qua non for nation build-
ing in Zimbabwe but how he personally initiated such mechanisms. The
peroration of this chapter paints Nkomo as a man who believed in one
nation, ‘sonke singama MaZimbabwe’ (we are all Zimbabweans).
The Need for Transitional Justice

The need for genuine transitional justice in Zimbabwe cannot be over-
emphasised. As aptly stated by Ndlovu-Gatsheni and Benyera (2015),
Zimbabwe lacks interventions that genuinely seek to bring social cohe-
sion to this racially and ethnically polarised nation. This absence of genu-
ine healing and reconciliation was conceived out of the state’s proclivity
towards mechanisms that privilege political transitions over transitional
justice since 1980. This proclivity for pardons, amnesties, clemencies and
commissions of inquiry has been an overarching theme in Zimbabwe’s
historiography. On several occasion, the late Nkomo rebuked the nation
for such tendencies, especially at the burial of one of ZIPRA’s command-
ers General Lookout Masuku. The problem in Zimbabwe is therefore not
that of an absence of transitional justice, but rather an absence of genuine
transitional justice, with an emphasis on justice. Lessons from the South
African Truth and Reconciliation Commission are that any transitional jus-
tice mechanism which negates the justice component is a farce. Because
without justice, the formerly disadvantaged and oppressed will remain
exactly in that position of underprivileged, oppression and marginalisation,
282 E. Benyera
while their former oppressor will carry into the new dispensation all the
privileges and all forms of power which they used to enjoy.
Five factors therefore necessitate transitional justice in Zimbabwe,
without which the transitional process which began in 1980 and is still
ongoing will remain a protracted and agonising never-ending affair.
Firstly, without accountability for historical human rights abuses and
long spells under dictatorship, societies rarely transition into sustainable
peace. They become what Benyera (2014) termed stagnant transitional
states, i.e. states that got stuck in the transitional process. Once most his-
torical human rights abuses have been accounted for and the perpetra-
tors brought to justice can nation building and state building take root.
Besides Zimbabwe, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is case in
point of a stagnant transitional state.
Secondly, transitional justice must address all the five pillars of transi-
tional justice. These pillars are justice, reparations, truth seeking, mem-
ory and memorialisation and institutional reform. Any transitional justice
that emphasises part of the five pillars and negates others, even one, is
bound to, at least fail, and at most perpetuate the injustices of the pre-
decessor regime. In Zimbabwe, this is complicated by the fact that the
political party accused of being the main perpetrator and beneficiary of
human rights abuses is still in power. The problem becomes that of try-
ing to transition within the same political dispensation. Criminal justice is
absent in Zimbabwe and has been replaced by executive pardons, amnes-
ties and clemencies. Reparations were awarded only to a handful such
as the War Victims Compensation Scheme. The truth has never been
fully recovered, and some of the most important documents such as the
Chihambakwe and Dumbutshena Commission of Inquiry reports have
never been made public. This amounted to the obstruction of transi-
tional justice by the state.
While memorialisation has occurred, this has been largely done
at national level and led by the state. Days such as the Heroes Day,
Independence Day and Defence Forces Day are used to collectively
memorialise the brutalities of the predecessor regime and the enemy states
such as the United Kingdom and the USA while exalting the current
regime as a champion of human rights. Memorialisation at the community
level has largely been outlawed especially in the two Matabeleland and the
Midlands Provinces which experienced the 1981/1982 genocide code
named Operation Gukurahundi. Institutional reform has been absent in
Zimbabwe whose uniformed forces witnessed a series of pseudo-reforms
such as the 1979 unification of all the armies operating in the then
Rhodesia and the 2008 harmonisation of the security sector to form one
command structure. In other words, there is no security sector person-
nel held accountable for their actions during Zimbabwe’s war of liberation
and after. Again, executive amnesties, clemencies and pardons have been
used to exonerate those who otherwise ordered or carried out the most
heinous human rights abuses in Zimbabwe.
What Constitutes Genuine Transitional

Justice in Zimbabwe?
What constitutes genuine transitional justice has been contested both
at scholarship and in practice. This is attributable to the fluidity of the
term and the infancy of the discipline of transitional justice. In practice,
what constitutes genuine transitional justice has been mired by the trans-
formation of transitional justice to the status of an industry, compete
with experts, toolkits, best practices and even international guidelines.
Genuine transitional justice is not only elusive in Zimbabwe but else-
where on the African continent. What exist does not meet the demands
of healing, reconciliation and other needs of the survivors. This is why
Mahmood Mamdani (2009) has continued to call for what he terms ‘sur-
vivor’s justice.’ It is the opposite of victors’ justice which emphasises the
punishment of the losers such as what happened with the Nuremburg
Trials. Survivors’ justice is characterised by the complementarity rather
than conflict between justice and peace. Mamdani rightly posited that:
If peace and justice are to be complementary, rather than conflicting,

objectives, we to distinguish victors’’ justice from survivors’ justice: If one
insists on distinguishing right from wrong, the other seeks to reconcile dif-
ferent rights. (Mamdani 2009: 285)
However, in order for survivors’ justice to be effective, there is a need

for public acknowledgement for all past atrocities as the starting point.
This is what is absent in Zimbabwe with the only acknowledgement of
past atrocities coming from Mugabe ironically at the funeral of Joshua
Nkomo when he characterised the genocide as a moment of madness
(Murambadoro and Wielenga 2015: 35). To date, the government has
not taken any responsibility for the genocide, let alone acknowledge
the atrocities. The only acknowledgement came from the late former
284 E. Benyera
Defence Minister Moven Mahachi who publicly apologised for the

Gukurahundi atrocities (Stiff 2000: 226). This obviously made Nkomo
despair, however, he remained hopeful of a reconciliation and sustainable
peace in Zimbabwe, pledging his full commitment to that cause. Writing
about those moments, he stated:
I have never abandoned hope that I might contribute to a reasonable solu-

tion to our national problems, by discussion rather than confrontation.
Sometimes it looks as though progress is possible; sometimes I have to
fight back despair. (Nkomo 1984: 244)
Those moments of despair notwithstanding, Nkomo remained a

firm believer in human rights. He subscribed to the view that all
Zimbabweans, regardless of race colour, creed religion, etc. were equal
and most importantly survivors of the brutal and protracted war of lib-
eration. He aptly noted that:
Zimbabweans have lately fought a long and terrible war. It has disrupted
their lives. But it has also left them with an extraordinary sense of national
solidarity which binds together people of all races, colours, whichever side
they fought on. (Nkomo 1984: 251)
He went on to attack the state for sabotaging genuine transitional jus-

tice and social coercion noting that: ‘That energy is being dissipated by
a government which seems to feel the need to exercise a partisan author-
ity rather than to mobilise the national will to survive’ (Nkomo 1984:
251–252). In other words, genuine transitional justice is characterised
by bottom-up, victims-centred processes that address all the five pillars,
i.e. justice, reparations, truth seeking, memory and memorialisation and
institutional reform. Writing on the importance of bottom-up processes,
Nkomo noted that:
But all this, in the towns and the countryside alike, depends on the active
and willing cooperation of those involved. (The failure of the ujamaa
resettlement policy in Tanzania shows how wrong things can go when
plans are imposed on the people and not developed with their participa-
tion). Human beings will work together, and be the happier for it, if they
feel that their ideas and their initiatives are taken onto account in the final
decision of what is to be done. (Nkomo 1984: 251)
What constitutes genuine transitional justice in Zimbabwe is therefore

that which heals the nation and must accordingly be dictated by the peo-
ple and not by any other bodies especially the state. The role of the state
is that of a facilitator, a catalytic role. It is the people who are in need of
healing and reconciliation, and it can only be them who know how they
can be healed and reconciled. To that effect, Nkomo was unequivocal in
calling for the Mugabe-led government to facilitate a national dialogue
around the issue of reconciliation. Nkomo wrote:
From London I wrote two carefully considered letters to Prime Minister

Mugabe. One detailed his political; mistreatment of Zimbabwe since tak-
ing office. The other proposed a non-political national conference chaired
by himself of all the major interest groups in our country – churches, trade
unions, farmers’ organisations, professional bodies, local councils, politi-
cal parties, together with representatives of students societies, the armed
forces, ex-combatants and youth groups – in order to trash out an agreed
understanding of our problems and to work towards a reconciliation of the
nation with itself. (Nkomo 1984: 244)
Land occupied and continues to occupy a central place in Zimbabwe’s

body politic. The war of liberation was fought primarily over land; hence,
the need for land reform cannot be overemphasised. Nkomo was a firm
believer in social development and economic empowerment of black
Zimbabweans (Ndlovu-Gatsheni 2007: 35). Ndlovu-Gatsheni (2007:
35) further contends that ‘Nkomo was very vocal against land imbal-
ances in Zimbabwe the first nationalist to warn a second revolution as
long as the land remained concentrated in the hands of a few whites and
a few blacks’.
The form of healing being advocated in these pages is one that oper-
ates at three realms; firstly, healing within the individual; secondly, heal-
ing at family/community level; and finally, healing at the national level.
For Nkomo, human rights, whose abuse necessitates transitional justice,
is both a right and a responsibility bestowed on both leaders and the cit-
izenry at large. Nkomo has this to write about human rights: ‘African
leaders must improve their record on human rights, and African peoples
too must have greater regard to their responsibilities’ (Nkomo 1984:
247).
This is how Nkomo undertook and interpreted human rights, as
a two-pronged process comprising rights and responsibilities. In the
286 E. Benyera
discipline and practice of transitional justice, the notion of human rights

as constituted by and through the duality of rights and responsibilities
can be best epitomised by unpacking the five pillars of transitional justice
and how these have been absent in Zimbabwe, notwithstanding the calls
by Nkomo and many others for survivors’ justice premised on the will
to live as opposed to the will to power (Ndlovu-Gatsheni and Benyera
2015). This analysis is attempted in the next section starting with insti-
tutional reform as a key pillar upon which the transitional process hinges.
Nkomo’s Views on Human Rights Abuses

Joshua Nkomo was clear in his condemnation of human rights abuses
especially those committed in pursuance of a greater common good such
as political independence. He believed in the Universal Declaration of
Human Rights and wrote:
Patience in the face of injustice is hard. It would be easier to achieve if

our rulers would accept a shared standard by which to judge their won
conduct and seek to improve it; and such a standard already exists, in the
Universal Declaration of Human Rights which all our governments have
signed. (Nkomo 1984: 247)
One development that Nkomo lamented in post-independence

Zimbabwe was the continued incarceration, especially of former ZAPU
and ZANLA operatives even when acquitted by courts of law. During
the burial of Lookout Masuku, Nkomo did not mince his words, lam-
basting the Mugabe government for treating Zimbabweans exactly as
they were treated by the Smith administration. He said:
Therefore, I say he died in prison. Why should men like Lookout and
Dumiso, after being found innocent of any wrongdoing by the highest
court in this land remain detained? When we ask we get the same answer
from the Minister as we used to get from the Smith regime. (Nkomo
1984)1
Nkomo was a firm believer in truth telling as a means to heal and rec-
oncile Zimbabweans. Like Nelson Mandela, Nkomo admitted culpability
for the war crimes and other atrocities committed by ZIPRA members.
As the Commander-in-Chief of ZIPRA, the buck ultimately stopped
with Nkomo. These atrocities included the downing of two civilian Air
Rhodesian Viscounts with serious loss of civilian lives including the wip-
ing out of the entire Gulab family. Ironically, Mr Gulab was Nkomo’s
friend and he used to assist Nkomo with air tickets when he needed to
avoid police detection (Nkomo 1984: 166). Nkomo admitted his culpa-
bility when he wrote:
Of course it was not our policy to shoot down civil airliners; if we had
wanted we could have done so often, but we carefully refrained from that.
What happened was that we identified one of the same aircraft that had
been shown on television loaded with troops. It landed at Victoria Falls,
where we knew paratroopers were stationed, and as it took off we shot it
down with a Sam missile. Forty eight people, most of them holiday mak-
ers, died in the crash; eight survived. Ten of those who died were said
to have been shot on the ground after escaping from the wreck. It was
a tragic mistake. I felt it personally. One man was killed with his mother
and father and his wife and children – the whole, family wiped out. […] I
regret (this) loss of life. (Nkomo 1984: 166)
The paragraph quoted above depicts a man who not only deeply regret-
ted the actions of those under his command but also one who believed in
telling the truth, even if that truth was very painful. Admitting that ten
of the victims of the air crash were probably pursued by his man and shot
after escaping from the plane wreck is indicative of a type of transitional
justice that Nkomo practised, i.e. one anchored in truth telling as a way
of healing war wounds. On the same account of civilians killed by ZIPRA
members, Nkomo lamented the callousness that evolved as the war pro-
gressed. This led to serious atrocities and he again admitted capability
when he wrote:
The worst thing about the war was the callousness it bred. It is true, and I
regret it, that atrocities were committed by people on our side, by ZIPRA
fighters as well as ZANLA men. Some of those killed were isolated white
farmers and their families who happened in the way. Some were African
chiefs who may have collaborated with the Smith regime…It was not our
policy to kill such people. (Nkomo 1984: 168)
Such forms of truth telling as exhibited by Nkomo possess a positive

multiplier effect down the rank and file of the men and women who
fell under his command. Essentially, when the commander-in-chief
has admitted that mistakes were committed and atrocities committed,
those under his command cannot produce a different narrative. Such
288 E. Benyera
was the profound impact that Nkomo exerted on transitional justice in

Zimbabwe especially on his former ZIPRA members.
It is also largely due to Nkomo’s transitional justice legacy that for-
mer ZIPRA members proceeded with the process of transitional justice
through the work of the Mafela Trust. The work of the Trust consti-
tutes restorative justice. Named after ZIPRA Captain Lookout ‘Mafela’
Khalisabantu Vumindaba Masuku, the Mafela Trust was established in
1992 to assist as many people as possible get over the wounds inflicted
on them by the liberation war. Its work included helping the families of
combatants who died during the war overcome their loss. This was done
through a number of programs one of which involves the identifica-
tion of combatants and civilians who died during the liberation struggle
whose remains’ whereabouts are not known (Brickhill 1995: 166). So
effective was the restorative work done by the Mafela Trust that:
By the end of 1991 the research team had located 1087 gravesites and estab-
lished the circumstances of the death of 1414 fighters out of an established
2500. (These included 35 ZANLA and 16 South African ANC members).
The real names of 657 dead ZIPRA fighters had been established and their
next of kin informed (Mafela Trust Project Report in. Brickhill 1995: 169)
The recovery of the remains of both the civilians and the combatants is
central in transitional justice as it allows for closure and healing to take
place. Additionally, the naming of the trust, while not attributable to
Nkomo, forms part of the process of memorialisation.
Statist Transitional Justice During the Times of Nkomo

Zimbabwe has implemented a multiplicity of state-led transitional jus-
tice mechanisms. One common characteristic of Zimbabwe’s statist tran-
sitional justice mechanisms is a deliberate attempt to induce a blanket
amnesia, hide the truth, compensate those aligned to the ruling party
and enforce mass nationwide memorialisation as opposed to commu-
nity and other bottom-up memorisations. This can be traced to the then
Prime Minister Robert Mugabe’s inaugural speech as the leader of an
independent Zimbabwe when he said:
If yesterday I fought as an enemy, today you have become a friend and

ally with the same national interest, loyalty, rights and duties as myself.
If yesterday you hated me, today you cannot avoid the love that binds you
to me and me to you. (Mugabe, Independence speech, Rufaro Stadium,
Harare: April 1980 in Benyera 2014: 39)
This statement can be castigated for setting the wrong tones for tran-
sitional justice in Zimbabwe, one, that is, anchored on a political tran-
sition devoid of justice. These can be include the following: Amnesty
Ordinance 3 of 1979, Amnesty (General Pardon) Ordinance 12 of 1980,
Emergency Powers (Security Forces Indemnity) Regulations of 1982 SI
487/82, Clemency Order No. 1 of 18 April 1988 (General Notice 257A of
1988), Clemency Order Number 1 of 2000 (General Notice 457A), Order
No. 1 of June 2008 (General Notice 85A of 2008) and Clemency Order
Number 1 of 2002. (Benyera 2014: 40). This tendency of pardoning
human rights violators who commit atrocities allegedly as part of their
official duties can be traced back to the colonial era where the minority
government of Ian Smith used the Indemnity and Compensation Act of
1975 to effectively sanctioned impunity by granting Rhodesian Security
Forces immunity in advance (Benyera 2014: 40).
Nkomo was very critical against the continued use of colonial era
repressive laws. He not only questioned the morality of such laws but
also questioned their post-independence use when the removal of such
oppressive laws was one of the rallying points of the liberation struggle.
On point 92 of his letter to Mugabe, he lamented:
Under the terms of the Indemnity Act, which we condemned as barbaric

and fascist during the liberation struggle, a citizen has no right of appeal
or redress against those who illegally torture, maim, kill, destroy property
or do any illegal act on him or against him. I am sure you realize that the
result of this use of Smith’s laws and torturers has been to create in an
independent Zimbabwe a climate of terror and fear even more discrimi-
nate than that created by the Smith regime. Remember, there is no war in
Zimbabwe today.2
Nkomo on Inclusive the Government

One of the mechanisms used in post-independence to navigate the
mucky waters of political transitional and the concomitant transitional
justice has been inclusive governments. These also date back to the
colonial times when Ian Smith used this methodology to create the
290 E. Benyera
short-lived Zimbabwe Rhodesia between 1 June 1979 and 12 December

1979 under the leadership of Prime Minister Abel Muzorewa and his
deputy Josiah Gumede. Nkomo was very clear on the limitations of
inclusive government’s right from 1979, yet he was also too clear about
their efficacy as peacebuilding, nation building and most importantly
transitional justice mechanisms. In fact, it is Nkomo and his deputy
Josiah Chinamano who hand-picked Bishop Muzorewa and appointed
him treasurer, a front organisation set-up for the coordination of African
views to be presented to Lord Pearce whose commission was garnering
views on a proposed new constitution. Nkomo wrote:
I also got in touch with Josiah Chinamano, who had by now been released
(from prison), in order to set up a front organisation to coordinate African
opposition. On his suggestion we approached a well-known churchman, the
Methodist Bishop Abel Muzorewa. He seemed an ideal candidate … we
decided to call (the organisation), the African National Council…. (p. 141)
This is how Muzorewa became a politician and ended up being the Prime
Minister of Zimbabwe Rhodesia. These events attest to Nkomo’s belief in
inclusivity especially in the pursuance of a greater common good.
The 1980 unity government formed by Mugabe included Nkomo
and some of his leading members from ZAPU. The 1980 unity govern-
ment only lasted for 2 years as ZANU began to systematically leave out
PF-ZAPU in the nation-building process. It finally collapsed when arms
caches were discovered in PF-ZAPU-owned properties around Bulawayo
that same year. In retrospect, Nkomo later admitted that he was rather
naïve in believing that the 1980 unity government was a genuine gesture
by ZANU for fostering post-independence peace. In a letter written to
Mugabe from London in 1983, Nkomo admitted:
In retrospect, I now believe that I and ZAPU were deceived and cheated
by you and your party when you talked of unity, reconciliation, peace and
security. I now honestly and sincerely believe that when you invited us to
take part in your government you believed that we would reject your offer
and set ourselves up in strong opposition to you and thereby label us dis-
gruntled rejected plotters3
The second time that Nkomo was involved in an inclusive government

was in 1987 when Zimbabwe changed the constitution and ushered
in an executive presidency. The 1987 Unity Accord signed between

Nkomo’s party ZAPU and Mugabe’s party ZANU-PF to form ZANU
(PF) was the culmination of a genocide which claimed in excess of
20,000 predominantly Ndebele-speaking civilians in the three prov-
inces of Matabeleland North and South and the Midland. Signed on 22
December 1987 with Mugabe becoming president and on 31 December
1987 with Nkomo and Muzenda the two vice-presidents, this accord
again demonstrates how Nkomo believed so much is forging inclusive
governments in pursuit of sustainable peace. The tragedy is that con-
trary to Nkomo’s vision of a unity government as a unifying factor,
for ZANU-PF and in the words of Didymus Mutasa, ‘the ruling party
(ZANU PF), desires national unity so as to finally establish a one party
state’ (1989: 290). Mugabe himself also uttered the same sentiments
when the unity government of 1980 collapsed in 1982 stating that
‘…because that is what united people should do. They should be one
party, with one government and one Prime Minister’ (Ndlovu-Gatsheni
and Willems 2010: 8). This points to a party that enters into unity gov-
ernments as a political strategy for self-preservation and not for nation
building, contrary to what Nkomo yearned for.
Nkomo’s Views on Gukurahundi

The problem in Zimbabwe as Nkomo would put it is that of attempting
political transitional while negating the justice factor (willingly or unwill-
ingly). Transitional justice is not a game of halves where you negate justice
and pursue peace only. Contrary to common views, peace and justice are not
contradictory but rather complementary. Without the other, one will not be
sustainable. What has happened so far in Zimbabwe is not transitional justice
but rather political transition (especially of power) which is just the formative
phase of transitional justice. One of the events in Zimbabwe’s political his-
tory which yearn for transitional justice is the 1982/1983 Gukurahundi gen-
ocide. As such, a chapter on Nkomo’s views on transitional justice cannot be
complete without delving into his views on this dark moment in Zimbabwe’s
history. Nkomo was clear of what happened during Gukurahundi, a state-
sponsored genocide. He painfully narrated how it all began thus:
In January 1983 the killings began in Matebeleland. The first reports

reached me from Mbembesi on the 25th, then from Bubi and from
Tjolotjo in the country north-west of Bulawayo, areas already subject to
292 E. Benyera
curfew. The police had, I was told, instructed not to intervene…The per-
petrators were young men in camouflage uniforms with distinctive red
berets, calling themselves the Fifth Brigade. (Nkomo 1984: 235)
In an attempt to halt the killings, Nkomo met then President Reverend

Canaan Banana and then Minister of Supply Enos Nkala. This was to no
avail and the consequence in Nkomo’s words, there was ‘the burning
of villages, slaughtering of cattle, the assaulting of women and a killing
inspired by the need to instil fear’ (Nkomo 1984: 235). In the absence
of the prime minister who was out of the country and denied access to
the Deputy Prime Minister and the Minister of Home Affairs (Simon
Muzenda and Hebert Ushewokunze, respectively). Nkomo thus effec-
tively failed to halt the genocide. In fact, his life was in danger. In his
letter to Mugabe, he criticised the government for disregarding the rule
of law and choosing to operate impunity. For Nkomo, such actions went
contra the aims of the liberation war and most importantly were bound
to serious hamper efforts to foster a peaceful, united and reconciled post-
independence Zimbabwe. On point 115, he wrote:
This is not government; it is the abuse of government, an abuse which trans-

forms the rule of law into the law of rule. As such it cannot lead to a free,
united, peaceful and prosperous Zimbabwe. But to one in which oppression,
division, violence and poverty will shadow all our hopes, and make a mock-
ery of the freedom struggle in which so many heroes gave their lives.4
Throughout his political career after the genocide, Nkomo was con-
vinced that all Zimbabweans (not only the Ndebele victims) deserved to
know what happened and why. Most importantly, he believed that the
state must one day apologise for its role in the genocide. This apology
and an official acknowledgement by the state are still outstanding.
Nkomo’s on Accountability
Nkomo’s intervention in terms of ensuring that post-independence
Zimbabwe attains transitional justice can best be captured through his own
words. Concluding his book Nkomo: The Story of my Life Nkomo wrote:
It is not too late to change at all, to muster the collective energy of our
people and build the new Zimbabwe we promised through all those long
years of suffering and struggle. During my brief in exile in 1983 I appealed
in this sense to Prime Minister Robert Mugabe, calling as a start for a
national conference of all the country’s interest groups, under his chair-
manship, to begin the process of reconciliation. (Nkomo 1984: 252)
He went on to chronicle his disappointment at not receiving a response

nor an acknowledgement from the then prime minister. He simply
wrote: ‘He (Prime Minster Mugabe) did not answer then’. However,
Nkomo remained optimistic about the role he expected the Robert
Mugabe government to take in initiating the critical dialogue around the
question of reconciliation. To that effect, he wrote:
Perhaps in the interval between the writing of this book and its publica-
tion he (Mugabe) will change his mind and reply constructively. For my
part, I shall continue working to that end. Long live Zimbabwe! (Nkomo
1984: 252)
During his term as a parliamentarian, Nkomo called for a debate in par-

liament which focused on the Gukurahundi atrocities. He also called for
an impartial enquiry into human rights abuses in Zimbabwe, but his calls
were either shouted down or simply ignored in parliament. This paints
the picture of a man who solidly believed in post-colonial construc-
tive dialogue as a means of settling differences with other nationalists
and establishing the truth about the atrocities committed not only in
Matabeleland, but elsewhere in Africa. Nkomo lamented the behaviour
of his fellow nationalists in Africa in general especially their dislike of dia-
logue noting that:
The new African rulers who came to power at independence have all too
often claimed the same unquestioned authority as their traditional and
colonial predecessors. Instead of welcoming debate as the necessary means
form improving government. (Nkomo 1984: 246)
It is this tendency to avoid dialogue which breeds a proclivity towards

dictatorship and human rights abuses. According to Masipula Sithole,
Nkomo must be lauded with accolades for ‘swallowing a bitter pill’
and allowing the violence in the two Matabeleland Provinces and the
Midlands to end even in the face of a rather humiliating unity accord.
Humiliating because of the triumphalism, victors’ justice paraded by
ZANU as evidenced by Sithole’s observation that:
Even a cursory look at the terms of the Unity Accord (let alone the
Chiwewe minutes) gives one the impression that the document spells out
294 E. Benyera
terms of surrender and not compromise. Nowhere in the eleven-point

agreement does Nkomo’s name appear, but Mugabe’s appears three times.
(Nkomo’s name only appears as a signatory to the document). Nkomo
should be praised for the bitter pill he swallowed because his humility
brought peace to Matebeleland. Eight of the eleven points are pregnant
with victorious Mugabe’s ideas. Where mention is made of PF-ZAPU it is
either to indicate that henceforth it shall be called ZANU (PF)or that its
leadership shall take ‘immediate vigorous steps to help eliminate and end
the insecurity and violence prevalent in Matabeleland. (Sithole 1991: 150)
Conclusion
This chapter explores the views held by Joshua Nkomo on the issue of
transitional justice. It presented Nkomo as more than a nation builder,
someone who went the conventional Father Zimbabwe and exhibited
his desire for genuine healing and reconciliation in Zimbabwe. Genuine
reconciliation and healing as seen in the pursuit of healing mechanisms
which strives to address the five pillars of transitional justice which are
justice, reparations, truth seeking, memory and memorialisation and
institutional reform. The negation of one of these pillars jeopardises
transitional justice as obtained in Zimbabwe where the justice was never
pursued in favour of amnesties, clemencies and pardons; truth was sup-
pressed in favour of creating a ‘patriotic history’, memory was deliber-
ately obliterated in favour of amnesia; reparations paid to a section of the
victims (mainly ex-combatants); and institutional reform was never con-
sidered an option. Only memorialisation was rigorously pursued, albeit at
national level through commemorations such as the Armed Forces Day
and Independence Day. This chapter argued that such top-down tenden-
cies have not yielded genuine reconciliation and healing in Zimbabwe
and only aided in further polarising the nation.
Notes
1. Joshua Nkomo speech at the burial of former ZIPRA Commander Lt
Gen Lookout Masuku in Bulawayo On 12 April 1986, available online at:
http://www.pambazuka.net/en/category.php/zimbabwe/49235/print
(retrieved on 21 January 2015).
2. Joshua Nkomo letter to Robert Mugabe from exile in the UK, available
online at: http://nehandaradio.com/2013/12/24/joshua-nkomo-letter-
to-robert-mugabe-from-exile-in-the-uk/ (retrieved on 21 June 2015).
3. Point 53 of Nkomo’s letter to Mugabe.

4. Point 115 of Nkomo’s letter to Mugabe.
References
Benyera, E. (2014). Debating the efficacy of transitional justice mechanisms: The
case of national healing in Zimbabwe, 1980–2011. PhD thesis, University of
South Africa.
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the Mafela trust. In N. Bhebe & T. Ranger (Eds.), Soldiers in Zimbabwe’s
liberation war (Vol. 1, pp. 163–173). Harare: University of Zimbabwe
Publications.
Mamdani, M. (2009). Saviors and survivors: Darfur, politics, and the war on ter-
ror. London: Verso.
Murambadoro, R., & Wielenga, C. (2015). Reconciliation in Zimbabwe: The
conflict between a state-centred and people-centred approach. Strategic
Review for Southern Africa, 37(1), 31–52.
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Zimbabwe’s national political development. In C. S. Banana (Ed.), Turmoil
and tenacity: Zimbabwe 1890–1990 (pp. 288–304). Harare: College Press.
Affairs, 30, 25–42.
Ndlovu-Gatsheni, S. J., & Benyera, E. (2015). Towards a framework for resolv-
ing the justice and reconciliation question in Zimbabwe. African Journal of
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Zambezia, XVIII(ii), 143–152.
Stiff, P. (2000). Cry Zimbabwe: Independence-twenty years on. Alberton: Galago.
PART III
Nation-Building, Persecution,
Autobiography and Rehabilitation
CHAPTER 13
Joshua Nkomo and Nelson Mandela:

Ideas of Nation and Liberation
Sabelo J. Ndlovu-Gatsheni and Busani Mpofu
Introduction
Joshua Nkomo and Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela belonged to the group of
the first generation of African nationalists to fight anti-colonial struggles
that eventually led to the black majority in Zimbabwe and South Africa,
respectively. They played pivotal roles that contributed to the attainment
of the black majority rule in Zimbabwe in 1980 and South Africa in
1994, and their overriding quest for peace and unity presents interesting
similarities of the ideas that they had for their countries and the concep-
tions of liberation they envisaged. Nkomo served 10 years in jail at the
hands of the colonial government, while Mandela was jailed by the apart-
heid government for a total of 27 years.
While Nkomo did not ascend to power as president of Zimbabwe
in 1980 as his party lost elections to a rival nationalist power, Mandela
S.J. Ndlovu-Gatsheni (*) 
B. Mpofu 

300 S.J. Ndlovu-Gatsheni and B. Mpofu
assumed power in 1994. However, their autobiographies, just like that of

other postcolonial ‘fathers of the nation’, give us glimpses of the devel-
opment of their political consciousness, the ideas of the Zimbabwe and
South Africa they were fighting to create, and the conceptions of free-
dom or liberation that they envisaged, respectively. This chapter, while
a historical reflection, is also a critical comparison of Nkomo’s idea of
Zimbabwe with Mandela’s idea of South Africa, their political conscious-
ness, and their conceptions of liberation mainly through a comparison
of their autobiographies: Nkomo’s Nkomo: The Story of my Life and
Mandela’s Long Walk to Freedom, respectively.
Background
Nkomo and Mandela belonged to the group of the first generation of
African nationalists to fight anti-colonial struggles that eventually led
to black majority in Zimbabwe and South Africa, respectively. They
played pivotal roles that contributed to the attainment of black majority
rule in Zimbabwe in 1980 and South Africa in 1994, and their over-
riding quest for peace and unity presents interesting similarities of the
ideas that they had for their countries and the conceptions of libera-
tion they envisaged. Nkomo served 10 years in jail at the hands of the
colonial government, while Mandela was jailed by the apartheid gov-
ernment for a total of 27 years. While Nkomo did not ascend to power
as president of Zimbabwe in 1980 as his party lost elections to a rival
nationalist power, Mandela assumed power in 1994. This chapter there-
fore seeks to explore what imaginations of Zimbabwe and South Africa
are reflected in the autobiographies of Nkomo’s Nkomo: The Story of My
Life and Mandela’s Long Walk to Freedom? What ideas of Zimbabwe and
South Africa are reflected in their lives of struggle? How did Nkomo
and Mandela try to practically build a new Zimbabwe and a new South
Africa, respectively? This is done through a comparison of Nkomo’s
idea of Zimbabwe with Mandela’s idea of South Africa, their politi-
cal consciousness, and their conceptions of liberation. Joshua Nkomo,
popularly known as Father Zimbabwe, wrote his autobiography while
in exile after escaping an attempt on his life in Zimbabwe on 8 March
1983 and got it published in 1984. He passed on in 1999, at the age of
82. Nelson Mandela, regarded as the founder of the ‘rainbow nation’ in
South Africa, had his autobiography published in 1994 and died on 5
December 2013, aged 95.
13 JOSHUA NKOMO AND NELSON MANDELA: IDEAS OF NATION … 301
Nkomo and Mandela’s personal acquisitions of modern education

were crucial in the gradual development of their political consciousness,
together with their experiences at the schools and colleges and/or uni-
versities they attended and their relocations; Nkomo from Zimbabwe to
South Africa in 1942 and Mandela from Eastern Cape to Johannesburg
within South Africa. Nkomo’s work as a chief social worker at the
Rhodesia Railways in colonial Zimbabwe (Southern Rhodesia) since
1948, and his subsequent election as president of the African Railway
Employees Association and president of the Southern Rhodesian-
African National Congress (ANC) firmly thrust him into the political
arena which saw him taking a leading role in the organising and writ-
ing of petitions on subjects that included labour relations, voting rights,
land questions, or personal grievances against the national government
(Nkomo 1984: 45–46). Similarly, Mandela’s work as a lawyer and his
political activities with the African National Congress (ANC) party were
all crucial in raising his political consciousness and shaping his idea about
South Africa. Both Nkomo and Mandela’s struggles involved opposing
the minority white governments in their countries through non-violent
means first and only resorted to armed struggles as the last resort.
Differences between them lay in the fact that from the onset,
Nkomo’s idea of a racially and tribal inclusive Zimbabwe never changed.
He always believed in the equality of all racial groups and in the unity
of African nationalists and all ethnic groups in colonial Zimbabwe dur-
ing the anti-colonial struggle and after independence. In the 1950s,
for example, Nkomo was worried that some social organisations were
‘beginning to develop “very dangerously”, along local or tribal lines’, a
situation he resented actively (Nkomo 1984: 68–69). After the Lancaster
House Agreement that ended the liberation war in colonial Zimbabwe,
Nkomo spoke of reconciliation and warned against the spirit of revenge.
He argued that the war was over, all were now citizens who needed to
work together that people needed to forget the past and start building a
nation in peace (Nkomo 1984: 204). Nkomo called on blacks to prove
to whites that Africans fought for equality of all races and also called for
the inclusion of Coloured people and Indians who were marginalised and
ill-treated by the colonial Zimbabwe (Nkomo 1984: 251). This earned
Nkomo the title ‘Father Zimbabwe’.
Mandela, however, initially had conflicting ideas with regards to
whether being Xhosa (his tribe) or South African or African was more
important. He also strongly disapproved of allowing communists,

Indians, and whites joining the ANC in the fight for the liberation of
the country from apartheid colonialism but became more tolerant after
the National Party won the general elections in 1948 and began insti-
tutionalising apartheid (Mandela 1994: 129). When the ANC won the
first national elections on 27 April 1994, Mandela assured all minori-
ties, whites, Coloureds, and Indians, that they had a place in the new
dispensation. He emphasised that the liberation struggle was not a bat-
tle against one group or colour, but a fight against a repressive system
and therefore urged all South Africans to unite as one country, one
nation, and one people, attempting to create what has been popularly
referred to as the rainbow nation. This surprised those who had impris-
oned Mandela for 27 years as they expected that his reign would bring
vengeance and retribution but he preached reconciliation and forgiveness
(Alexander 2013).
As will be highlighted later, following the split of ZAPU on tribal
lines in the 1960s, Nkomo agonisingly struggled against the creation of
a nationalist party and consequently of a Zimbabwe that was premised
on tribalism and ethnicity. This became the biggest threat to the creation
of a Zimbabwe that was imagined by Nkomo. Similarly, Mandela faced
the task of building a South Africa whose idea was contested (Ndlovu-
Gatsheni 2015). According to Ndlovu-Gatsheni, the idea of South Africa
entails various searches for particular configurations of power and par-
ticular ideological frameworks that are sensitive to the realities of a soci-
ety characterised by a kaleidoscope of ethnic, racial, class, and gender
cleavages (2015, 7). This meant, in other words, that the idea of South
Africa is about how diverse and antagonistic identities can be moulded
into a nation. Kader Asmal argued that the idea of South Africa involved
‘…moulding a people from diverse origins, cultural practices, languages,
into one, within a framework democratic in character, that can absorb,
accommodate and mediate conflicts and adversarial interests without
oppression and injustice’ (Asmal 2001: 1). Therefore, for Mandela and
his ANC party, the most difficult task was to find an acceptable and
accommodative way of managing the diversity of South Africa without
excluding anyone (Alexander 2013). This culminated in Mandela’s idea
of South Africa as a ‘rainbow nation’ (inclusive nation that celebrated
its unity in diversity), which of course, still continues to be contested by
some sections of the South African society.
Development of Nkomo’s Political Consciousness

Nkomo’s personal acquisition of modern education was crucial in the
gradual development of his political consciousness. This was after his
realisation that the social and economic ills faced by Africans emanated
from racist policies of the colonial government. He argued that he
‘thirsted’ for freedom from his youth days when he began to understand
that he could not be free while his ‘country and its people were sub-
jected to a government in which they had no say’ (Nkomo 1984: xi).
The refusal by white people (outnumbered by black people by at least
one to twenty) in colonial Zimbabwe to accept blacks as fellow citizens
eventually forced African nationalists to take up arms and wage a libera-
tion war that was one of the longest and most cruel in Africa.
Nkomo was born on 7 June 1917. Educated initially at Tjolotjo
Government Industrial Boarding School in Matabeleland from 1932
until 1936, he initially worked as a lorry driver in Botswana soon after
acquiring a driver’s licence and later on moved to work as bread deliv-
ery van driver at Osborne’s Bakery in Bulawayo owned by Mr Macintyre,
who later on became Minister of Finance for the Federation of Rhodesia
and Nyasaland. When Nkomo realised that he earned £4 a month while
other Coloured drivers earned £12, he confronted Mr Macintyre over
this and he was eventually sacked (Nkomo 1984: 26–27).
From 1942 to 1945, he was enrolled at Adams College in South
Africa to further his studies. During the journey, he met Enoch
Dumbutshena, who later became Chief Justice in Zimbabwe after 1980,
Herbert Chitepo, who later became a great nationalist but died in 1975,
and Stanlake Samkange, who later on became a historian and professor.
From Adams College, he proceeded to Jan Hofmeyr School of Social
Work that was affiliated to Witwatersrand University in South Africa to
train as a social worker. At a Blue Lagoon restaurant in South Africa, he
met Nelson Mandela who was a student at Witwatersrand University
then. He also met Seretse Khama, who later on became president of
Botswana, while staying in one of the rooms at the Wits University hos-
tels (Nkomo 1984: 33–35). While in South Africa, Nkomo also realised
how government policies were designed to promote differences between
different ethnic groups of Africans in the country. Though he argued
that he was not yet ‘really political’ then, he attended political rallies
organised by the ANC in the townships frequently. When he left South
Africa in 1947, he was 47 and claimed that by then he still did not have a
political philosophy of his own (Nkomo 1984: 35, 38).
Once back in colonial Zimbabwe in 1948, he worked for the
Rhodesia Railways under the Department of African Affairs as a chief
social worker to train some welfare assistants. Soon in 1948, Nkomo
was elected president of the African Railway Employees Association. He
was also elected president of the Southern Rhodesia African National
Congress (ANC) in which he played a leading role in the organising
and writing of petitions on subjects that included labour relations, vot-
ing rights, land questions, or personal grievances. All petitions were
directed to the Secretary for Native Affairs in the national government.
Witnessing ordinary African people’s suffering and seeing them treated
like children convinced him that this had to change and that only
Africans could change it. The invitation by the Southern Rhodesia gov-
ernment of Nkomo in 1952 to be part of the government delegation to
a meeting hosted by the British government on the attempts of forming
a Central African Federation of Southern Rhodesia, Northern Rhodesia,
and Nyasaland was the first of the many (international and local) in
which Nkomo found himself invited to represent the African thought in
Southern Rhodesia (Nkomo 1984: 44–46). This effectively ushered him
into the national and international political stage as one of the leading
representatives of African political thought in Southern Rhodesia.
When the Minister of Native Affairs Mr Fletcher in 1953 told Nkomo
that inviting him to important international meetings on the affairs of
Southern Rhodesia was equivalent to ‘elevating’ him to the level of a
Minister and that he should therefore not let other Africans to ‘pull you
down to their level’, Nkomo argued that ‘Either we rise as a people or
we remain down as a people. You cannot pick out one man and raise
him above the ground’. He was eventually given back his passport that
had been confiscated by the national government after he spoke against
the proposed Federation (Nkomo 1984: 58). His opposition to the
Federation, which was dubbed as a partnership between a horse and a
rider, with the whites riding on the back of black people, gave him a firm
reputation as the spokesman of African opinion, and he thinks that this
was just a ‘pure chance’ that led to his ‘new fame’. When he returned
from one meeting of those meetings in London, some of the pamphlets
he was in possession of were confiscated. He was tried at the Bulawayo
Magistrates’ Court for importing the subversive literature as some of
the pamphlets contrasted black and white people’s housing in colonial
Zimbabwe. The massive African crowds in his support in court and on

the streets emboldened his resolve to continue opposing the Federation
and other oppressive government policies (Nkomo 1984: 59–60).
In the 1950s, Nkomo and other few educated members of Southern
Rhodesian-ANC who qualified to vote and held voters’ cards returned
them to the returning officer as a way of expressing their opposition to a
voting qualification that allowed only 400 Africans to vote while tens of
thousands of whites were allowed. He became convinced that whites in
the country would never give blacks their rights until they were forced to
do so. In 1953, he resigned from his social welfare officer job to become
full-time Secretary General of the Railway Employees Association and
served in that position for 3 years (Nkomo 1984: 65). Moving around
and visiting leaders of African social organisations, church groups, sports
clubs, and welfare societies, Nkomo met organisations that were ‘begin-
ning to develop very dangerously, along local or tribal lines’, includ-
ing the Matabele Home Society, the Bakalanga Kwayedza, Matabele
Highlanders, Mashonaland Football Club, boxing clubs exclusively
formed along tribal lines for the Zezuru, Makaranga, Manyika, and so
on. Nkomo constantly discouraged this trend, though without much
success, urging the organisers not to associate tribal names and tribal
feelings with aggressive sports like boxing as this could easily promote
tribal clashes even outside the sport (Nkomo 1984: 68–69). Political
opposition to the government gained momentum with the opposition
of the implementation of the Land Husbandry Act of 1951 which fur-
ther oppressed African communities. On 12 September 1957, Nkomo
was elected president of the new African National Congress, with James
Chikerema, George Nyandoro, Joseph Msika as vice-president, general
secretary, and treasurer, respectively (Nkomo 1984: 69, 71).
Nkomo in Exile
From 1958, Nkomo extensively visited other countries for 22 months
including India, Egypt, where he even opened an office at the expense
of the Egyptian government, UK-London, USA, Ghana, Guinea,
Liberia, and Ethiopia to publicise the Southern Rhodesian situation vis-
à-vis Africans. On 26 February 1959, the ANC was banned; leading to
the formation of the National Democratic Party (NDP) and Nkomo
was elected its president in absentia. When he returned to Southern
Rhodesia, he was met by a crowd that the police estimated to be
50,000. Nkomo had effectively become the symbol and leader of African
aspirations in Southern Rhodesia, so the crowd at the airport urged him
to carry on. The NDP was banned in December 1961 leading to the
formation of the Zimbabwe African People’s Union (ZAPU) in 1962 to
continue standing for freedom, justice, and equality for everyone in the
country (Nkomo 1984: 97–98).
Forced to Adopt Armed Struggle

In mid-1961, when the Duke of Devonshire expressed that Southern
Rhodesia had a complicated economy that could not be handed over to
be run by ‘untrained hands’ (blacks), Nkomo explained that:
If development in Southern Rhodesia is an obstacle to the political freedom

of the black people there, then we shall have to destroy that development.
In the war, if a bridge became a danger to your nation, you blew up the
bridge, not that you do not think bridges a good thing, but because at that
time that particular bridge was helping your enemy. (Nkomo 1984: 98–99)
As a result, the year 1962 ended with a military confrontation after

Nkomo had secured some rifles from Cairo. While he preferred a peaceful
road to freedom, he was eventually forced to fight. Initially, his struggle
against the minority white government was through non-violent means
and only resorted to an armed struggle as the last resort. He argued that
‘We had not wanted the armed struggle-but we were under attack, and
we had to defend our people’ (Nkomo 1984: 245, 102). When ZAPU
was banned on 19 September 1962 and all its leaders were restricted to
live for 3 months in areas where they were born, Nkomo was restricted
to his home area in Kezi district. During that time, he carefully persuaded
people that the time for peaceful protest in Southern Rhodesia was over,
and they had to get ready to fight (Nkomo 1984: 103, 105).
Imbrications of Nkomo in Ethnicity and Political

Divisions
Since 1963, divisions began to appear within the nationalist move-
ment abroad and that persisted well into the post-independence era in
Zimbabwe. On his way to Addis Ababa, for the inaugural meeting of the
Organisation of African Unity (OAU) in May 1963, Nkomo was warned
by his Egyptian friend Mohammed Faiek that he had been told that the
Shona were the majority tribe and that they were making moves to take
over the leadership of the nationalist party in the country. During the
same meeting, Leopold Takawira and friends launched their campaign
against Nkomo’s leadership, while Joseph Msika found their ZAPU col-
league Malianga with a circular openly encouraging ZAPU to get rid of
‘Zimundebere’, a derogatory Shona term meaning an old Ndebele man,
and to catapult the ‘majority tribes’, meaning the Shona, to the leadership
of the party. This openly incited a tribal revolt against Nkomo, regarded
as a Ndebele. Nkomo strongly resented this behaviour and noted that the
leadership of ZAPU, its central committee, was drawn from all areas of
the country and had a majority of Shona speakers, but now he was being
accused of giving preferences to Ndebele speakers. He regarded this as
the tragedy of Zimbabwe (Nkomo 1984: 112, 113–114).
When it became clear that ZAPU was also going to be banned, its cen-
tral committee resolved that no successor party was going to be formed
this time and that ZAPU would remain the sole party in the country until
independence was gained. This meant that the party was to operate as a
clandestine movement. ZAPU was eventually banned on 19 September
1962. However, the breakaway faction opposed to Nkomo, now led by
Ndabaningi Sithole, met in Enos Nkala’s house in Highfields, in Salisbury
where they formed a rival party called Zimbabwe African National Union
(ZANU). Nkomo believed that ethnicity was crucial in the formation of
ZANU in 1964. He believed that ZANU was born out of tribal feelings,
stirred first by Shona-speaking people in exile, and exploited those feel-
ings as a way of attacking Nkomo’s leadership of the nationalist parties.
In the townships, ZAPU’s supporters were angry at the ZANU leader-
ship’s betrayal of national solidarity. This led to violence between oppo-
site supporters, leading to a campaign of petrol bombing in the townships
that caused real danger. This split was also exploited and manipu-
lated by the national government to weaken the nationalist movement
(Scarnecchia 2008). Nkomo was arrested on 16 April 1964 and was only
freed on 3 December 1974, 10 years later (Nkomo 1984: 116–119).
Development of Mandela’s Political Consciousness

Mandela’s idea of South Africa kept changing from exclusionist to inclu-
sive tendencies as his political conscious and experience increased. As
noted, he initially had conflicting ideas concerning whether being Xhosa
or South African or African was more important. After passing Standard

V, his guardian sent him to Clarkebury Boarding Institute in the District
of Engcobo to further his studies. During this time, he still believed
that being a Thembu (Xhosa) was the most enviable thing in the world
(Mandela 1994: 42). After leaving Clarkebury, in 1937, when he was 19,
he joined Healdtown, Wesleyan College in Fort Beaufort which attracted
students from all over South Africa and also from Lesotho, Swaziland,
and Botswana. He began ‘to sense his identity as an African, not just
a Thembu or even a Xhosa’, but this was just a nascent feeling then
(Mandela 1994: 44–45). Later on, when Mandela left Healdton School,
he had relapsed back to see himself as a Xhosa first and an African sec-
ond (Mandela 1994: 49–50). From Healdton, Mandela proceeded to
the University College of Fort Hare to study BA. His exposure to mul-
tiethnic, multicultural, and multiracial environments, all of which were
crucial in shaping his idea of South Africa, heightened after his relocation
to Johannesburg in 1941.
When Mandela got a job as an articled clerk in a law firm Witkin,
Sidelsky, and Eidelman in Johannesburg, his new work colleague, an
African employee Gaur Radebe, a clerk, interpreter, and messenger, was
very fluent in English, Sotho, and Zulu. Radebe also taught Mandela
that the ANC preached the goal of Africans as full citizens in the coun-
try, that its constitution denounced racialism, and that its presidents had
come from different tribal groups (Mandela 1994: 82–83, 99). At the
same law firm, Mandela’s white colleague Nat Bregman ‘seemed entirely
colour-blind’ and became his first white friend. He shared everything
they had. They attended political meetings together and Nat invited him
to parties where whites, Africans, Indians, and Coloureds mixed together
(Mandela 1994: 85–86; see also Ndlovu-Gatsheni 2016: 17–24).
In Alexandra Township in Johannesburg where he once stayed,
Mandela discovered that urban life tended to abrade tribal and ethnic dis-
tinctions as Xhosas, Sothos, Zulus, Shangaans, and so on all lived together
as Alexandrans (Mandela 1994: 89). In 1942, when Mandela moved
closer to his workplace in downtown Johannesburg, he stayed at the
Witwatersrand Native Labour Association (WNLA) compound, ‘a multi-
ethnic, polyglot community of modern, urban South Africa’ comprising
of Sothos, Tswanas, Vendas, Zulus, Pedis, Shangaans, Xhosas Namibians,
Mozambicans, and Swazis among others (Mandela 1994: 96–97).
Politically, in 1944 when they formed the Youth League, African
nationalism was their battle cry; they attempted to create one nation out
of many tribes, to overthrow white supremacy, and to establish a demo-

cratic form of government (Mandela 1994: 114–115). Mandela was very
much opposed to a multiracial form of struggle because he thought that
blacks would then remain subservient to white culture and subjected to
a continuing sense of inferiority. He therefore strongly opposed allow-
ing communists or whites to join the league in 1944 (Mandela 1994:
115). However, when he enrolled for a bachelor of law degree at the
University of Witwatersrand in 1943, he met some white students,
who later became friends or colleagues, and he also made close friend-
ships with Indian students, who were firmly committed to the libera-
tion struggle and prepared to sacrifice themselves for the cause of the
oppressed despite their relative privilege (Mandela 1994: 105–106). But
he still believed that communists intended to take over the ANC under
the guise of joint action and that an undiluted African nationalism, not
Marxism or racialism, would liberate black people.
The victory of the National Party in the 1948 white general elections
led to the institutionalisation of apartheid and this pushed Mandela to
become more sympathetic to the ultra-revolutionary stream of African
nationalism, the Marcus Garvey-inspired ‘Africa for Africans’. Mandela
argued that he was angry at the white man, not at racism, and that while
he ‘was not prepared to hurl the white man into the sea, I would have been
perfectly happy if he had climbed aboard his steamships and left the con-
tinent on his own volition’ (Mandela 1994: 129). Since then, he gradu-
ally began to accept Indians and Coloureds provided they accepted ANC
policies. However, since he thought that their interests were different from
those of blacks, he still doubted whether or not they could truly embrace the
cause for blacks (Mandela 1994: 129). In the 1950s, when the spirit of mass
action heightened, Mandela remained sceptical of any action undertaken
with the communists and Indians (Mandela 1994: 132).
Mandela’s co-optation into the National Executive Committee of
the ANC, replacing Dr Xuma who had been defeated by Dr Moroka as
President General of the ANC in 1949 began to change his ideas. He
realised that it became difficult for one to be rebellious once he became
a member of the Executive charged with making decisions (Mandela
1994: 135). In the early 1950s, the implementation by the National Party
of the cornerstones of apartheid through the Population Registration
Act and Group Areas Act, among others, led Indians and Coloured peo-
ple to organise resistance campaigns, but Mandela, who had recently
become national president of the ANC Youth League, still believed that
disobedience campaigns should be exclusively African and still abhorred

joint actions with Indians and Coloureds (Mandela 1994: 141–142).
His appointment as first deputy president by the National Executive
Committee of the ANC in 1952 (Mandela 1994: 165) also pushed him
towards decisions that aligned with ANC’s multiracial approach.
The adoption by the ANC of the Freedom Charter in 1955 also
pushed Mandela towards multiracialism as the Charter became a major
‘multiracial manifesto’ with its preamble that stated that ‘South Africa
belongs to all who live in it, black and white’ (Mandela 1994: 203).
While some Africans in the ANC were anti-communist and anti-white
and objected to the Freedom Charter, Mandela, however, now wanted
the ANC movement to be a ‘great tent that included as many people as
possible’ (Mandela 1994: 222).
Mandela’s idea of a racially inclusive South Africa strengthened fur-
ther in 1956, when he and other political activists, black, white, and
Indian were arrested and detained in Johannesburg prison (Fort) where
he discovered that:
[S]uddenly there were no Xhosas or Zulus, no Indians or Africans, no

rightists or leftists, no religious or political leaders; we were all nationalists
and patriots bound together by a love of our common history, our culture
and our people. Something stirred deep inside all of us…that bound us to
one another. (Mandela 1994: 235)
When the Pan-Africanist Congress (PAC) was formed as an Africanist

organisation on 6 April 1959 under Robert Sobukwe, it completely
rejected ANC’s multiracialism. It rejected communism in all its forms
and considered whites and Indians as ‘foreign minority groups’ or
‘aliens’ with no natural place in South Africa. For them, South Africa was
for Africans and no one else. Mandela, however, found PAC’s views and
behaviour immature (Mandela 1994: 268).
In 1962, while Mandela encountered serious reservations about ANC’s
cooperation with whites, Indians, and communists during his secret visit
to African countries and other international destinations, he defended
ANC’s non-racialism policy (Mandela 1994: 369). His belief in a mul-
tiracial society was now strengthened by his close friendship with whites
and Indians. One of their lawyers after the Rivonia trial was Bram Fischer,
whom Mandela described as an Afrikaner, whose conscience forced him
to reject his own heritage and be ostracised by his own people, showing a
great level of courage and sacrifice (Mandela 1994: 462).
Forced to Adopt Armed Struggle

Mandela and the ANC initially pursued a policy of non-violent struggle
against the apartheid government. However, in 1961, Mandela believed
that the days of non-violent struggle had passed by. He questioned the
logic of the non-violent struggle when the apartheid government always
reacted to it by using naked brutal force to crush any form of that strug-
gle. It was becoming clear that a military campaign was needed to con-
front apartheid police brutality. Mandela thought it was now time they
reconsidered their tactics. He had first discussed adopting an armed
struggle in 1952 with Walter Sisulu. Mandela firmly believed that
non-violence was a tactic that should be abandoned when it no longer
worked. The ANC allowed Mandela to form a new military organisation,
Umkhonto we Sizwe, separate from the ANC to carry out sabotage acts
on government infrastructure (Mandela 1995: 319–323).
Mandela was eventually arrested in 1962 and sentenced to life impris-
onment in 1964 and was only released in February 1990, 27 years later.
Inside Robben Island, the ANC formed its internal organisation, with
a High Command, or High Organ composed of its imprisoned senior
members, Walter Sisulu, Govan Mbeki, Raymond Mhlaba, and Mandela,
all Xhosa speaking. This worried Mandela because it reinforced an incor-
rect perception that the ANC was a Xhosa organisation (Mandela 1994:
526). In the 1980s, when transferred from Robben Island and impris-
oned at Pollsmoor and when visited my Lord Bethell, Mandela contin-
ued to emphasise a future non-racial South Africa (Mandela 1994: 619).
Nkomo in the Liberation Struggle and Crisis of Unity

During the liberation war (1960s to 1980), Nkomo was the leader of
ZAPU, with the Zimbabwe People’s Revolutionary Army (ZIPRA) as its
military wing. Ndabaningi Sithole was the leader of ZANU from 1964
until Mugabe took over from him in 1976, with the Zimbabwe African
National Liberation Army (ZANLA) as its military wing (Nkomo 1984,
xiv). In the late 1970s, Nkomo desired reconciliation and unity between
nationalist parties in Zimbabwe. However, ZANLA forces, together with
some FRELIMO forces from Mozambique, at times raided communities
in eastern Zimbabwe that were loyal to ZAPU, beat and killed ZAPU
party organisers and forced people to shout anti-Nkomo slogans like
‘Down with Nkomo’. Nkomo agonised over this (Nkomo 1984, 203).
He had hoped that after the 1979 Lancaster House Agreement, ZAPU
and ZANU, as wings of the Patriotic Front (PF),1 were going to contest
the March 1980 elections as a single party (Nkomo 1984, 200). Nkomo
had hoped for unity between ZANU and ZAPU after the Lancaster
House Agreement because of the fact that they had fought the liberation
war and negotiated the Lancaster House Agreement and had been victo-
rious over white minority government, while on the same side. However,
a day after the signing of the Lancaster House Agreement, Robert
Mugabe spurned the agreement to talk with Nkomo at his London flat
and flew to Dar es Salaam where on arrival announced that he and his
ZANU party were to contest elections alone, not with ZAPU. Nkomo
felt that his campaign for national reconciliation had been shattered and
never fulfilled and believed that he and his ZAPU party were deceived by
Mugabe’s ZANU (Nkomo 1984: 200).
Nkomo’s invitations to Mugabe after the Lancaster House Agreement
for personal discussions on how to approach the 1980 elections were
ignored. ZANU went on to register for the national elections on its
own as ZANU-PF. Nkomo eventually registered his party for elections
as PF-ZAPU. Nkomo decried that victory over the minority white gov-
ernment had failed to bring unity in the nationalist parties. He con-
tinued to make overtures for peace to Mugabe. Once back in Lusaka
after the Lancaster House Conference, Nkomo asked his deputy Josiah
Chinamano to travel to Maputo in Mozambique and find out personally
from Mugabe whether he was determined to break their agreement for
unity and fight the election as a separate party (Nkomo 1984: 200–203).
Nkomo believed that Josiah Tongogara, a key member of ZANU who
died in a car accident in Mozambique in 1979 soon after the Lancaster
House Agreement, was a true patriot who was going to be a powerful
voice for unity in Zimbabwe as he was impatient of unnecessary divisions
and was even admired by some ZAPU members (Nkomo 1984: 201).
However, as noted, his life was cut short by an accident at a crucial time.
Nkomo eventually believed that Mugabe’s disappearance from London
after Lancaster House Agreement indicated that he was not interested in
talks for national unity (Nkomo 1984: 203).
When Nkomo returned to Zimbabwe for the first time after the
Lancaster House Agreement, at a press conference in Harare airport,
he spoke of reconciliation and warned against the spirit of revenge.
He argued that the war was over, all were now citizens who needed to
work together, that people needed to forget the past and start build-
ing a nation in peace, and that people would not be divided by artificial
barriers (Nkomo 1984: 204). As white people had fought so hard

against black majority rule because they feared that if blacks ascended to
power, they would treat the whites as badly as they had treated blacks,
Nkomo thus called for blacks to prove whites wrong and to show that
blacks believed in equality and that is what they were fighting for. He
also noted that the blacks in Zimbabwe needed to treat Coloured people
and Indians in the country well, because they also had been marginalised
and ill-treated in colonial Zimbabwe (Nkomo 1984: 251). However,
during the campaign for elections, two PF-ZAPU candidates and 18
party campaigners were killed and many were terrorised by what Nkomo
believed were fighters loyal to ZANU-PF (Nkomo 1984: xiv).
Voting took place on 27, 28, and 29 February 1980, and Mugabe’s
ZANU-PF won by 57 seats, PF-ZAPU got 20, and Muzorewa’s UANC
got 3, while 20 seats were reserved for whites were won by Smith’s
Rhodesian Front (Nkomo 1984: 210). Nkomo’s PF-ZAPU therefore
lost the national elections in March 1980 to Mugabe’s ZANU-PF which
ascended to power on 18 April 1980 (Nkomo 1984: xiv).
Mandela in Post-Prison Politics

Soon after his release from jail in February 1990, Mandela argued
that his mission was to liberate both the oppressor and the oppressed
(Mandela 1994: 751). Mandela also noted that he knew that people
expected him to harbour anger towards whites, but he did not. Instead,
his hatred for the apartheid system had increased now. Therefore, he
persuaded whites that a non-racial South Africa was a better place for
all (Mandela 1994: 680, 682). However, through this, he risked being
accused of too forgiving and compromising (Mandela 1994: 684).
Soon after his release from prison and while holding negotiations
with the white apartheid government over the ending of the apartheid
regime, Mandela faced a challenge similar to that faced by Nkomo in
Zimbabwe, that of violence between supporters of different African par-
ties. Violence and killings between the supporters of the ANC and Chief
Buthelezi’s Inkatha reached alarming proportions towards late 1990 in
Johannesburg and Kwazulu-Natal. Mandela made several efforts to meet
with Chief Buthelezi to end the violence even though he firmly believed
that the apartheid government had a role in sponsoring the black on
black violence to destabilise the negotiations to end the apartheid
regime (Mandela 1994: 707–709). Mandela also demonstrated his quest
for peace in 1993 after the assassination of Chris Hani by some white
supremacists. This threatened to trigger a racial war in the country but
Mandela appealed to all people in the country to remain calm and peace-
ful (Mandela 1994: 729).
Therefore while campaigning for the first national elections on 27
April 1994, Mandela told white audiences that they were needed in
the country, they belonged here, and they were South Africans and
should concentrate on building a better future for all with the ANC
(Mandela 1994: 737). Once the election results were out and it became
clear that the ANC had won, Mandela purposed to ‘preach’ reconcili-
ation to allay the anxieties of many minorities, whites, Coloureds, and
Indians. He reminded all that the liberation struggle was not a bat-
tle against one group or colour, but a fight against a repressive system
and urged all South Africans to unite and say ‘we are one country, one
nation, one people, marching together into the future’ (Mandela 1994:
745). According to Alexander (2013), Mandela’s message of reconcili-
ation and forgiveness became rooted in South Africa and for the first
time the country became known as the ‘Rainbow Nation’, in Archbishop
Desmond Tutu’s words, a symbol of acceptance and pride in its diversity.
Nkomo and Nelson Mandela’s Idea of Liberation

Nkomo envisaged new African leaders who would welcome debate as
the necessary means for improving governance, not those who mistook
opposition to particular policies for general disloyalty and where con-
structive criticism is ignored and regarded as undermining the state. His
idea of independence included a leadership that listened to diverse opin-
ions of different social groups and different economic interests. He also
envisaged recognition of regional differences since different regions in
many African states tend to be occupied by people of different languages
and cultural backgrounds. Nkomo looked forward to a leadership that
did not regard its own interests and those of other people as automati-
cally the same. He was against leadership that confused self-preservation
with national security while in the process disregarding the law and indi-
vidual rights of the general population. He resented the kind of inde-
pendence whereby a nation can win freedom and its people still remained
unfree (Nkomo 1984: 245–246).
In 1980, Nkomo felt that people’s human rights were still suppressed
and that people’s freedom in the newly independent Zimbabwe was
under threat, now not from the colonial government but from the fellow
former liberation fighters (ZANU-PF nationalists) who had ascended to
power (Nkomo 1984: xi). For Nkomo, independence was supposed to
kick start the task of building a Zimbabwean nation, uniting the divided
people, and working in unity. Colonial Zimbabwe was divided mainly
along racial lines, with whites refusing to accept majority rule and pursu-
ing separate development that favoured whites as rulers of the country
and oppressed blacks. The nationalists were also divided by the period
of forced exile, imprisonment, and other internal conspiracies that sur-
faced during that time. Nkomo argued that the majority of the African
population had not participated in the squabbles of their nationalist
leaders, and as such, wished to enjoy their freedom in unity (Nkomo
1984: 214). This, however, did not happen, because, according to him,
Zimbabwe’s first government, led by Robert Mugabe’s ZANU-PF, ‘set
out to impose a narrow sectarianism’ and did not prioritise the task of
healing the nation’s wounds emanating from a brutal war of liberation
(Nkomo 1984: xiv). He accused the new Zimbabwean government of
adopting the repressive techniques of the colonial government (Nkomo
1984: 245).
A False Start in Zimbabwe?

After the loss of the elections, Nkomo believed that it was crucial that
he accepted the results because independence had been gained through
a lengthy devastating war of liberation and any contestations now could
have inflamed emotions, divided the people, and encouraged external
enemies (like the apartheid South African government) to destabilise
the country. He calmed down his ZIPRA soldiers by telling them that
they had, together with other dead comrades, fought for majority rule
and everything else was secondary (Nkomo 1984: 211–212). Nkomo
believed that Mugabe attempted to reconcile the nation a little bit by
appointing two white members of Smith’s Rhodesian party and four
from PF-ZAPU in his cabinet of 22 ministers. He was initially offered
the ceremonial post of president of the new republic which he declined.
He was then offered the Ministry of Local Government and Housing
which he also declined. He eventually took charge of the Ministry of
Home Affairs in charge of the police. The next difficult task was to cre-
ate a national army and a national police force (Nkomo 1984: 211–
213). Prioritising promoting of peace, during the demobilisation period,
Nkomo at times accompanied ZIPRA generals (commanders) to assem-

bly points and spoke to the former fighters about the need for national
unity. As the new Minister of Home Affairs, Nkomo even signed orders
for detention without trial against more than 200 soldiers who breached
peace and all of them belonged to his ex-ZIPRA army (Nkomo 1984:
218).
Nkomo thought that Mugabe’s government had a false start mainly
because ministers from ZANU-PF, who numbered 16 out of 22,
regarded their party’s central committee as more supreme than the
cabinet or parliament itself. As a result of this, Nkomo complained that
Mugabe picked up several government ministers whose only qualifi-
cation for the job was their membership of some ZANU faction so as
to achieve some internal party ethnic balance. This resulted in some
‘gross acts’ of irresponsibility by ministers going unchecked, increas-
ingly making it difficult for cabinet members like Nkomo who did not
belong to ZANU-PF to do their work because of too much interference
from ZANU-PF ministers. Nkomo argued that this amounted to ‘offi-
cial gangsterism’. In other words, ZANU-PF’s central committee had
taken over the functions of the cabinet and of parliament. However, in
the midst of such challenges, Nkomo ‘utterly rejected’ embarking on
any actions that could lead to a renewed civil war in Zimbabwe (Nkomo
1984: 217, 219, 223).
After independence, the greatest threat to Nkomo’s idea of a united
Zimbabwe was ethnic divisions which escalated during the demobili-
sation period in the post-1980 era especially between soldiers in the
ex-ZANLA and ex-ZIPRA camps on the outskirts on Bulawayo, the sec-
ond-largest city in Zimbabwe. This culminated in the first fight between
the two camps in November 1980 after ZANU-PF had held a party rally
at White City Stadium during which several of its ministers, including the
most vocal one, Enos Nkala, insulted PF-ZAPU and Nkomo as its leader
and argued that all minority parties should be crushed. Soon afterwards,
gunshots were fired into the ZIPRA camp at Entumbane township and
ZIPRA retaliated by firing back into the ZANLA camp. During these
fights, civilians were killed and 60 people were killed (Nkomo 1984:
219).
The culpability of Enos Nkala in sparking the army clashes has also
been highlighted by Nyarota (2009). According to Nyarota, in a
ZANU-PF political rally in November 1981 at Bulawayo’s White City
Stadium, Nkala actually promised a total destruction of the PF-ZAPU
party. This, according to Nyarota, sparked off a two-day exchange of

gunfire between ZANLA and ZIPRA in Bulawayo’s Entumbane suburb,
where returning soldiers of the two guerrilla armies were temporarily and
separately cantoned. This initial confrontation spiralled into the bloody
Gukurahundi campaign that engulfed Matabeleland, with Nkala openly
cheering as the Fifth Brigade army massacred people who belonged to
his own Ndebele ethnic group. If he was not the cause of Gukurahundi,
according to Nyarota, Nkala was certainly its catalyst.
In January 1981, Nkomo was sacked as Minister of Home Affairs
and appointed Minister of Public Service by Mugabe. He declined to
accept this one and was eventually appointed as Minister without port-
folio (Nkomo 1984: 220). Fighting broke out again between the ZIPRA
and ZANLA soldiers in February 1981 at the National Army camp in
Ntabazinduna near Bulawayo, Entumbane and Connemara Barracks near
Gweru. Nkomo, together with senior ex-ZIPRA officers Masuku and
Dabengwa, was once again called upon to talk to ZIPRA soldiers and
ordered them to lay down their arms (Nkomo 1984: 221).
On 5 February 1982, after the raiding of PF-ZAPU-owned Ascot
and Woodville farms, the government announced the discovery of mas-
sive stockpiles of weapons in ZAPU’s properties. Nkomo was accused
of plotting to overthrow Mugabe’s government with the help of South
Africa. On 17 February 1982, Mugabe sacked Nkomo from the cabi-
net together with his other three ZAPU colleagues. On 11 March 1982,
former ZIPRA commanders Lookout Masuku and Dabengwa, together
with five other senior ex-ZIPRA officers, were arrested and charged
with treason (Nkomo 1984: 228, 229). Robert Mugabe then likened
PF-ZAPU to a snake, a cobra, and threatened that ‘the only way to
deal effectively with a snake is to strike and destroy its head’ (Nkomo
1984: 229). This was followed by the constant killing of people close to
Nkomo and Mugabe eventually proclaimed in parliament that ‘the father
of Zimbabwe had become the father of dissidents’. Managers of com-
panies that Nkomo discussed a possibility of joint ventures with black
people were detained for a week and some heavily reprimanded (Nkomo
1984: 230, 232). By so doing, Mugabe ruled out a policy of reconcilia-
tion and adopted confrontation towards ZAPU. Nkomo escaped to exile
after an attempt on his life in Zimbabwe on 8 March 1983. Nkomo thus
believed that he was the symbol of national unity, which was, however,
rejected by Mugabe’s ZANU (Nkomo 1984: xiv).
Then from January 1983, the national government-sponsored Fifth

Brigade army began killing Ndebele-speaking people in Matabeleland
North, Matabeleland South, and Midlands Provinces after accusing
them of harbouring dissidents that were destabilising the government.
The Fifth Brigade army burnt down villages, slaughtered cattle, assaulted
women, and killed many just to instil fear. This was the birth of the so-
called Gukurahundi massacres. Late in 1983, the Catholics bishops esti-
mated that about 20,000 Ndebele-speaking people had already been
killed2 (Nkomo 1984: 235–237). In spite of all this, Nkomo still pro-
posed to Mugabe a non-political national conference to work towards
reconciliation as he never abandoned hope that he could contribute a
reasonable solution to the national problems in Zimbabwe by discussion
rather than confrontation (Nkomo 1984: 244).
Nkomo worked hard to avoid an outbreak of a civil war in Zimbabwe.
According to the current ZAPU president Dumiso Dabengwa, one of
the commanders of the ZIPRA military wing in 1979, Joshua Nkomo’s
commitment to peace and unity prevented Zimbabwe from plunging
into a bloody civil war soon after independence. Dabengwa argued that
Nkomo had to endure treachery and personal humiliation but humbled
himself in spite of the fact that he had massive military forces at his dis-
posal, to remain steadfastly committed to peace and unity in the new
country (Dabengwa 2016).
Mandela as State President

During his inauguration as president on 10 May 1994, Mandela argued
that ‘We enter into a covenant that we shall build a society in which all
South Africans, both black and white, will be able to walk tall, with-
out any fear in their hearts, assured of their inalienable right to human
dignity – a rainbow nation at peace with itself and the world’ (Nelson
Mandela, Inaugural Address, Pretoria 9 May 1994). According to
Ndlovu-Gatsheni (2015: 26), the reality on the ground may be that
the ‘rainbow nation’ envisaged by Mandela has failed to live at peace
with itself. This is because South Africa is still struggling to transcend
the racial categories and identities constructed by colonialism and apart-
heid. There are even complaints about reverse-racism as a poor approach
towards the resolution of the intractable national question. However,
according to Alexander (2013), one has to understand that in 1994,
when Mandela became the first ever black president, he faced a daunting
task of attempting to unite a traumatised, divided, angry, and fearful

nation. While many expected that his reign would bring vengeance, ret-
ribution, and civil war, he preached reconciliation and forgiveness and
therefore understanding the diversity of South Africa is crucial to under-
stand the challenges faced by Mandela.
Attempts at Economic Empowerment

While aware that they had accepted from Britain a constitution that had
imperfections, Nkomo believed that they had to make it work in gov-
erning the country as it enshrined the rule of law and the rights of the
individual, among other good tenets (Nkomo 1984: 216). Nkomo’s
concept of liberation included an idea of Africans that were economically
liberated. In urban areas, he wanted a system whereby blacks would also
have a stake in their communities through ownership of the properties
they lived in. He therefore bemoaned the fact that in 1980 only 6000
white commercial farmers owned the most productive land in the coun-
try while about 6 million Africans farmed communally in less-productive
land. As such, resettlement of land-hungry Africans, including those
from communal areas, workers in commercial farms, and ex-combatants,
disbanded from the former liberation movements needed to be priori-
tised in Zimbabwe (Nkomo 1984: 251). Therefore, after independence,
Nkomo mobilised resources to buy properties including farms on which
to resettle ZIPRA ex-combatants and create some businesses as coopera-
tive enterprises. The idea, according to Nkomo, was to integrate local
farm workers and ex-combatants in those farms.
Properties registered under ZAPU included two farms and five busi-
ness enterprises owned by ZAPU, four farms and five business enter-
prises owned by Nitram, a company established by Nkomo, and five
farms and three businesses owned by individuals linked to ZAPU, and
all were being used to resettle ZIPRA ex-combatants. According to
Nkomo, 4000 ZIPRA ex-combatants who contributed $50 a month
were involved. Nkomo was deeply involved as he personally raised
funds for the establishment of the collectively owned African enter-
prises which assumed different patterns of ownership. Some enterprises
included a thousand hectare vegetable farm on the outskirts of Bulawayo
which produced tomatoes, onions, carrots, and maize, a small ranch
outside Gweru which had 200 cattle, a motel and entertainment com-
plex, a tourist resort known as Snake Park outside Harare, a garage, a
clothing factory with its own retail outlet, a chicken farm, a pig breed-
ing enterprise, a farm set-up as a women’s cooperative, a secretarial col-
lege, one clinic intended to be the first of a chain of rural health clinics,
and urban housing that was to be sold in instalments to its occupants.
All these enterprises had taken off without any input from the national
government to empower black people (ZIPRA ex-combatants), ‘to free
them from dependence on the state or the municipalities by encouraging
home ownership and co-operative enterprises’. All these businesses were
confiscated by Mugabe’s government and put in the hands of a liqui-
dator after 5 February 1982 when the government announced the dis-
covery of massive stockpiles of weapons in ZAPU’s properties (Nkomo
1984: 224–227).
During his inauguration in 1994, Mandela noted that ‘We have, at
last, achieved our political emancipation’. He thus pledged ‘to liberate
all our people from the continuing bondage of poverty, deprivation, suf-
fering, gender and other discrimination’ (Statement of Nelson Mandela
at his Inauguration as President, 10 May 1994). In his autobiography,
he also noted that ‘The true test of our devotion to freedom is just
beginning’ (Mandela 1994: 751). He reiterated this in 1999, towards
the end of his presidency when he argued that while the achievement of
democracy was the defining challenge, ‘the long walk continues’ (fare-
well speech to Parliament, 29 March 1999), highlighting awareness that
the liberation he envisaged for the majority of South Africans had not yet
been attained.
Conclusion
The autobiographies of Joshua Nkomo and Nelson Mandela highlight
pivotal roles that both played in contributing to the attainment of black
majority rule in Zimbabwe in 1980 and South Africa in 1994, respec-
tively. Their overriding quest for peace, unity, and reconciliation between
races and supporters of different African nationalist parties presents inter-
esting similarities of the ideas that they had for their countries and the
conceptions of liberation they envisaged. Nkomo spoke of reconciliation
and warned against the spirit of revenge. He argued that the war was
over, all were now citizens who needed to work together, that people
needed to forget the past and start building a nation in peace (Nkomo
1984: 204). Similarly, Mandela also endeavoured to create a peaceful and
united South Africa, the ‘rainbow’ nation that he envisaged. He argued
that he saw it as his mission to preach reconciliation, bind the wounds of

the country, engender trust and confidence, and ensure that all minori-
ties, whites, Coloureds, and Indians felt secure. He also emphasised
that the liberation struggle was not a battle against one group or col-
our of people, but a fight against a repressive system. He urged all South
Africans to unite and declare that they were ‘one country, one nation,
one people, marching together into the future’ (Mandela 1994: 745).
The earlier differences between them lay in the fact that from
the onset, Nkomo’s idea of a racially and tribal inclusive Zimbabwe
never changed. He always believed in the equality of all racial groups
and in the unity of African nationalists and all ethnic groups in colo-
nial Zimbabwe during the anti-colonial struggle and after independ-
ence. Mandela, however, initially had conflicting ideas with regards to
whether being Xhosa (his tribe) or South African or African was more
important. He initially also strongly disapproved of allowing commu-
nists, Indians, and whites joining the ANC in the fight for the liberation
of the country from apartheid colonialism but became more tolerant
after the National Party won the general elections in 1948 and began
institutionalising apartheid (Mandela 1994: 129). At the end, however,
both Nkomo and Mandela became known for their quest for unity,
peace, and reconciliation between different African ethnic and racial
groups.
Notes
1. The Patriotic Front was formed in Dar es Salaam in 1976 by the central
committees of ZAPU and ZANU and was signed in Addis Ababa in early
1979 (Nkomo 1984: 200).
2. For a comprehensive report of the massacres, see Catholic Commission for
Justice and Peace in Zimbabwe. 1999. Breaking the Silence: A Report into
the Disturbances in Matabeleland and the Midlands, 1980–1988, (Harare:
The Legal Resources Foundation).
References
Alexander, M. (2013, December 6). Nelson Mandela dies: Man who reinvented
South Africa as a ‘rainbow nation.’ Accessed March 1, 2017, from. http://
theconversation.com/nelson-mandela-dies-man-who-reinvented-south-africa-
as-a-rainbow-nation-15594.
Asmal, K. (2001). Foreword. In The manifesto on values, education and democ-

racy. Pretoria: Department of Education.
Dabengwa, D. (2016, April 4). Look Masuku: The people’s hero. A paper presented
at the Memorial Lecture of Lookout Masuku hosted by Ibhetshu likaZulu at
the Bulawayo Progressive Residents Association (BPRA) Local Governance
Centre, Bulawayo, Zimbabwe.
Mandela, N. (1994). Long walk to freedom: The autobiography of Nelson Mandela.
London: Little, Brown and Company.
Ndlovu-Gatsheni, S. J. (2015, March). Genealogies and trajectories of the strug-
gle to become South Africa and South African. Keynote Address Delivered at
The Wits Centre of Diversity Studies on the Theme: Dominance, Oppression
and Transformation: The Psycho-Social Dimension, Impact and Consequences
of Dominance and Oppression and the Emotional Work of Transformation,
Emoyeni Conference Centre, Parktown, South Africa, 25–27.
Ndlovu-Gatsheni, S. (2016). The decolonial Mandela: Peace, justice and the poli-
Nyarota, G. (2009, July 24). When an owl flies in broad daylight. The Zimbabwe
Times.
Rochester Press.
CHAPTER 14
Reconstructing the Self: Hauntology

and Spectrality in Nkomo’s Autobiography
Josiah Nyanda
Introduction
This chapter focuses on how Joshua Nkomo, popularly known as ‘Father
Zimbabwe’, uses his political memoir to reconstruct the self, in the way
that Ana Carden-Coyne (2009) calls reconstructing the body. The mem-
oir, Nkomo: The Story of My Life (1984), republished two decades later
after his death, illustrates a specific understanding of reconstructing the
self through hauntology and spectrality as analytic lenses. This chap-
ter carefully examines Nkomo’s political autobiographical narrative and
shows the reader how different narrative strategies are deployed in this
book to illustrate reconstruction of the self. First, this chapter examines
two conceptions of reconstruction namely ruin and ruination as con-
ceived by Ann Laura Stoler and others (2013). This section details how
each respective concept describes human destruction, ‘dislocation and
dispossession’, and deconstruction in a way that spells political ruin and
ruination for Nkomo and the party he founded PF-ZAPU.
J. Nyanda (*) 
University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa

324 J. Nyanda
This chapter then presents an argument that the concept of recon-

structing the self adequately describes the Gothic effect of Joshua
Nkomo’s memoir, The Story of My Life through hauntology and spec-
trality as metaphors of the haunting effects of the political memoir. This
political autobiographical narrative illustrates a live of pain and suffering
dedicated to liberating Zimbabwe and Zimbabweans, first from colo-
nial bondage and second from Robert Mugabe’s ZANU-PF tyrannical
rule. It is, therefore, my argument that through massive investment in
the symbolic infrastructure of pain and suffering, the memoirs of Joshua
Nkomo embrace in them what Roger Luckhurst calls the language of
‘ghosts and the uncanny – or rather anachronic spectrality and hauntol-
ogy’ (2002: 527).
Therefore, what we have in Nkomo’s narrative, I argue, is a politi-
cal autobiographer and political figure whose self-narrative deals with
ghosts, not of the dead, but ghosts of the living; something Shane
McCorristine calls ‘phantasms of the living dead’ (2010: 139─191).
Joshua Nkomo is undoubtedly conscious of the processes of ruin and
ruination that have been meted against him through ‘hostile deconstruc-
tion’ (Ndlovu-Gatsheni 2007: 78) as a way of ‘uprooting’ (Yap 2001)
him and PF-ZAPU and its military wing ZIPRA from the political his-
tory of Zimbabwe before and after independence. Thus, through self-
narration, Nkomo projects himself as a political ghost, a phantom that
cannot be done away with but whose spectres will forever haunt and
occupy that special place in Zimbabwe’s political history and landscape
regardless of how ‘altered’ this ‘terrain of [the] struggle itself’ is (Scott
1999: 16).
Ruin and Ruination of Nkomo

The process of reconstructing the self presupposes that deconstruction
and destruction have taken place. Drawing on Stoler and others’ ideas
of ruin and ruination in their astute and multidisciplinary (anthropo-
logical, historical and archaeological studies) book Imperial Debris: On
Ruins and Ruination (2013), I will call this process of deconstruction,
‘ruin and ruination’. While alternative phrases and vocabulary such as
‘historical blunting’, ‘degraded personhoods’ (Stoler 2013), and ‘refash-
ioning the self’ (Scott 1999) and ‘the self in transformation’ (Herbert
Fingarette 1963) will come in as synonymous phraseology of deconstruc-
tion and reconstruction, respectively, they will serve as the jargon that
14 RECONSTRUCTING THE SELF: HAUNTOLOGY AND SPECTRALITY… 325
serves not only to authenticate Nkomo political autobiographical narra-

tive but also to validate that processes of political ruin and ruination, and
reconstruction of the self have, indeed, taken place in Nkomo’s personal
and political lives as exemplified in his political autobiography.
What I find fascinating in the way narrative is strategically deployed in
Nkomo’s political memoirs is the writers’ awareness of the ‘symptom[s]
and substance of history’s destructive force’ (Stoler 2013: ix) and
the processes of ruin and ruination that this history has and continues
to mete on his political career and image. By history, I am here refer-
ring to Joshua Nkomo’s experiences in both colonial Rhodesia under
Ian Douglas Smith’s UDI and post-independence Zimbabwe under
Mugabe’s ZANU-PF rule. Nkomo (1984: xiii) for instance, clearly
states that his book is not a history but ‘one day, if I am spared, I may
contribute to the writing of one with a happy ending (my emphasis)’.
The happy ending never came and consequently, he did not get to write
another narrative, one with a happy ending as he had hoped to do. The
aura of fear, insecurity and uncertainty in the carefully worded cautionary
statement ‘if I am spared’ shows that he is conscious of the imminence
of death and destruction, and the carefully calculated process of histori-
cal dislocation and dispossession that is taking place in order to wipe him
off Zimbabwe’s historical terrain. Similarly, Wilfred Mhanda, whose nom
dejure during Zimbabwe’s Second anti-colonial struggle was Dzinashe
Machingura, also ‘seen by Robert Mugabe as a very great threat’ (Moore
2011: xiv), faced, as Nkomo did, the process of defanging (ibid. xv), as
Mugabe was ‘eliminating [this] thorn from his side’ (xvi). Thus, Wilfred
Mhanda (2011: 253), like Joshua Nkomo, views himself ‘as a victim of
the internal struggles within ZANU before [and after] liberation’. This
victim mentality, which has the potent effect of turning Joshua Nkomo’s
memoir into a victim narrative, is a result of the fact that Nkomo is aware
of the degradation and scarring his body and self are going through in
the aesthetics of being politically ruined and destroyed by their political
opponents—black and white alike.
At issue here is the political life of Nkomo, and how this life, through
ruin and ruination has been turned into political debris. Focus is on
how Joshua Nkomo has taken advantage of his political ruin to ‘provide
a favoured image of his vanished past’ (Stoler 2013: 9), in a way that
ensures that his reconstructed self has a continual haunting effect on the
politics of Zimbabwe. In her introduction to Imperial Debris: On Ruins
and Ruination (2013: 9), Stoler describes to ruin as ‘a virulent verb’ (9)
326 J. Nyanda
that signifies the ongoing process of ‘decimation [and] displacement’ in

people’s lives. (8) In its virulent state, to ruin has an ongoing corrosive
effect that condenses alternative voices and narratives of a people’s his-
tory. Consequently, to ruin according to The Concise Oxford Dictionary,
as quoted by Stoler (9), ‘is to inflict or bring great and irretrievable dis-
aster upon, to destroy agency, to reduce to a state of poverty, to demor-
alize completely’. Through the diction ‘inflict’, ‘destroy’, ‘reduce’ and
‘demoralize’, we envision the power of the metaphor of destruction and
how irretrievably battered and shattered one’s image will be after being
ruined.
This idea of ruin and ruination is extended by Ariella Azoulay when
she describes ‘To ruin’ as the architecture of destruction in which indi-
vidual units ‘have been totally demolished’ (2013: 209). While Azoulay’s
focus is the actual house, this house demolition can be taken metaphori-
cally to refer to the ruin and ruination of a person’s character, personal-
ity and history. This act of ‘deliberate and willful destruction’ of persons
and property, as Vyjayanthi Rao calls it in his article ‘The future in ruins’,
constitutes the deconstruction that has taken place on Joshua Nkomo’s
political history and career. His place and role in the history, politics
and struggle for the liberation of Zimbabwe from British colonial rule
have been deliberately and carefully ‘tamed’, ruined and decimated ‘so
as to limit any deleterious and feudal pull it might exert on the future’
(Rao 2013: 291). The fact that both the Smith regime and Mugabe’s
ZANU-PF rule inadvertently ‘colluded’ to ensure that the political his-
tory of Nkomo is deconstructed through deliberate and carefully con-
structed processes of ruin and ruination succinctly points towards the
central role that he occupies in Zimbabwe’s political history of the strug-
gle for liberation. I now turn to the concepts of hauntology and spec-
trality and how as metaphors of textual resistance to ruin and ruination
manifest Nkomo’s political memoir The Story of My Life as a phantom
that resurrects the image of Nkomo as a monumental political figure that
refuses to be destroyed.
Understanding Hauntology and Spectrality in Nkomo’s

Memoir
Hauntology, according to Davis (2013: 54) entails ‘replacing the pri-
ority of being and presence with the figure of the ghost as that which
is neither present nor absent, neither dead nor alive’. Taken in its
metaphorical sense, Nkomo’s political autobiography The Story of My

Life constitutes the ghost that in essence comes back to haunt Zimbabwe
and challenge ZANU’s dominant and hegemonic politics. First, it was
written while Joshua Nkomo was in exile, which means that Nkomo was
physically absent from his home Zimbabwe. His narrative, therefore,
is the ghost that comes back to haunt his political adversaries. Second,
it was banned in 1984, as an act of ruin and ruination meant to make
sure that his story did not get to the people of Zimbabwe. This makes
it a haunting narrative that ‘represents a new aspect of, the ethical turn
of deconstruction’ (Davis 2013: 54), in Zimbabwe’s post-independ-
ence political discourse. As an act of ruin and ruination, the banning of
Nkomo’s narrative shows that ZANU was ‘intent on preventing its trau-
matic and usually shameful secrets from coming to light’ (Davis 2013:
54). It also inadvertently transforms the book into a phantom, which
represents Nkomo’s ‘return from the dead in order to reveal something
hidden or forgotten, to right a wrong or to deliver a message that might
otherwise have gone unheeded’ (Davis 2013: 54).
One would find narrative similarities in Wilfred Mhanda’s memoir
Dzino: Memories of a freedom fighter, which follows the literary trope of
hauntology in the manner it ‘track[s] secrets [about the struggle] and
bring[s] them to light’ (Dzino 2013: 55). Thus, Mhanda’s narrative, like
Nkomo’s, exemplifies a phantom, a text ‘in distress’ harbouring secrets,
to borrow from Davis (2013: 55). I must, however, be quick to point
out that the two political narratives, The Story of My Life and Memories
of a Freedom Fighter are not explicitly ghost stories but their narrative
thrust and the memories they evoke and invoke, according to Davis,
revolve around the transmission of phantoms and secrets. As spectres,
the two books act as deconstructive narratives hovering over and above
the ZANU-PF hegemonic and dominant discourses, thus ‘making estab-
lished certainties vacillate’. Looked at as spectres, the narratives of Joshua
Nkomo and Wilfred Mhanda reveal historical secrets that are shameful
or otherwise. They, as Davis (2013: 54) says, ‘open us up to the experi-
ence of secrecy […]: an essential unknowing which underlies and may
undermine what we think we know’. The political history of Zimbabwe
that we know through the grand narrative of ZANU-PF is challenged,
deconstructed and haunted by the spectres of Nkomo’s (and Mhanda’s)
memoir. As a literary spectre, a ghost and phantom, Nkomo’s memoir
pushes at the boundaries of dominant, hegemonic historical narratives of
Zanu, and ‘gesture towards a still unformulated future’ (Davis 2013: 58)
328 J. Nyanda
narrative of Zimbabwean history from the point of view of minor narra-

tives and voices.
Commenting on the spectrality and haunting power of texts (books),
Wolfreys (2013: 71) says, ‘there is thus at work here a certain troubling,
a trembling, in the idea of text itself’. Such lucid description of the
power of text speaks to the idea of the machinery of the autobiography.
Nkomo’s book partakes in its own haunting power. Thus, the banning
Joshua Nkomo’s book in 1984 was ZANU-PF’s attempt ‘to bury the
text, to entomb or encrypt it’ (Wolfreys 2013: 72) in the name of pre-
serving and entrenching a purely ZANU-PF grand narrative of the strug-
gle. However, books, whether banned or not ‘appear to have a material
presence, without which anchoring that such materiality provides, our
lives would assume a ghostly condition of impermanance; or, rather say,
as does Updike, more ghostly, more phantasmal. Thus the book, as one
finite identity for textuality, seems to keep us in the here and now by
remaining with us from some past, from our pasts, from the past in gen-
eral’ (Wolfreys 2013: 71). Not only does the narrative work as an appari-
tion of Nkomo, who through the text, engages in the self-embalming
process but the text gives Nkomo a state of permanent existence. Dead-
and-alive, the life of Nkomo’s political career is preserved and main-
tained through the text. Thus, in its state of permanency, the text serves
as a troubled and troubling spectre and phantom that will continue to
haunt and trouble Zimbabwe’s political history.
Nkomo, like many of his colleagues in politics, was forced into exile
by Mugabe’s security agents. In a sense, his exclusion from Zimbabwe is
synonymous with what Vidler (2013: 404) calls the act of being ‘buried
alive’. Thus, desirous of self-restoration, Joshua Nkomo uses his politi-
cal memoir to steer out of it ‘a feeling that death was beginning to talk’
(Gravida quoted by Vidler 2013: 404). The next section focuses on how
both the colonial regime of Ian Douglas Smith and Robert Mugabe’s
post-independence regime tried to destroy and deconstruct the political
history of Nkomo.
From Gonakudzingwa to Gukurahundi

In an environment that is characterised and rocked by violence, racial
and political tension as a result of the oppression of one race by another,
imprisonment, deliberate isolation and/or detention for long periods
are some of the ways of ensuring the political demise of your opponent.
Thus, the mere mentioning of Gonakudzingwa and Gukurahundi1 takes

us into what Richard Strier (1982: 386) calls ‘the theatrical dimen-
sion of public life’ for Nkomo. Gonakudzingwa was/is a detention
camp in the Gonarezhou national park. It was/is notorious for being
‘home’ for many Black Nationalists during the struggle for liberation in
Zimbabwe. It was a place of political ruin and ruination. The idea behind
Gonakudzingwa was that of ‘hiding prisoners away in game reserves’
(Nkomo 1984: 121), firstly because ‘the natives were just there, part
of the African fauna like elephants’ (Nkomo 1984: 121), and secondly,
‘[t]he objective was to cut us off from the world, to make it forget us
and us forget it’ (Nkomo 1984: 130).
This delineation of Gonakudzingwa evokes the ideas of ruin and
ruination as ongoing processes of destroying and decimating a person’s
life, character and political career. We begin to see this process of decon-
struction when Nkomo, by virtue of being a political prisoner, loses his
name and is referred to as ‘a prisoner’. The ‘Father Zimbabwe’ tag that
he claims to have been called by immediately falls away, especially when
he is dehumanised to the level of being equated with wild animals. Not
only is he hidden, to ensure political invisibility and insignificance, but
the place of hiding is a ‘game reserve’ because a native in the eyes of
colonial authorities is the same if not worse than beast.
Added to this is the idea of rot. Nkomo headlines the chapter that
focuses on his life at Gonakidzingwa as ‘Left to Rot’ (130–142). The
association between Gonakudzingwa and the image of rot projects
Gonakudzingwa not only as a place of detention but also an imperial pro-
ject with the potential to ruin a person completely. Thus, Gonakudzingwa—
and to adopt Stoler—becomes a metaphor of a ‘degraded environment,
[for] degraded personhoods’ whose political lives are redefined by spaces
that have been ‘turned toxic’ in order to ensure severed relations ‘between
[them] and people and between people and [them]’ (Stoler 2013: 7–8). As
a place of detention and isolation from public life, and a force of destruction
of one’s image and ambition, Gonakudzingwa, one would expect, meant for
Nkomo, a vanished, falling, neglected past in a state of decay and disrepair.
The effect of this offensive strategy of ruination is best captured by
Nkomo when he says, ‘[t]hey wanted us, and the cause we stood for,
out of the way. So they shut us up to rot quietly, in Camp 5 of the
Gonakudzingwa protected area, in Gonarezhou Game Reserve’ (Nkomo
1984: 131). Because the rot was gradual and carefully calculated as a
form of erasure from active nationalist politics, Gonakudzingwa was
330 J. Nyanda
home to Nkomo for 10 years. The objective was to ruin Nkomo’s

political career and ensure that his growing support base would shrink.
This was made clear to Nkomo by the British foreign secretary Sir Alec
Douglas-Home during a meeting of the two in Salisbury (now Harare)
in 1970. After years in detention, Nkomo dared to refer to himself as a
representative of the African population, whereupon he was told, ‘The
people have completely forgotten you’, said Home. ‘They no longer
recognise you: you do not represent anybody now. What we have done
is reasonable, and if you do not accept it you will be left out’ (Nkomo
1984: 140). While one cannot rule out the possibility of this being polit-
ical propaganda aimed at extinguishing Nkomo’s revolutionary spirit
through isolation, what cannot be missed, however, is the implied ‘you
have been politically ruined’ by detention at Gonakudzingwa. Stoler
refers to this prolonged detention as ‘targeted humiliations of subject
populations […that] are neither aberrant nor exceptional tactics of impe-
rial regimes, but fundamental to their governing grammar’ (Stoler 2013:
3). Evidently, this language of detention was part and parcel of the whole
imperial project aimed at stifling African Nationalism, for which Nkomo
was a leader. Whether it worked or not shall be seen in the section on
reconstruction.
The 11 of November 1965 spelled doom not only for Southern
Rhodesia as a whole but also for Nkomo and his colleagues who were in
detention. For those like Joshua Nkomo and others who were detained
at Gonakudzingwa, Ian Smith’s Unilateral Declaration of Independence
meant direct political assault and total isolation from the outside world.
A state of emergency was declared, and in a movemeant to consolidate
Nkomo’s image as political debris, ‘[a]ll our visits were stopped, the
police guard on us was strengthened, and we were forbidden to move
across into the other camps’, says Nkomo. He adds ‘Now there were to
be no visits, no news of the outside world, no free association with the
people in the neighbouring camps. We were shut away’ (Nkomo 1984:
128). In short, there was no life, and admittedly, Nkomo adopted a
defeatist attitude at this point. By saying ‘we were shut away’, Nkomo
draws our attention to the process of ruin and ruination that took place
at Gonakudzingwa. The isolation through prolonged detention, the
dehumanisation that took place through forced association with wild ani-
mals and the state of emergency are all tactics that speak one language,
the governing grammar of an imperial regime whose harsh and toxic cor-
rosion of individuals that are perceived as a threat is an act of ruination.
The attainment of independence on 18 April 1980, after decades of

a protracted struggle against British colonial rule did not bring respite
for Nkomo. It was a transition from Gonakudzingwa to Gukurahundi.
Where Ian Smith’s Gonakudzingwa had failed to break Nkomo, then
the brutal and fierce acts of Robert Mugabe’s Gukurahundi were meant
to destroy him completely. From being called a terrorist by Ian Smith,
Nkomo and his opposition party Patriotic Front—Zimbabwe African
People’s Union (PF-ZAPU) would soon earn a new tag; Mugabe’s
ZANU-PF accused him of being the ‘father of dissidents’. Paradoxically
for Nkomo, the transition from Rhodesia to Zimbabwe made him real-
ise that nothing had changed. The same allegations of trying to desta-
bilise the country that was levelled against him by Ian Smith were
revivified by Mugabe’s ZANU-PF government. A reign of terror in the
form of a ZANU-PF North Korean-trained military wing, Fifth Brigade
was unleashed in Matabeleland and parts of the Midlands provinces in
what came to be known in Zimbabwe’s post-independence history as
Gukurahundi. An estimated 20,000 people, mostly of Ndebele origin
lost their lives.
Writing on what he calls the ‘triple metamorphosis of Joshua Nkomo’,
which in essence implies the shape-shifting, forms of life and multiple iden-
tities of Nkomo, as well as his reincarnation as an apparition, to haunt his
adversaries and Zimbabwe’s political landscape, Ndlovu-Gatsheni says,
‘[t]his portrayal of Nkomo as “father of dissidents” set the stage for a sys-
tematic, violent campaign against PF-ZAPU, Joshua Nkomo and ZIPRA
combatants’ (2007: 75). If the name Gukurahundi (a Shona term for the
storm that sweeps away the chaff, paving way for the normal rainy season)
is anything to go by, it translates to violent acts whose objectives are cleans-
ing, ruin and ruination. Hence, Ndlovu-Gatsheni posits that ‘[t]he violence
against PF-ZAPU, demonisation of Joshua Nkomo and attempts at writ-
ing ZIPRA out of the liberation struggle, was taking place at a crucial time
of nation-building by ZANU-PF’ (Ndlovu-Gatsheni 2007: 75). Simply
put, there was a deliberate and strategic deployment of both military and
non-military force aimed at wiping off the name Joshua Nkomo, his party
PF-ZAPU and its military wing ZIPRA from the history of Zimbabwe’s
liberation struggle. Unlike Gonakudzingwa which symbolised prolonged
detentions, Gukurahundi had the objective of yielding immediate results.
The deconstruction, decay and ultimate ruin and ruination of Nkomo
became the obsession of ZANU-PF, which was bent on rewriting the his-
tory of the struggle that would exclude Nkomo, PF-ZAPU and ZIPRA.
332 J. Nyanda
The Fifth Brigade violence which was meant to demolish Nkomo

and his party was officially sanctioned by Robert Mugabe as the Prime
Minister when he publicly said, ‘ZAPU and its leader Dr. Joshua
Nkomo, are like a cobra in a house. The only way to deal effectively with
a snake is to strike and destroy its head’ (Nkomo 1984: 2). The serpen-
tine imagery in ‘cobra’ and how to deal with it, which entails striking in
order to ‘destroy its head’ makes us envision Mugabe posing as a ‘god’
pronouncing his first punishment against mankind in the Garden of
Eden after man’s first act of sin. This god-like quality of Robert Mugabe
meant that his word was final and could not be challenged hence, the
violence that followed led to the deaths of thousands of people. This is
the same man who had addressed Parliament in 1982 and warned that
‘some of the measures we shall take are measures that will be extra-legal
[…] an eye for an eye and an ear for an ear may not be adequate in our
circumstances. We might very well demand two ears for one ear, and
two eyes for one eye’ (Hansard 1982). What began as a verbal warning,
turned out to be an officially sanctioned act of genocide and/or ethnic
cleansing. What we should not lose sight of is that Gukurahundi was an
act of political ruin. Zimbabwe’s history was being redirected and rewrit-
ten to ensure the exclusion of ZAPU, Nkomo and ZIPRA.
Complicit in this project to destroy Nkomo and relegate him into
the dustbin of history were several ZANU-PF ministers who insulted
ZAPU, insulted me as its leader, and said that all minority parties should
be crushed’ (Nkomo 1984: 219). This language of hate and violence,
argues Gaylard (1993) would be repeated by Edgar Tekere, Minister of
Manpower Development and Planning, when he called for a military
operation to crush the PF-ZAPU opposition in the following terms:
‘Nkomo and his guerillas are germs in the country’s wounds and they
will have to be cleaned up with iodine. The patient will have to scream a
little’2 (Astrow 1983: 167). The systematically patterned acts of violence
that followed these utterances were aimed directly at decimating Nkomo
and his party PF-ZAPU. Barely a year into independence, Nkomo was
‘sacked’ from his job as the powerful home affairs minister, faced ‘demo-
tion’ to a politically insignificant minister of public service and eventually
to the ‘meaningless title of minister without portfolio’ (Nkomo 1984:
220). This humiliation and degradation of personhood as Stoler puts, it
signifies the corrosion and decay that precede the political ruin and ruin-
ation of a public figure like Joshua Nkomo.
Realising his loss, Nkomo 1984 (224–234) painfully labels him-

self ‘outcast’. This was a case of history repeating itself, only that this
time, the architects of his fall were his former partners in the struggle
against white minority rule. He admits that ‘my own losses were very
large indeed; other party members much less able to afford any loss at
all were ruined’. Nkomo goes on to add that PF-ZAPU and its leaders
‘had been eliminated’ (my emphasis 228). There is no doubting that
Nkomo’s admission that he, together with his support base and party,
had been ruined and eliminated sounds defeatist and fatalistic. However,
we should not lose sight of the fact that he had realised that he was deal-
ing not with an individual, but a powerful system whose intention was to
destroy once and for all his support base. It is this attempt to ruin and
deconstruct him politically that he challenges using his memoir. It is here
that the value of the book as a form of self-embalmment and a text of
haunting becomes apparent. The memoir is the instance of the ineradi-
cability of the ghost of Nkomo. It is the tool used by the autobiographer
to manifest the justice-seeking nature of the ghost of Nkomo who, even
when detained and isolated at Gonakudzingwa, in exile running away
from Mugabe’s security agents, and seemingly dead-and-buried, eternally
returns to haunt until some form of expiation has been conducted.
On Refusal to Fall: Spectres of Nkomo

In Nkomo’s memoir, there is ‘an unrelenting drive to reconstruct, per-
fect, and beautify the [self]’, as Carden-Coyne (2009: 4) says with ref-
erence to the bodies that were mutilated by the First World War. The
Second Chimurenga (hereby represented by Gonakudzingwa) and
the 1980s Gukurahundi destroyed human bodies and identities on an
unprecedented scale. In particular, the onslaught upon the body, per-
sonality, identity and political career of Nkomo and how he refashions
and reconstructs his identity is my concern. There is a hidden awareness,
in Nkomo’s memoir, of the imminent death and collapse of ZAPU as a
political party and ZIPRA its military wing. That PF-ZAPU will be sub-
merged, destroyed even, by ZANU-PF is glaring. Therefore, by unleash-
ing the memoir The Story of My Life three years ahead of the 1987 Unity
Accord, which marked the official demise of PF-ZAPU, Nkomo is liter-
ary refusing to die. His memoir is, in Derridian terms (1994: xx), ‘a liv-
ing on’ spirit that ‘in advance comes to disjoin or dis-adjust the identity
334 J. Nyanda
to itself of the living present as well as of any effectivity’ of the decon-

struction of Nkomo’s identity at the hands of Mugabe’s ZANU-PF. It is
a political narrative that not only seeks to reconstruct Joshua Nkomo’s
identity but also to ensure that identity will have a permanent, haunting
effect on Zimbabwean history. There is thus in Nkomo’s memoir what
Derrida in Specters of Marx calls ‘some spirit. Spirits. And one must reckon
with them. One cannot have to, one must not be able to reckon with
them, which are more than one: the more than one/no more one [le plus
d’un]’ (Derrida 1994: xx). It is this living on spirit that seeks to redefine,
refashion, reconstruct and re-infuse Nkomo’s identity through memoir
writing, into the ‘sanitized and reinvented’ (Ndlovu-Gatsheni 2007: 73)
history of Zimbabwe, a history that Chennells (2005: 233) calls ‘state
patriotic history’ from which many, like Nkomo, ZAPU and ZIPRA are
deliberately and by design excluded.
The memoir is testimony that there is connection between the death
of a political party PF-ZAPU and the fate of Joshua Nkomo the man
and his invaluable role in history. When it comes to the history of the
Zimbabwean struggle, the name ‘Joshua Nkomo’, ‘is—in a certain
sense—entirely uncircumventable’ (Magnus and Cullenberg 1994: xi).
This has been made certain by the memoir which carries within it the
spectre of Nkomo. Therefore, the official end and collapse of PF-ZAPU
in 1987 did not portend that of Nkomo both politically and histori-
cally. The fact that as early as 1984, he was aware of ZANU-PF’s plot
to deliberately deconstruct the history of the struggle when he says,
‘[e]ven our national history is distorted’ (Nkomo 1984: 228), shows
that he is disillusioned and thus his book ‘is the personal record of a life
that has played a part in history’ (Nkomo 1984: xiii). It is this life, which
Derrida calls the spirit that we cannot, must not be able to reckon with—
the haunting spectre of Nkomo that is the focus of this section. Here,
I focus on two strategies that were used by Nkomo in his memoir to
reconstruct and refashion his identity to a point where the mere men-
tion of his name haunts Zimbabwe’s political history. These are his link
with the spiritual world and his association with the founding fathers of
African Nationalism.
Nkomo’s visit to the Dula Mwali cult shrine in the Matopos Hills
in the 1950s portrays him as the favoured and chosen one to lead the
struggle for the liberation of Zimbabwe. His encounter with the spirit of
the mountain God at the Dula Mwali shrine was not a chance encoun-
ter. He attributes it to the development and growth of ‘the spirit of
Zimbabwean nationalism’ (13). His desire for freedom from white

colonial rule found him with some twenty others at the mouth of the
shrine. We are told that after falling into a soft rhythm of clapping, sud-
denly a voice like that of an ancient man began to call us by our names:
‘You, son of Nyongolo […]—what do you want me to do for you?
How do you expect me to accomplish it: when I told King Lobengula
what not to do, he did it?’ He goes on, ‘I replied, as leader of the group:
Babamkhulu, grandfather, we have come to ask you to give back this
land to your children, the people of this land’, whereupon he is told ‘I
will give you back your land. It will be after 30 years, and it will be after
a big war in which many will die’. It is, however, Nkomo’s claim that ‘for
thirty years I kept the secret that the voice had foretold a long and costly
struggle’ that is of particular interest here’ (Nkomo 1984: 14). Even
though this incident is rooted in traditional African religion, it bears
resemblance with two biblical incidents. The first one is the baptism of
Jesus where a voice was heard talking, ‘Thou art my beloved Son with
whom I am well pleased’. (Matthew 3 v 16). The second is the voice that
Moses heard commanding him to go to Egypt to set free God’s children
and take them to their Promised Land Canaan—an undeniably tall order,
which would take Moses 40 years to accomplish.
Similarly, it would take Nkomo 30 years to see the liberation of
Zimbabwe from British colonial rule. His claim to be the favoured and
chosen one takes him to a point ‘where he appropriates ritual powers
so as to mythologies himself as the true inheritor of a chain of power
that stretched from pre-colonial times only to be disturbed by colonial
rule’ (Ndlovu-Gatsheni, 2007: 79). By projecting himself as the custo-
dian and ‘keeper of national secrets that other nationalists did not know’
(Ndlovu-Gatsheni 2007: 79), Nkomo puts himself on a pedestal that
others including those that are trying to deconstruct history by ruining
his character, identity and political career, cannot challenge. He places
his degraded name and degraded personhood into the spiritual realm
where none can bring them down. By turning his struggle for recogni-
tion into a spiritual warfare, Nkomo has taken his fight into a realm that
no ordinary man can challenge. It is here that we begin to see the spectre
of Nkomo coming back to haunt Zimbabwean history. It is a history that
is littered with spirits, ghosts and phantoms that as Derrida suggests we
cannot afford not to reckon with.
The same voice would visit him in the form of a dream at
Gonakudzingwa to pronounce his freedom and the fact that the war was
336 J. Nyanda
coming to an end. The mysterious voice called him by name, ‘Joshua’,

and went on to tell him, ‘I have come to tell you it is over now. Get
out of here’ (Nkomo 1984: 145). By now, Nkomo’s lifetime of strug-
gle has gone full circle. What begins as a call to lead the struggle at the
Dula Mwali shrine in Matopos Hills ends with a declaration of comple-
tion when he is told it is over now—reminiscent of Jesus’ last words on
the cross, ‘It is finished’ (John 19 v 30). This, coming against the back-
drop of demonisation by ZANU-PF as the father of dissidents, serves to
present a diametrically opposite image of Nkomo as the chosen one to
lead the struggle, an identity and role he would not betray for the sake of
power.
Besides ritualisation, visions and dreams, Nkomo’s rebuttal of
Mugabe’s ZANU-PF’s demonisation and ruination of his identity as the
father of nationalism in Zimbabwe comes by association. Contrary to
the criticism levelled against him ‘for being too fond of travel, and for
spending too little of my (Nkomo) time at home’ (Nkomo 1984: 86),
which would reduce him to an absentee nationalist who was gallivanting
when others were in the bush fighting the enemy, Nkomo uses details
of his acquaintances and contemporaries to consolidate his position
not only as ‘father Zimbabwe’ but also as one of the founding fathers
of African nationalism. Among the luminaries of nationalist struggles in
Africa he associated with were Nelson Mandela, Kenneth David Kaunda,
Dr. Hastings Kamuzu Banda, Kwame Nkrumah, Patrice Lumumba, Sir
Seretse Khama, and Mwalimu Julius Nyerere, all of whom became presi-
dents of their respective countries. Added to this is that he was elected
president of the African Railways Employees’ Association, president of
the African National Congress, in absentia, president of the National
Democratic Party and life president of ZAPU. Implicit here is that if all
his acquaintances became presidents in their respective countries, then
Nkomo was robbed by Mugabe and ZANU, of his opportunity to be
the president of Zimbabwe, hence he talks of ‘the doubtful elections’ of
1980, which ushered Zimbabwe’s independence. Ndlovu-Gatsheni puts
it well when he submits that by associating himself with Africa’s political
greats, Nkomo’s intention was:
To alert his readers to his rightfulness to the leadership of Zimbabwe, like

other continental leaders who assumed power at the departure of colo-
nialists. One is also given the impression that Joshua Nkomo is project-
ing himself as a supra-nationalist who ranks alongside luminaries of the
broader pan-Africanist struggle in Africa. (Ndlovu-Gatsheni 2007: 80)
In other words, Nkomo’s memoir projects him as an embodiment of the

pan-African spirit, which cannot be wished away. Thus, any attempt to
deconstruct his identity by erasing him from the history of the strug-
gle is an exercise in futility because it will entail rewriting the entire his-
tory of nationalism in Africa. There is a bold statement that says he ranks
among Africa’s greatest statesman and political heavy weights, and thus
no amount of demonisation can bring his name to ruin. The same tech-
nique of narrative by association is used by Edgar Tekere to foretell the
doom that would befall ZANU-PF after he was expelled from the party.
He recalls Africa’s political heavy weights—Mwalimu Julius Nyerere,
Samora Machel and Quett Masire—questioning Mugabe’s logic of expel-
ling Tekere from ZANU-PF: ‘How can Robert [Mugabe] hope to run
Zimbabwe without Edgar [Tekere]?’ they asked (Tekere 2007: 132).
However, the collapse of PF-ZAPU and ZIPRA did not portend the
death of Nkomo. The fact that Nkomo’s name continues to be exploited
by Mugabe’s ZANU-PF today—32 years after he wrote his memoir and
17 years after his death—to woo votes from the people of Matabeleland,
most of whom are Ndebele-speaking people, shows that the spectre of
Nkomo lives on, and continues to haunt Zimbabwe’s political landscape.
It is a spirit we cannot afford not to reckon with.
Conclusion
In his book Refashioning Futures: Criticism after Post-coloniality,
David Scott (1999: 94) talks about de-historicising history and avers
that the shape of the past ought to guarantee the shape of the present.
Conversely, Scott is talking about the symbiotic relationship between
the past and the present and admitting that the past will always have an
effect on the present. Similarly, in the current chapter, I embarked on
examining a meticulously exhaustive exercise in historical reconstruction.
Focus has been on how Nkomo in The Story of My Life reconstructed the
self against the backdrop of political onslaught on his identity and his-
tory aimed at creating ruins of him. I traced how the tactics of ruin and
ruination used by the colonialists against Black Nationalists are similar to
the systematic methods of disregard, decimation and destruction applied
by the independent government of Robert Mugabe’s government.
Central to my reading of Nkomo’s memoir was less the history it so
masterfully accomplishes than the historiographical narrative strategies of
reconstructing the self that inform the book. Consequently, the question
338 J. Nyanda
I was grappling to answer was whether hauntology and spectrality are

part and parcel of the process of reconstructing the self in The Story of
My Life. What comes out clearly is that in the memoirs of Nkomo, the
past is being mobilised and deployed as the guarantee of one’s claims
about the self in the present. The spectral is at the heart of the narrative.
Essentially, the past is represented as the spectre that continually haunts
the present. Through reconstruction of the self, we see that the authority
of the past has great influence in the present.
That the memoirs of Nkomo were written at a strategic moment in
the life of the memoirist is telling. Nkomo wrote his memoir in exile at a
time when his future in Zimbabwean politics was uncertain. The memoir
then served as a permanent record of his political life which was dedi-
cated to ensuring freedom and justice for all regardless of race or ethnic
group. He thus presents a narrative that reclaims his father Zimbabwe
tag. Additionally, Joshua Nkomo wrote at a time when his political career
had waned completely—3 years before the signing of the 1987 Unity
Accord—which would see PF-ZAPU being submerged into and by
ZANU-PF to form ZANU-PF. His memoir is a direct challenge to the
emergence and gradual development patriotic history, which in essence
would turn out to be exclusionary, selective and a Robert Mugabe and
ZANU-PF history. The text invokes and exhumes the metaphorical
‘bones’ of the liberation struggle in order to evoke the haunting ghostly
image and name of Nkomo, PF-ZAPU and ZIPRA. This gives his mem-
oir an aura of spectrality that haunts ZANU-PF narratives of the strug-
gle. Conclusively, in Nkomo’s memoir, there is fetishisation of the self
which projects the memoir as a form of power to cause ruin and ruina-
tion of the memoirist’s adversaries while reconstructing the buttered
image of the self.
Notes
1.
Gonakudzingwa was a restriction camp situated in the Gonarezhou
Game Park. The place was used by the Rhodesian security forces during
the Second Chimurenga. It was at this camp that political prisoners that
included the late Father Zimbabwe, Joshua Nkomo, Josiah Chinamano
and his wife among others were incarcerated and isolated right in the mid-
dle of the jungle, surrounded by dangerous wild animals. Gukurahundi—a
Shona word for the spring rain that sweep away dry season chaff—was a
code name for a Mugabe’s Zanu-PF led military operation aimed at the
suppression of Zimbabwean civilians, mostly supporters of Joshua Nkomo,

by Zimbabwe’s notorious 5th Brigade in the predominantly Ndebele
regions of Zimbabwe during the 1980s.
2. There is irony in Tekere’s utterances when one realises that the same Edgar
Tekere had used medicinal imagery in support of ‘ethnic cleansing’ would
complain later when the political party Zanu, he founded, rejected him
and subjected him to the same treatment that had been meted on Nkomo,
with his full blessings and support.
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of Helsinki.
CHAPTER 15
Self-Writing and Subjection: Frederick

Douglas and Joshua Nkomo
Tendayi Sithole
Introduction
It is in this chapter where two figures who occupied different geogra-
phies and lived in different centuries under different regimes are brought
together by a set of existential questions and ensuring that the plight of
being human is what features in politics. In this context, the conven-
tional fissure of time and space leads to Frederick Douglass and Joshua
Nkomo not being in the same ensemble, and it will be argued here that
they are tied together by one epoch. To qualify this claim, it is impor-
tant to install the concept of subjection which serves as the knot which
ties Douglass and Nkomo together as racialised subjects. Their common
lived experience stems from the fact that they are pathologised for being
black and they are not worthy of being in the fraternity of the polis. They
are also banned from the realm of the sovereign. Both did not accept the
condition they were in and took it upon themselves to resist, and in so
doing, they reconfigured the world.
T. Sithole (*) 

342 T. Sithole
Their self-writing is what ties them together, and this is clear in the
manner in which they raise existential questions. These existential ques-
tions are paramount in the struggle for liberation and to install the form
of life that will allow humanity to exist together. It is a life that is out-
side the strictures of dehumanisation. Douglass and Nkomo’s foremost
critique calls into being new forms of life. This should not be construed
as prophesy of that which is yet to come, it is rather a forceful critique
that they make existential demands, and inherent in these demands
is the impatient and tenacious call that things should be fundamentally
changed. The world as it is, because it is plagued by subjection, is yet to
fundamentally change and this cannot be the automated process where
human activity is structurally delinked from the processes that confer
existence, whether precarious or not. Rather, the critique of Douglass and
Nkomo demands that the world change because the hellish reality that is
unleashed by subjection through its radical mutations of socio-historical
processes, say slavery (in the case of Douglass) and settler colonialism (in
the case of Nkomo), are ones which are not natural but manifestations of
subjection by the master and colonial master, respectively.
Unmasking Subjection
Slavery and settler colonialism signify subjection, and their operating
logic is racism. Thus, technologies of subjection do not suggest the con-
tinuity or discontinuity of the two epochs—slavery and settler coloni-
alism; in most cases, they are entangled as a single epoch; suffice it to
say that subjection has highly invested in its time, contextualisation and
modes of operation. Since subjection of racialised bodies is dehumani-
sation, both Douglass and Nkomo faced the vulgarity of their being,
making their lives superfluous. It is not uncommon that there is not any
resistance to this vulgarity of being which comes through ontological
violence that seeks to mask and redeem itself through the discursive prac-
tices of justification. Simply, slavery seeks its elaboration through hold-
ing, owning, whipping and extracting the racialised body as nothing but
property—the body which is vulgarised as being cast out of humanity,
dehumanisation being the very logic and the very elaboration of slavery
itself. Douglass as a slave is a case in point. Douglass ([1845] 1995: 3)
writes: ‘Master, however, was not a humane slaveholder’. In showing the
cruelty of subjection, it is important to ask: Is Douglass making excep-
tions of having better slaveholders who are humane? Even if they were to
15 SELF-WRITING AND SUBJECTION: FREDERICK DOUGLAS … 343
appear as such, is not the idea of being a slaveholder a serious one, one in
which there cannot be any chance of being humane? But to answer this,
in making reference to Mr Plummer who was a slaveholder, Douglass
([1845] 1995: 3) vivid description goes: ‘He was a cruel man, hardened
by a long life of slaveholding. He would at times seem to take pleasure
in whipping a slave’. In point of fact, no slaveholder can be human being
since being a slaveholder is to be a dehumaniser, and nothing human
being can come out of this. Douglass is right that Mr Plummer has an
iron heart and his purpose is nothing but being a murderous figure, a
sadist in the extreme degree. Douglass ([1845] 1995: 9) condemns such
a figure as having ‘no flesh in his obdurate heart’.
On the other hand, settler colonialism seeks its elaboration through
conquest, dispossession and the displacing of racialised bodies as that
which constitutes lack and deficits—a body that is also cast out of
humanity and that is nothing but a superfluous entity with no place.
Settler colonialism legitimates itself through the juridical apparatus and
hyper-legislation where arbitrary laws are made and applied to contain
racialised bodies. The law is not there to protect those who are wronged;
it benefits the wrongdoers and perpetrators of injustice. Nkomo (1984:
16) writes: ‘I understood almost without being told that they had taken
something from us. Later what I discovered that what they had taken
was our country’.
It is, therefore, imperative not to discount the fact that there are dis-
tinctions between Douglass and Nkomo: Douglass, a slave located in the
nineteenth century, on American soil, and Nkomo, a colonised subject
located in the twentieth century, on African soil. Indeed, there are in
them sets of relations that differ in terms of proximity to power in its
enactment and the type of subjection they endure. Douglass, under the
institution of slavery, is physically close to his master who exercises power
over him, the master who owns him. The life and death of Douglass
wholly depend on the will of the master. The enactment of power does
rest not only in the institution of slavery, but also in proximate bodily
relations between the master and a slave in the plantation. The place that
a slave inhabits is a hellish place that is reconfigured as the world of the
master—that is to say, the existence of a slave is contingent upon the will
of the master. It is in this place a slave must produce what the master
wants and how the master wants it—excessive and impossible as it may
be—everything should, however, be realised because failure (and some-
times even success) will be met with the wrath of the master.
344 T. Sithole
The corporeality of the racialised body of a slave, being the site of

production, is worked to death, whipped, beaten and dehumanised in
order to confirm the existence of the master. Nkomo, in contrast, is a
colonised subject who is distant from the colonial apparatus in that he
does not live in the same place as his oppressor, but instead he lives in
constant interface with the oppressor’s representatives—the police and
the army who mete out violence. Oppression is legalised in the settler
colony (though through illegal means), and the institutional arrange-
ments are such that they must ensure subjection where relations and
the status of citizenship are suspended. Therefore, as the citizen out-
side citizenship, the dispossession that is institutionally re-inscribed and
cemented and bars the racialised body from any access to privileges and
allows it to wallow in dispossession. Being as it may, the distinction
between Douglass and Nkomo is not peculiar as their racialised bodies
are dehumanised. Subjection becomes the norm as their modes of being
are outside ethical relations because they are ontologically suspended.
Subjection as a discursive marker of power and the (re)production
of asymmetrical power relations through the paradigm of difference—
dehumanisation as the leitmotif—has to be understood in relation to
the fault-lines that are created in order to deny humanity. It is subjec-
tion that Douglass and Nkomo contended with and in making their ethi-
cal demands on the world that put their humanity into question; they
militate for the right to exist—to be human. It is, rather, the hardening
of dehumanisation that no concessions are given and nothing is forth-
coming. For, the horizon of liberation, the terrain that Douglass and
Nkomo seek to arrive at, cannot be a given in that they will have to earn
the gains of the struggle through their very same efforts. In short, it is
impossible to fathom a situation where they will be declaratively elevated
to ‘you are now human and liberated’ in the ontological structure that
denies them their humanity.
If subjection is what Douglass and Nkomo have to contend with, it is
therefore imperative to claim that they are in the same ontological strug-
gle, in that they live under subjection, which in their relentless pursuit
of freedom they want to end absolutely. The struggle is then not to just
merely survive; it is about the will to live. It is upon Douglass and Nkomo
that they marshal their modes of critique, to unmask the scandal of sub-
jection and to engage in the new discursive intervention of the humans.
Douglass and Nkomo launched a critique of slavery and colonisation
respectively in a manner that is neither parochial nor universal, but cen-
tres on the human question. In their argument for a better world, it means
that human relations ought to change fundamentally. This is not sentimen-

tal; it is the politicised demand and, at best, is the call that the world as it
is, which finds its existence and elaboration through subjection, should be
confronted. In short, reality as it is should be fundamentally altered.
The confrontation with the world, in both Douglass and Nkomo’s
account, does not suggest the anticipation of the apocalyptical; rather,
it is a set of relations that have to come into being and the ones which
are not brought by those who mete out subjection, but that being the
sole project of those who are on the receiving end of subjection. This is
imperative in the light of the fact that those who experience subjection
know what it is, and they know what kind of life they want outside sub-
jection. Having lived in the melodramatic existential reality which must
be fundamentally altered, as they were denied their full status of being
human, it is expected for Douglass and Nkomo to ask fundamental ques-
tions about the world they find themselves in and the world which they
want—that is, the question is not what is but rather, what ought to be.
This is the confrontation with the world, its making and unmaking. For
this to materialise, it is important to name and explain the human condi-
tion by unmasking dehumanisation.
Douglass and Nkomo ask existential questions, and the human con-
dition cannot be engaged outside the sphere of these questions. Such
attainment with phrasing these questions has to do with particular modes
of thinking which, of course, are in stark opposition to the status quo
where unethical relations that inform subjection are masked or if they are
the modus operandi, they are deemed natural and nothing can be done
about that. Therefore, it cannot be expected that subjection is to be
reflective and it is important to pose a set of questions against subjection
because it is the justification in itself. Dehumanisation is not a problem in
that subjection finds its expression in dehumanisation. If dehumanisation
is a problem for Douglass and Nkomo because of being racialised, it then
becomes expected that the ensemble of fundamental questions they pose
would not illicit any form of empathetic relations. For, it is the task of
subjection to justify itself—that is, it poses as reality and human nature.
The Cosmic Hobo

The concept of the cosmic hobo is denoted by Wilderson (2008) as the
figure of no ontological density, the figure of no place in the world. It
is not to belong and to be outside the realm of the ontological realm
as Wilderson (2008: 404) remarks, the human being ‘ain’t no cosmic
346 T. Sithole
hobo’ in constant comparison, ‘like you, Negro’. The logic of power

and structure of the modern colonial world remind the Negro that their
place is the domain of nothingness. This is the main function of sub-
jection, to remind blackness of what it is and what it is not. The figure
of the cosmic hobo is not to own anything, let alone owning the self.
Dispossession is what haunts the cosmic hobo, and as Wilderson attests,
there is everything to lose and nothing to salvage. It is to be scribbled
off anything that lays that basis of humanity. The cosmic hobo is the
figure of the obsolete, and therefore, the implication is that it has been
the figure under siege. It is to be a figure of lesser human value, to have
the absence of ontological density. It is not to have the weight of being
human. The processes that came into being in the production of the sub-
ject are the emergence of hierarchisation and classification of human spe-
cies, denying them the status of being.
The emptying of the category of being is the violent process of
abstraction that installed the cosmic hobo. This is as the result of the
invention, allowing the process of abstraction to elaborate itself through
systematic, systemic and continual violence. The figure of the racialised
flesh is the cosmic hobo—the black of blackness—the one plagued by
slavery and colonisation as technologies of subjection. Not only is the
cosmic hobo institutionally made, but it is the figure that is ontologi-
cally unscripted through discursive markers of racism. It is the figure
that is structured through separation, difference, distance, exploitation,
violence, absence and even death. Where does the cosmic hobo exist
(if there is existence) in the racist imaginary of subjection? It is impor-
tant to note that the racist imaginary is not an elusive phenomenon; it
is the transfiguration of the fantasy to the real. This even means that
the absurdity of fantasy or its excessively perverse desires become real-
ity when they are projected and enacted on racialised bodies. Everything
becomes licentious in so far as racialised bodies are concerned.
Consciously or not, the racist imaginary of subjection suggests a num-
ber of ways that the hate of those who are racialised is turned out to be
a form of pleasure. This is what dehumanises Douglass and Nkomo as
they are at the receiving end of the passion of hate. They even detail this
passion of hate in their self-writing and, in return, assert their humanity.
This assertion does not mean that the category of the human being is a
given as it is the very thing that they are seeking, the thing that should
be taken back and restored, and the thing to be thought anew and
remade. In short, the struggle is to become human being.
Ontologically, the struggle for liberation is not detached from the

local histories; its contestatory horizons inform the human question.
Also, the narratives that inform the struggle for liberation cannot be sep-
arated from ontology in that everything is about life itself and for-itself.
The centrality of life means that life has to be life, and since there are no
half measures in the demands of the struggle for liberation, what ought
to come into being is not survival but life qua life. Thus, the figure of
the cosmic hobo—the figure that is dispossessed of life and made to sur-
vive through dehumanisation—is the one who fights for life. In short, to
be in the struggle to be free is to struggle for life. The struggle for libera-
tion for the cosmic hobo is fundamentally predicated in the will to live.
There is no basis of preserving because it is the enslaved and colonised
entity, and to break the shackles of enslavement and colonisation is to
reclaim life. Therefore, there cannot be the preservation of what is dis-
possessed; preservation is subsequent. For the cosmic hobo, the struggle
is to make the insatiable demand to live and this is not something that
can be given, it has to be taken since it is adjoined to the struggle for lib-
eration. The very process of self-writing means the starting of the politics
of antagonisms where the cosmic hobo creates a resurgent narrative. It is
the will to live that creates this narrative and self-writing details the exis-
tential struggle and formidable commitment to another reality, another
world. From this vantage point, it is necessary for Douglass and Nkomo
to engage in self-writing to rid themselves of the life of bondage and to
create that of liberation.
The ultimate purpose of the struggle for liberation launched by the
cosmic hobo is to create the enabling condition for the assertive will
to live and the reconfiguration of the world through the subjectivity
crafted from the stance of the dehumanised. In this struggle, the world
is imagined in another way and the viewpoint of the cosmic hobo is a
world that is exclusionary, oppressive, exploitative, rapacious, racist
and dehumanising. It is a world that exists through the suspension of
ethics—a world without others (Ndlovu-Gatsheni forthcoming). It is a
world of non-relation to those whom it dehumanises. Even though they
are grossly violated and that creates a form of an ontological scandal to
be accounted for, everything turns to reigning through impunity. The
ontology of that which is put in the domain of nothing, those who exist
in the world but without any form of relationality, without any form of
visibility and with no possession, the reign of impunity lies at the fantasy
of subjection.
348 T. Sithole
Whatever is fantasised in order to perfect the sadistic relations of

dehumanisation, the racialisation of Douglass and Nkomo is the starting
point. What is being dehumanised is not degraded from being human
to non-human, but rather the non-human is dehumanised. The ques-
tion therefore is: What does it mean to dehumanise that which is not
human being? Clearly, the paradox therefore arises in that it is impossible
to fathom the dehumanising of the non-human. The cosmic hobo, the
figure of the non-human, cannot be accounted for on the basis that it is
a figure that does not embody life. Clearly, death cannot be said to occur
in the light of the fact that the non-human has never before been a figure
of existence.
The self-writing of Douglass and Nkomo from the positionality of
the cosmic hobo means writing from the position of death. It is the ethi-
cal reason that deals with a difficult set of questions in the age of ter-
ror and lamenting a critique that defines the new aporias that inform a
new set of ethical questions. It is to generate a new force and new pos-
sibilities. It is to engage in the categorical significations that deal with the
lived experience. It then means that both assume the category of what
JanMohammed (2005) refers to as ‘the death-bound subject’. Douglass
and Nkomo are death-bound subjects by virtue of being dehumanised.
To be dehumanised is to be rendered justifiably dead. Both Douglass and
Nkomo are rooted outside the category of being, history and human-
ity. Therefore, their self-writing is the way in which they understand the
world, the ways in which they locate themselves in relation to the prob-
lems they are confronting. The figure of critique emerges through the
resistance of subjection in order to forge another reality. It is the confron-
tation of life and the one that comes into being at the end of subjection.
The cosmic hobo then is reconfigured to refer to the call for funda-
mental change against subjection which is the condition of no possibil-
ity—the justification of non-justification—a scandal. It is this justification
practice that propagates injustice as justice. As a form of critique, the
self-writing of Douglass and Nkomo and the subjectivity of the cosmic
hobo show the politico-ontology of justice, the stand against subjection,
the writing of humanity into being and the writing that confronts dehu-
manisation and claims the place of the cosmic hobo in the world. The
subjectivity of the cosmic hobo erupts despite the plethora of impos-
sibilities. The self-writing of Douglass and Nkomo is the inscription of
the cosmic hobo qua, the death-bound subject where now writing is the
struggle in itself. Violence not only defines the existence of the racialised
body that Douglass and Nkomo carry, it structures the manner in which
they confront death. To render their racialised bodies vulnerable to vio-
lence is the means through which subjection justifies itself.
Self-Writing and the Politics of Being

The self-writing of Douglass came into being as the making of the self,
and of course, the politics of being. ‘Means of knowing’, Douglass
([1845] 1995: 1) inscribes, ‘were withheld from me’. In seeking means
to know, the very act of transgression by taking back what was withheld,
Douglass embarks on self-writing to fracture the strictures that affirm the
withholding of knowing. To know is self-writing, the affirmation of one’s
place in the world. ‘Instead it is the personal record of a life that has
played a part in history, and it is also the work of an active politician who
wishes to see things change for the better in the lives of the ordinary
people of his country’ (Nkomo 1984: xiii). Both Douglass and Nkomo
have valid reasons to engage in self-writing which are tied to their poli-
tics of being.
Moral currency is often infused in the discourses that call for the end
of subjection. This is often declarative in that the self declares immoral
that which negates the self and in turn the moral is challenged through
a set of moral questions so that the immoral can be negated. The nega-
tion of the immoral is the emergence of the self, and that is what calls for
the discursive interventions that are liberatory in intent. The militancy
against subjection that dehumanised the racialised cannot have weight
on moral grounds only, since immorality cannot change on the basis of
being named immoral. Whether the stance is moral or not, it is impor-
tant to register that both stances are justified, and in their modes of
operation, they engage in the practice of self-justification.
What is unjust is immoral and what then happens when what is unjust
justifies itself and claims moral currency? For this to happen, it is impor-
tant to then make a distinction between the perpetrators of injustice and
those who are its victims. For the perpetrators, moral currency is justi-
fied on the basis that what they do to their victims is justified. This hap-
pens because they do not see them as human being and everything that
happens to them cannot be morally challenged. So, it means that there
is no moral dilemma for perpetrators in that their acts are just in so far
as they are done to those who cannot be accounted for as they are not
human being. As such, it is moral for perpetrators to dehumanise, and
350 T. Sithole
they can also go as far as to deny that what they are doing is dehumanisa-
tion on the basis that there are no humans. To deny those they racialise,
humanity is the starting point that will make their every act justifiable.
What is unjust is justified. The unjust is just because it is just—that is,
it is the favourable position of the perpetrators of injustice. Those who
suffer as the result of this justified injustice are denied the legitimacy to
raise any moral questions in that they are dehumanised and, as such, the
non-human cannot make the distinction between what is moral and what
is not. They are outside the grammar of justice, and they cannot claim to
be at the receiving end of injustice. Even if the victims would condemn
injustices meted out against them and unmask them to expose the moral
bankruptcy, this would do nothing to shake the foundation of injustice
itself.
The distillation of the distinction of moral currency and moral bank-
ruptcy is a key to understanding how subjection functions as the act of
self-justification. Since moral currency and bankruptcy are both defined
by the perpetrators of subjection, it means that there is no way that
the victims have a claim. For, they are not on the moral scale accord-
ing to the terms which are set by the perpetrators—those who are mor-
ally bankrupt while they fashion themselves in moral currency. Indeed,
this is not a paradox in the sense that Douglass in slavery and Nkomo in
colonialism found themselves spitting salvo towards that which cannot
be tainted or called into question on the basis of being self-justification.
Everything is urgent in the self-writing that is confronting subjec-
tion; it is the subjectivity that is restless in that Douglass and Nkomo
write with their backs against the wall. The subjectivity of Douglass and
Nkomo departs from the socio-historical experience they are writing
from; there is no discourse. There is no discourse in that there is no set
of discursive and institutional arrangements where there is a free flow of
ideas and their robust contestation. They write in the condition of strug-
gle, they struggle as they write and their writing is written in struggle—a
risk. To write is to risk and to risk is to write—that is, writing and risking
are inseparable. This intimate connection aims to bring to the open the
concept of the racialised figure in subjection. This form of writing then
becomes a deliberate method of thought that affirms life and launches
a combat against death. In this form of writing, which is declarative for
what it stands for, it reconfigures itself and recreates another world. The
narrative voice and authorial stance which is epistemological and onto-
logical risk the possibility that death that might occur. It is to write and
yet putting one’s life at risk and to wage combat in order to imagine the
politics of liberation.
The politics of liberation are what remains at stake in that they are
tied to life, which is also at stake, and the fact that not only is the writing
of Douglass and Nkomo a confrontation with death, but they themselves
are confronted by death. Their self-writing is not a matter of self-indul-
gence, but the politics of witnessing. There is not much to derive from
self-indulgence since this will not an achieve understanding of the human
condition that pathologises those who are racialised, the neurotic infra-
structure which creates a plethora of knots of conflict which lead to mad-
ness. As such, there is no way that there will be time for self-indulgence
as what is at stake is not the narcissistic ego, but life itself. It is therefore
right for the self-writing of Douglass and Nkomo to be combatant in
that it bears the politics of witnessing dehumanisation and discursively
carving the language that speaks for the necessity of liberation.
Political imagination is about the possibility of becoming that which
was never was the invention and reconfiguration of the world in line with
the aspirations of those who want better lives. Butler (2015: 30) is on
point to write: ‘The imagination is nothing other than the contemplation
of the figure or image of a corporeal thing’. What should be imagined is
life itself, to imagine the present that will rescue the future from the per-
sistence of the death-world that cements the subjection of the modern
colonial world. To imagine is the very thing that propels Douglass and
Nkomo to defy constraints that instil fear and the denial of the embod-
ied self to emerge. The lived experience of having to be weighed down
by subjection and its ontological erasure does not hamper the political
imagination of those who reconfigure the unmaking of the death-world
in remaking life-worlds. Political imagination is always at work, and it is
the very existential motif that keeps Douglass and Nkomo relentlessly
fighting for liberation. Butler’s idea of ‘traumatic inauguration’ which
serves as the field of experience which might point to a break, dissonance
of the affective and the psychic structures, does not constrain political
imagination even if subjection continued to heighten itself. The trau-
matic imagination, Butler insists, comes through interruption and diso-
rientation of human experience. This has to be seen as something that is
ever present to those who are racialised.
The desire to see another world, the life-worlds outside the edicts
and strictures of the death-world will only manifest through politi-
cal imagination. Life-worlds embody other forms of lives, and this calls
352 T. Sithole
to attention the manner that the new concept of the human being is
unmaking the world while remaking life-worlds. The world is not just,
it has not been just to the racialised, and it has to be, in the remaking of
life-words, just in terms determined by those who are racialised. This is
political imagination in so far as it calls for a total restructuring of reality
and the existential condition of those who are racialised coming to the
fore and resurrecting from their conditions of disappearance. In this way,
for there to be the unmaking of the world, the effort for this to be done
and realised has to come from those whom the world is against and those
who are structured to be at the receiving end of injustice.
In inscribing political imagination, there has to be a formidable will to
live and to emphasis the necessity that there has to be the emergence of
new forms of lives. The different ways in which the figure of the political
comes to be considered is to make such consideration from the perspec-
tive of the racialised—Douglass a slave and Nkomo a colonised subject.
Their self-writing is political imagination because it goes beyond the
limits, edicts, prohibitions and dead-ends which present themselves as
a finale. They create the impression that they are the last-standing and
nothing can emerge beyond them. But then, political imagination is the
formidable force that creates another terrain of struggle to say that the
status quo cannot remain. It is the force which goes against the grain,
the criticism that self-writing qua political imagination is wishful think-
ing, the impossible. Therefore, if the status quo is to remain, the better
as there is no way that things can change. Not that change is unneces-
sary; there should be no change at all as there is nothing to change. The
reality is then perceived from those who are not racialised, and because
of their dominant position, reality serves them best and it is their own
reality. Instead of reality being that of humanity at large, it is made
through the corruption of the ontology of the dehumanised through
dehumanisation. The deceptive representation of reality orients it to such
a point that those who challenge it are marginalised if not vanquished to
be on the wayside.
The self-writing of Douglass and Nkomo has to do with the question
of the human being which is then interrogated from the condition of
being racialised. There is no totality of the narrative that accounts for
the humanity of the all in the world and without also having to think of
the implications of race as the organising principle through which the
modern colonial world is constructed. The self-writing of Douglass and
Nkomo has been the ontological domain that signifies a void of things
worldly and existent. Not that they are poised at the domain of negation,
but it is the nothingness of being and not in itself but as the creation of
the modern colonial world that denies the full humanity of those who
are racialised.
What dominates the subjectivity of Douglass and Nkomo is the
political imagination fuelled by the will to see the rupture of freedom.
Douglass ([1845] 1995: 49) self-declared: ‘I must do something… on
my part, to secure my liberty’. This is rooted from his being coming into
consciousness and refusing to be in bondage. Nkomo wanted to be free
at all costs, and this did not mean the freedom of the individual. It is to
be free with others and this is much clearer when he says ‘I could not be
free while my country and its people were subject to a government in
which they had no say’ (Nkomo 1984: xiii).
The politics of witnessing is the dramatising force with which the
racialised life is dehumanised. To bear witness is to also reconfigure the
world. Thus, Douglass and Nkomo take seriously the question of being
alive and also not forgetting that death is an inevitable possibility, and
the suspension of its fear makes them be committed to the will to live.
They want to live in a manner that they do not fear death; the fear of
death is the one that eclipses the imagination of freedom. Those who
want freedom will fight for it even in the face of death. So, self-writing is
declaratively to exist.
There is a demand for political commitment for self-writing to take
place. The self that is in a combat struggle can be characterised in three
ways. First, it is the through self-writing that subject formation becomes
clearly pronounced—that is, self-writing is inseparable from subject for-
mation. As both Douglass and Nkomo write, they both demonstrate
how they have become shaped overtime and their hardening commit-
ment in their existential struggles. Second, it is through self-writing the
constitution of the political sets out conditions for (non)relations where
the self writes itself in the throes of the political. Third, self-writing is the
writing which calls the world to be unmade in order to be remade again.
These three ways that characterise the combat struggle are tied to the
question of liberation.
There is no discourse because the position of the being at the receiv-
ing end of subjection means that both Douglass and Nkomo are not
human subjects in the polis. The polis denotes a place, the structure of
political life, of belonging. This does not, however, apply to the racialised
subject—a cosmic hobo with no place in the world. The polis serves as
354 T. Sithole
the place of the sovereign, the figure which belongs and the one who is
protected by the institutions of the polis. The fact that there is the figure
of the sovereign means having a relation with the world by virtue of hav-
ing a place in the world. It is the figure which gives legitimacy to the
power and authority of the polis. Note here that the polis is legitimate in
so far as it determines moral currency and its bankruptcy in ways that are
arbitrary. The legitimacy of the polis is not contingent upon the ontologi-
cal plight of Douglass and Nkomo as they are not citizens. To be citizens
of the polis, Nkomo and Douglass should fit neatly into its configuration
by having access to rights and privileges. Alas, they are in bondage and
dispossession.
The difference is not the opposite of sameness. However, sameness
will mean the non-existence of subjection. The fetishisation of sameness
avoids pandering to the racist infrastructure upon which the subjection
dwells. There is no sameness or its repetition; if the world remains fun-
damentally unaltered, then there is no polis. The fetishisation of sameness
avoids the question of the racialisation where difference is launched as
the standard bearer. Subjection discursively legislates the fetishisation of
sameness without admitting that it finds its justification in the paradigm
of difference. The paradigm of difference is the constitutive element of
the polis which functions through double fetishisation—the banality of
sameness and difference; subjection aims to mask the forms of lives and
to deny any form of responsibility with regard to the ethical questions
that have to do with the figure of the human being. It depends what
sameness and difference are, their interchangeability depends on the will
of the polis, and this can be defined without contradiction. It is not the
responsibility of the polis to live up to its ethos, and they do not apply to
Douglass and Nkomo because they are just its surplus, the ones which
have no standing before the polis.
It is subjection, the governing ethos of the polis, where Douglass
and Nkomo are not allowed to make a register of being the same as the
humans and also being different. The fetishisation of sameness and that
of difference means the domains that the enslaved and colonised sub-
jects are excluded from. Dehumanisation creates the psychic structure of
sameness in which if propagated to the racialised, the latter should be
inferior, and if they are declared to be different, they are inferior still.
This ontological impasse means that in the fetishisation of sameness and
difference puts Douglass and Nkomo in the abyss.
Both Douglass and Nkomo are situated in their local histories which
then serve as the impetus through which they understand their lived
experience and the manner in which they article their (non)relation to
the world. Thus, these local histories are not events, but the very narra-
tives of their lives which are difficult to craft into what they are denied
about their being and subjectivity. Both are tied by the spell of subjec-
tion, and their local histories in their self-writing cannot be characterised
as parochial nor are they universal. They carry in them the fundamen-
tal political activity which is the politics of resisting the institutionalisa-
tion of the polis as the legitimate sphere. In their authorial practice, both
Douglass and Nkomo in no way claim to speak on behalf of the people
or to have the stance of universal subjects. They are situated in order to
give an account of their ontological condition—their place in the world
that defines the testimony that is contained in their authorial practice.
The authorisation of the subject means the politics of being—the
being of becoming, the place of the subject—that is, embodiment. Thus,
it is to claim that stance, the self as the self through writing, the perspec-
tive of one’s own in relation to the world. The paradox that emerges,
however, is that Douglass and Nkomo have no relation to the world, but
their self-writing, which is not just the relation of the self, is the perspec-
tive of the world. The displacement of Douglass and Nkomo is much
more pronounced, and it is fundamental to think of the self-writing of
the cosmic hobo as the writing of that which is denied a place in the
world. Is it possible to think about the place of that which has no place?
Indeed, in enslavement and colonisation, it is true that there is no place
for those who are at the receiving end of subjection. From where the
writing of Douglass and Nkomo is done, they have no place in the sense
that they are denied belonging in the world. Therefore, self-writing is
the crafting of the narrative of that which does not exist. The place that
Douglass and Nkomo inhabit is placelessness, the construct of the non-
belonging.
It is obvious that the narrative of Douglass and Nkomo is the plight
of the oppressed, the plight of those who are written outside the realm
of the humans. As such, the shouts and cries that are evident in both
of their writings fall on deaf ears. The world has no place for the cries
of those whom it bans from belonging. Those who are humans are the
full construct of themselves, and their self-writing comes from the tran-
scendental subject—the one who assumes the stance of the usual—the
human qua human. There is no need to construct the narrative that is
356 T. Sithole
declarative, the world has a rapport structure and the plight is never at
stake. If there are any ontological violations, there are structural reme-
dies in place so that the world does not become inconsistent. The sen-
sibilities of the human qua transcendental subjects are what make the
world a place, one of belonging. The narrative that is yielded as the one
thing is a given. To write is to relate the story of the humans, and if it is
self-writing, it is the projection of the self to the world that is expected to
have a rapport.
But still, the concern remains, what about the pain of writing the self
in the domain of placelessness? Does that mean placelessness is a privi-
leged space, one of liminality, transcendence, hybridity—of constant
mobility that suggests that the self can write itself outside place? In point
of fact, self-writing is the reclaiming of a place and it is to militate against
placelessness as it is not a privileged site, but the site of systematic eras-
ure of the self. The textualised nature of Douglass and Nkomo critiques
placelessness as a myth if it has to be privileged. Their self-writing is born
out of necessity; it is to reclaim the politics of being—the domain where
self-writing takes place.
Douglass is writing from the enslaved Americas. Nkomo is writing
from colonial Africa and its postcolony—he is reclaiming the place in the
system that displaces him. Both claim their place not in the geographic
sense, it is an ontological reclaiming, the demand for the politics of
being. If humanity is denied, it is then avoidable that there would be an
ontological struggle in the form of the politics of being. The self-writing
of Douglass and Nkomo cannot be expected to be confessional or it is
a witness account; it is the call for liberation, the experiment with free-
dom. The narrative that comes from their writing is the reconfiguration
of reality and to declare self-writing as nothing but the right to exist.
The self-writing of Douglass and Nkomo, which is largely viewed in
the domain of the autobiographical, fails to capture the complexity of
the individuals who were unmaking and remaking the world. To read
both their existential accounts in the limited scope of the autobiographi-
cal forecloses the possibility of fracturing the reality that they were in. It
is also not to recognise the textual force with which the human question
crystalises. In other words, the self-writing of Douglass and Nkomo is
concerned not about themselves but the plight of humanity, particular
the dehumanised. This self-writing is to be understood as what Mafeje
(2000) calls ‘a combative ontology’ which is predicated on the politics
of refusal to be complicit in subjection. It is the writing that is rooted
in the existential condition of subjection and also that works to rid itself
of that plague. A combative ontology is the politics of being, the cen-
tring of being in pursuit of liberation. Fanon ([1961] 1990) makes the
assertion that those who are clutched in subjection engage in a strug-
gle simply because they cannot breathe. This struggle is founded on the
fundamental factor that they want to live, and there is no way that they
can live while they cannot breathe. The lack or absence of breathing is
suffocation which results in the squeezing of the life out of the body of
the racialised, to put them to death as they do not deserve to live. In
order to breathe, they must struggle to breathe, to live and to be free.
According to Agathangelou (2011), there must be a theft of air and a
fight for that air. If breathing is the main function of existence and it not
a given in the ontologico-existential condition of subjection, breathing is
only natural in the body of the humans whose being is not put into ques-
tion through dehumanisation. It is problematic when the body is denied
what embodies it—breathe—the entity of the body whose absence means
the liquidation of life.
The existence of Douglass and Nkomo is suffocated through subjec-
tion—they cannot breathe. Their existence and humanity are denied.
Their assertion of being human is backlashed with dehumanisation.
Everything that they both stand for—the politics of life mainly in order
to create a new concept of being human in life-worlds—is met with
the formidable wrath of subjection. The more they want to breathe,
the more they are suffocated. It becomes clearer that by taking it upon
themselves to say no to subjection and attest to the fact that combat
breathing is a matter of necessity. This is mainly because combat breath-
ing what gives life to the dehumanised in order to become humans.
It does not mean that when Douglass and Nkomo breathe, then the
struggle is over; when they breathe, they must engage in the struggle.
Combat breathing cannot be a struggle on its own; it is ontologico-exis-
tential armour, the possession that must embody the racialised.
So, combative ontology, which comes into being after combat breath-
ing, means that Douglas and Nkomo declared a struggle against sub-
jection, for it and dehumanisation to end. Combative ontology is a
resurrection of those who have been dehumanised and getting out of the
throes of the death-world and giving birth to life-worlds. The form of
writing that is engaged here is positioned at the standpoint that is onto-
logically violated. Therefore, there is no way that there will be the nego-
tiation with the world to change its standpoint of being the death-world.
358 T. Sithole
The combative ontology is thus predicated at the confrontational zone

with the asymmetrical relations of the world. There is no way a combat-
ive ontology is avoided, and this is because of the way politics are framed
necessitating the call for life. The self-writing of Nkomo and Douglass
entails what Ngũgĩ refers to as ‘the poetic political composition’ which
calls for the dehumanised to see themselves clearly. What the self-writing
of Douglass and Nkomo calls for is ‘a liberating perspective with which to
see ourselves clearly in relationship to ourselves and to other selves in the
universe’ (Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o 1981: 87). For Ngũgĩ wa Thiongo, the
call is for those who are in the clutches of subjection to come to them-
selves and to see themselves clearly, that is, to understand the predica-
ment that they are in. It is to understand a set of questions that are before
them, and how to address those questions. Ngũgĩ (1981: 88) writes:
‘How we see a thing—even with our own eyes—is much depended on
where we stand in relationship to it’. There is no way that the self will see
itself clearly without understanding how subjection works.
The People
It is, in fact, practical to think of the people as the constituent elements
of the polis and to emphasise that there is no polis without the people.
But what is of interest is that there is a category of people who have been
written off from the polity, and they are made to be nothing—they are
dehumanised to such an extent that they cannot even fit into the cat-
egory of the people. The fact that they are dehumanised cannot make
them not be people, but it is important to contend with the fact that
they are not human beings. Indeed, dehumanisation is not the making
of the humans, but the unmaking of the humans. Let it be stated clearly
that slavery and colonisation erased Douglass and Nkomo from the
polis—they were not part of it, but were rather the exteriori. What is a
given is a conception that the concept of the people signifies the political,
if not its constitutive parts—that is, people are political agents who have
their place in the polis. But this then leaves a contention where people
are in the clutches of subjection in the very polis which is assumed to be
democratic by virtue of being given legitimacy by the people those who
have freedom as their ultimate horizon.
What are they to make with the concept of the people? Can the peo-
ple exist outside the polis? These questions are important in the light of
what Laclau puts forth, ‘the construction of a people is the sine qua non
of democratic functioning’. The people do not exist in a vacuum; they

are the constitutive part of the political.
Since the construction of the ‘people’ is the political act par excellence—as
opposed to pure administration within a stable institutional framework—
the sine qua non requirements of the political the constitution of antago-
nistic frontiers within the social and the appeal to new subjects of social
change—which involves, as we know, the production of empty signifiers
in order to unify a multiplicity of heterogeneous demands in equivalential
chains.
Laclau also laments that for a discourse to be considered political, or to

say the least, to be a form of self-writing, there should be the equivalence
of the production of the people. The construction of the people by means
of self-writing means that the narratives of the subject are constitutive.
The narratives of freedom contained in Douglass and Nkomo’s corpus of
work clearly mark that it is not themselves as individuals who matter, but
the people as a whole. These narratives have the people at the heart in
that the ontological condition that is being witnessed and critiqued erases
the people in the face of the world. In point of fact, slavery and colonial-
ism do not allow those who are in the clutches of subjection to emerge
subjects but as things condemned to non-existence. The existence of a
thing, a slave such as Douglass, if there is such thing as existence for a
slave, is a domain of nothingness. To be a thing, a commodified subject
in the case of the racialised, a property which is owned, means that there
cannot be any claim in the realm of rights. To be a thing is not to be the
embodiment of the self. Even if the concept of the self can be made to
be, dehumanisation makes it not to be. The self does not exist if the self is
turned into a thing. In brief, there is no way a thing can carry life. The
very signification of a thing means that life is taken away. In other words,
to be a thing is to be expelled from life and, therefore, condemned to
death. Douglass is a slave and Nkomo is a colonised subject and both
are denied existence. They write from the zone of death, not that they
are dead, but they take self-writing as a coming to life as they knew that
death was a near possibility—they could die at any time.
As those who are deprived, Douglass and Nkomo would rupture into the
state of being, and since the people are not those who are being, they are
yet to become humans. They will be humans if they have a place, for they
have no place in the world. The lives of Douglass and Nkomo count for
360 T. Sithole
nothing in the regime of slavery and settler colonialism, respectively. This is

the concept of the people:
They were noble souls; they not only possessed loving hearts, but brave
ones. We were linked and interlinked with each other. I loved them with
a love stronger than any thing [sic] I have experienced since. It is some-
times said that we slaves do not love and confide in each other. (Douglass
[1845] 1995: 49)
Douglass continues:
They came because they wished to learn. Their minds had been starved by
their cruel masters. They had been shut up in a mental darkness. I taught
them, because it was the delight of my soul to be doing something that
looked like bettering the condition of my race. (Douglass [1845] 1995: 49)
The love for the people is what informs Douglass and Nkomo’s subjec-
tivity. The struggle for liberation is for the people, and the horizon of
liberation lies in the solidarity with the people. In affirming this, Nkomo
(1984: 60) writes: ‘My own triumph was in the streets, with those thou-
sands and thousands of people from all over the country’. The love for
the people is the bond that binds. This is even expressed in the sense of
political commitment. For Nkomo (1984: 89) to write: ‘But I, and the
people I spoke for, believed that what people demand cannot be sup-
pressed’, is a serious statement of political commitment.
The articulation of ontological demands, their expression, constitutes
empty signifiers, and the contention is that this is not the case for those
who are racialised and who are at the receiving end of subjection. Empty
signifiers, for Laclau, are symbolic limits, and emptiness is not so much
about identity but the social location. The production of empty signifiers
is essential for Laclau, and this is clear in his emphasis that without them
there are no people. Emptiness, Laclau argues, does not mean a void,
but to point out that potentiality is fully realised. This is because there is
no competition and that is wherein emptiness lies. What then appears is
democracy which presents the telos of the political and this is fundamen-
tal in Laclau’s concept of the people, the people as democratic subjects.
Without the people, there is no democracy. The standard definition of
democracy, which can be simply put as the government of the people, by
the people and for the people, does not apply to those who continue to
suffer from the legacy of slavery and colonialism.
The challenge that arises when Douglass and Nkomo are brought
in, particularly in relation to the concept of the people, is their onto-
logical signification not being in the sense of Laclau’s formulation, and
then, there are challenges that arise. To note the concept of the people
in Laclau’s formulation does not include a slave and a colonised subject.
In other words, the people in the context of Douglass and Nkomo are
under subjection, and there is no way that they will be democratic sub-
jects. In short, there is no democratic subject in subjection. The demo-
cratic subject is the embodiment of rights, those who enjoy those rights
by virtue of being protected by those rights. These are not the rights
that are codified in order to ward off subjection, but they are rights to
life. The democratic subject is the subject of life. So, these rights are not
extendable to a slave and a colonised subject, who are not even part of
the polis on the basis that they are not people.
The present epoch where the racialised subjects find themselves is the
past that has been erased. This erasure creates the system that perpetu-
ates injustice—that is, the absence of the past is to make sure that they
have nothing to retrieve from in order to relate to the present. It is to
ensure in the present they have nothing to hold onto. Even though both
Douglass and Nkomo root themselves in the struggle of the people who
are facing the plight of subjection, they do not essentialise the history
of the people, but they do, in the struggle, authorise the people as the
nodal points of the imagination and actualisation of freedom. This then
makes the self-writing of Douglass and Nkomo not only testimonial, but
also authorisation in that the people are asserted as the agents of their
own liberation. It is the textual form that works with what exists and to
create a formidable force that actualises the practices of freedom. If the
people are to be, they are going to have the subject position of humans.
In this way, it is important to consider that Douglass and Nkomo are not
complete as the people, they are people in becoming because they are
deprived of freedom. They are dehumanised and they cannot have the
full stand as part of the people.
Laclau makes reference to the position of ‘being against’ which is tied
to the politics of Douglass and Nkomo, being against slavery and coloni-
sation, respectively. Being against serves as the necessity because opposi-
tion is the fact of life in the ontological condition of subjection. Even if
subjection can instil and amplify fear, there will still be those who rebel
362 T. Sithole
against it. Laclau makes it clear that the people are not just against; they
are in opposition to other things which are not in relation to others.
Laclau is in favour of the realm of the people, the entity that is
inseparable from the political. The people are the constitutive parts
of the political, the polis, which then scandalously excludes those
whom it does not refer to as people. These three constituent ele-
ments, as Wilderson (2008) refers to them, are the badge of enti-
tlement, the very given right that the imperial subject would justify
their existence at the expense and detriment of others. Douglass
and Nkomo made claims to these three constitutive elements with
the commitment of calling the human world into being, the world
where people will be people. The pious nature of equality, liberty and
fraternity has been nothing but dubious. Those worship at the altar
of these constitutive elements—that is, those who uphold equality,
fraternity and liberty even if none applies to them—have been the
nature of politics. It is as if they are part of their lives, whereas that is
not the case.
What still remains is the present scandal in the face of the fully
constitutive subject—the democratic subject. This is the subject
which has the place in the world and is protected by the embodiment
of rights. Its relation to the polis is the limitation of excess—that is,
the rights protect the democratic subject from the power of the state.
The polis is made without a slave and a colonised subject in mind,
and this ratifies the fact that the concept of the people is not inclu-
sive. The ways in which political formations come into being extend
precisely to subjection as that which includes while excluding, the
latter which is always the case for those who are racialised. In point
of fact, the concept of the people bares no same meaning between
the democratic subjects of the polis and those who are racialised—the
exteriori of the polis. If they are forced to be people, they are then the
rightless people, those who never qualify to come close to the con-
cept of the people qua the polis. Should it be the case that the people
are one and the same thing—if to say, universally, then it is appropri-
ate to change the relations that exist? But there seems to be no ges-
ture that calls for relations in that Douglass and Nkomo are placed
in the position of racial exclusion. Conceptual difficulties emerge as
the democratic subject is made to mean to refer to everyone, whereas
that is not the case. The democratic subject cannot be a slave or a
colonised subject.
The people that Douglass and Nkomo have in mind are different.
They are subjects of liberation, those who are to become, the creators of
life-worlds. As such, they are dispossessed through dehumanisation and
do not have the ontological currency to be the people of value, and their
lives being something that matters. They are not human qua human,
subjects qua subjects; their humanity is always in question in systematic,
systemic and continuous ways, life has meant a hellish existence. There is
no way, therefore, that the world that Douglass and Nkomo inhabit can
be the polis, and this necessitates that they are structured outside rela-
tions.
What remains is that Douglass and Nkomo still remain a scandal in
the face of the democratic subject, the subject which they cannot identify
with since they have no place in the world. Democracy has not ended the
death-world, even if it is propagated as the best regime. It is the regime
that propagates the pious, while at the same time it is hellish in that it
masks the death-world that clutches the racialised into nothingness. The
democratic subject is a sentient being and is exempted from the ontologi-
cal violence of this modern colonial world by virtue of not being racialised.
The longing of the people to be free was not the existential struggle
that was pursued in the ‘I’—the individual was not part of the grammar,
but all who shared the plight of subjection. To be free as an individual
was not the struggle that preoccupied Douglass and Nkomo. They were
part of the wretched people and their plight was that of the people. They
did witness the brutality of subjection not of themselves as individuals,
but with others, and this is what is contained in their narrative and cri-
tique. The call for the new concept of the world is fundamental in that
this is not the world of an individual. By tackling the concept of the
democratic subject, Douglass and Nkomo become aware of its limits—
the struggle of the democratic subject is that of democracy itself while
this is not the case for those who are slaves and colonised subjects.
The polis which is at the epicentre of civil life and the democratic
subject having civic duties, being protected by the law, serve as a clear
marker that the polis is not for a slave and a colonised subject. If there
are to be life-worlds, which usher communal and relational life-forms,
that have to be made beyond the polis and its modern colonial world.
Douglass and Nkomo cannot claim to be democratic subjects, and
their aspirations will be erroneous if they gesture towards this sub-
ject configuration because it is not who they are or who they will
become. The democratic subject exists in a sense of belonging in the
364 T. Sithole
world—being-in-the-world—where bonds are made and strengthened

by democracy. This is the subject which is not bothered by ontologico-
existential questions which have to do largely with being human. The set
of relations is embodiment of rights where democratic subjects are pro-
tected by law. Strange enough, Douglass and Nkomo have no standing
before the law as legitimate subjects in that they are outside the index of
the legal. Even though in the polis there is a pious judicial cliché that eve-
ryone is equal before the law and no one is above it, those who are extra-
judicial subjects have no relation and they are outside the ‘protection’ of
the law. The law is essential for Laclau’s democratic subjects in that they
bare civil duties and they must maintain those relations for the better
good of the polis and public life. In short, there must be the maintaining
of law and order. In brief, the democratic subject is protected by law, and
in return, this subject must uphold the law. It is important to note that it
is through law that slavery and settler colonialism are founded.
It is clear from the above that being enslaved and colonised brings a
completely different set of questions with regard to the law. What is the
law to those who are written outside its configuration? What is the law
to those who are criminalised by virtue of their race? What is the law to
those who are ontologically violated and whose relation to the world is
absolute absence in the sense of the extra-juridical? Can the cosmic hobo
use the law to defend their presence and to be guaranteed by law while
not having a place in the world?
The manner in which the law is attached to the aspirations of the
democratic subject suggests the ways in which there are institutions
that serve as guarantors of rights and the upholding of the law. The law
then becomes the mechanism of relations but which on the contrary
to Douglass and Nkomo, is nothing but cosmetic. The law becomes a
weight to them and it crushes their existence. The law, in short, is noth-
ing but subjection. For subjection to justify itself, it is backed up by the
law which informs the ethos of the institutions and justifying subjection
as just and necessary. This is done without any elaboration or ethical
accounting. The fact that it is the law defines the means and the ends—
it is the law, end of dialogue! To claim justice in the face of injustice is
what Douglass and Nkomo are struggling with. The democratic subject
participates in the polis with good relations with the law; this is differ-
ent to Douglass and Nkomo. It is therefore important to distil forms of
relations and to be mindful of the ways in which ideas of the democratic
subjects cannot apply to Douglass and Nkomo.
Confronting Death
It may thus be acknowledged that the ontological violation of Douglass
and Nkomo cannot be understood outside death. The self-writing is
structured by death. Their existence is not life to the full extent; for the
fact of being thingified, it means that death is inevitable and it is to the
extent that they lived knowing that death could claim them at any time.
Not that death is inevitable, but their self-writing being the thing that
invites the wrath of subjection which then signifies death. Of course,
the manner in which the self-writing takes place from Douglass and
Nkomo does not suggest they were writing from the tomb. They were
in the world, but the world which is structured by the ethos of dehu-
manisation. It remains indisputable that their lives were predetermined
by death, and not that they were writing, by virtue of being racialised, it
means that they were susceptible to the whims of death. But then, they
did not fear death in that they were committed to bringing another life.
Indeed, it would be a fallacy to suggest that the quest for martyrdom
preoccupied the self-writing of Douglass and Nkomo. The struggle for
the life of freedom, the world to come, is what preoccupied these two
thinkers. It is clear that they dealt head-on with the question of death.
There is no contradiction between life and death when they are
applied to those who are dehumanised. It means that life and death can
be arbitrarily superfluous without any form of accounting that will raise
ethical questions. Death outweighs life in that it is the end of life itself
and to be dehumanised means that life is not in its fullest, it is that which
is without. In brief, life is lived in uncertainty because death is lurking in
every path, space, terrain and territoriality. Given this context, the onto-
logical burden for Douglass and Nkomo means that their self-writing
deals with the world that is not only lethal, but deadly. In short, slavery
and colonialism are lethal in that they are regimes that are effective in the
production and legitimation of death.
The reason for this spectre of death—the death-world—is that the
racialised bodies of Douglass and Nkomo should be routed in that they
have no place in the world. The life that is lived while being declared
dead because it is dehumanised cannot be expected to resist. It is Derrida
(1978: 254) who declares: ‘Resistance is possible only if the opposi-
tion of forces lasts and is repeated at the beginning. It is the idea of a
first time which becomes enigmatic’. Derrida is on point here in that
for Douglass to fight with his slave master, Covey, Douglass for the first
366 T. Sithole
time has to fight and it was for the first time he was starting to chart the
terrain for liberation. ‘I resolved to fight; and, suiting my action to the
resolution, I seized Covey hard by the throat; and as I did so, I rose’. It
was not expected for a slave to fight the master, but it did happen. Not
only did Douglass resist, he fought in order to defeat Covey. In short, a
slave gave the master a beating. In a vivid description, Douglass ([1845]
1995: 42) gives this account: ‘I watched my change, and gave him a
heavy kick under his ribs’. The status of Covey as a slave breaker was
dethroned by a slave. To fight, Douglass ([1845] 1995: 44) argues, is to
‘carry off the rebellious spirit of enslaved humanity’. He began to fight
Covey at the very beginning—not of his enslavement or the encounter
with Covey who has taken many beatings—rather, the very beginning of
him coming to consciousness and facing his ultimate enemy, that is, fear.
With the ultimate purpose of facing and transcending his fear,
Douglass, as Derrida shows, is fundamental in every act of resistance.
Nkomo, on the other hand, had to pick up arms through armed guerrilla
warfare against the colonial regime of Ian Smith (the then prime min-
ister of Rhodesia now Zimbabwe). This is because, and Nkomo (1984:
61) writes: ‘The beginnings of a united African resistance were in sight’.
It means that the fight for liberation cannot be postponed any further.
Nkomo (1984: 105) boldly states, ‘the time for peaceful protest was
over, and we must get ready to fight’. To begin is the very act of life—
pushing all ontological and psychic frontiers to the transcendental level,
the radical suspension of slave consciousness. To ward off any form of
fear and impotence, there has to be a radical shift of consciousness. The
most appalling barbarity was justified through pious acts—the decep-
tion at best—masking the injustices that the racialised subject suffers.
The inducing of fear and the strike of terror is what befell slaves, and
in no way were they allowed to think about the possibility of freedom.
Disciplinarity, which serves as the actualisation of authority, the master
justifying his existence by inducing fear and striking terror, to crack a
whip that eats the flesh of a slave, is the justification of life in the death-
world. For this world to exist there must be those who enjoy privilege
and those who suffer. This is the justification of appalling barbarity which
sees itself as legitimate and even those who are enslaved should see that
the precarity is justified.
Subjection is arbitrary in slavery that being its rationale. This plays
into what Douglass ([1845] 1995: 10) articulates: ‘They never knew
when they were safe from punishment. They were frequently whipped
when least deserving, and escape whipping when most deserving it’.
But this does not suggest that even if they escaped whipping they were
not whipped since their existence was already whipped. They could be
whipped at anytime, anywhere and anyhow. It is in slavery that a slave is
always wrong. The word of a slave cannot stand with that of the master.
My master was one of this rare sort. I don’t know of one single noble act
performed by him. The leading trait in his character was meanness; and if
there were any other element in his nature, it was made to subject this. He
was mean; and, like most other mean men, he lacked the ability to conceal
his meanness. (Douglass [1845] 1995: 31)
There is no way the master can be contrary to what Douglass is hinting

at. The master has to be mean because he is mean. This attitude of the
master is brought about by the fact of owning slaves and seeing slaves as
nothing but things to be possessed and disposed of. Slaves, on the other
hand, are made to live in bad faith, and they must express being con-
tent with their living condition, even if this is not the truth. Telling the
truth is deadly in that slaves cannot put their masters to the test of truth.
The truth is the sole domain of the master; only the master can tell the
truth for he determines what is truth. Even if the master lies, that should
be regarded as truth by a slave. For, a slave can be in a deadly situation
for accusing the master of having lied. ‘This is the penalty of telling the
truth, of telling the simple truth, in answer to a series of simple ques-
tions’ (Douglass [1845] 1995: 11). By standing up for the truth, and
refusing the sheepish attitude induced by fear, Douglass and Nkomo saw
the truth as nothing but to fight.
If Douglass fought Covey as a slave and Nkomo fought Smith as a
colonised subject, it is important to ask: what does it mean to fight?
What is being fought for and why is it worthy of the cause? To fight,
Douglass ([1845] 1995: 1) contends, is the ‘evidence of a restless spirit’.
This is true with Nkomo who amplifies thus: ‘It made us more than ever
determined never to compromise with our enemy’ (Nkomo 1984: 145).
No change will occur if there is no beginning. The first step is essen-
tial to undertake the politics that underpin Douglass and Nkomo. They
were born in struggle, and they began, for the first time, to confront
death by their modes of resisting subjection. They began to articulate
their lived experience and then actualise their consciousness into deeds—
to fight. Indeed, for the first time and to begin, Douglass and Nkomo
368 T. Sithole
confronted death. In order to begin and for the first time, something
must happen to a slave and a colonised subject. As a slave, Douglass amid
being enslaved he also rejected the meek consciousness of a slave. The
same applies for Nkomo, a colonised subject. To admit is to know what
one is—to understand oneself as being dehumanised—and to reject is to
think beyond that ontological position of being enslaved or colonised.
What remains fundamental is to mark one fundamental principle—all
the structures that mete out, abate and facilitate dehumanisation must
come to an end. A slave cannot claim to be free as a fully constituted
human subject, while the infrastructure of slavery still remains intact.
The same applies to a colonised subject. The domain of consciousness is
necessary to undergo a radical shift, and this happens through the rebel-
lious effort of a slave and a colonised subject. Both Douglass and Nkomo
fight and for the first time, going beyond themselves and becoming com-
mitted to fight for liberation at whatever cost. ‘But it was not to be. We
were forced to fight’ (Nkomo 1984: 98).
It is the duty of Douglass and Nkomo to propel their existential motif
to the higher level of consciousness and not the transcendental one but
the antagonistic one. The transcendental form of consciousness means
that a slave and a colonised subject can evade responsibility and choose
to be complicit in their own subjection. In this form of consciousness,
which to Sartre (1956) means bad faith, the transcendental conscious-
ness claims to have nothing to do with subjection but getting over it.
This means doing nothing about it and letting it to be as it is. But it is
clear that subjection is, to a slave and a colonised subject, something that
should be of concern. Thus, something must be done about it. For, it
is the very thing that dehumanises, it denies existence and animates the
politics of death in the world—the death-world. In this case, Douglass
and Nkomo act against bad faith by adopting the antagonistic form of
consciousness in that they take responsibility, risk their lives and commit
themselves to the cause of liberation. Gordon (1998: 210) writes: ‘The
onus of human existence is thus born by the human being’. The duty
to actualise antagonistic consciousness, which is the self coming to itself,
by means of opposition to alienation of the self from itself, is a necessity.
A slave and a colonised subject are not free, and their lives have been
plagued by subjection; at worse, both Douglass and Nkomo were not
born free. In order for them to be free, does not mean returning to the
life that their forebears, who were not enslaved and colonised, lived.
They have never been free, and yet, they are informed by the desire to be
free on their own terms.
To fight and to confront death is the foreclosure of any pacifist stand-
ing, its obliteration. To fight as a slave and colonised subject is, accord-
ing to Gordon (1998: 215), ‘being able to do what was both denied
and forbidden’. It is to be beyond ontological strictures—to be in direct
confrontation with the will and might of subjection—to confront death.
Subjection denies and forbids confrontation because it crushes resistance,
opposition and rebellion with death, by threat or actualisation. To begin
and for the first time á la Derrida is the installation of the politics of
possibility. Thus, facing oneself through the self coming to itself—ridding
oneself of any fear of death (perceived or real)—that is, to be in a sense of
being in the life-world. This is appropriate in the condition that dehu-
manises, and for there to be liberation one has to fight in order to be
liberated. Liberation, its call, is the unmaking of the death-world and the
remaking of life-worlds.
Both Douglass and Nkomo took the project of demanding the world
to be fundamentally changed, seriously. To understand their political
project is to imagine where thinking of the future world is made out
of reclaiming the life-worlds that are supposed to be resurrected from
death-worlds infused in subjection. This clearly shows how this political
imagination is predicated on the restructuring possibilities that will be
the launching of the humans in the world, charting the terrains that do
not fear death. It is to work through death—as the possibility or actu-
ality—by confronting the world that sanctions death to those who are
perceived as a threat to the symbolic order. It is clearly formidable in
the thought of Douglass and Nkomo that they were still determined to
reconfigure the world, despite the possibility or actuality of death. They
have a different concept of the world, the life-world in which they must
exist and not the death-world which renders them dead while they are
still alive.
The articulation of the world from the perspective of a slave and a
colonised subject is a different concept altogether; the imagination of
life-worlds is not the one that means that these worlds must exist side
by side with the dehumanising world—the death-world. The antagonis-
tic consciousness of Douglass and Nkomo is to fight the death-world, to
fight it to come to an end. To be precise, it is not the end of slavery and
colonialism; it is subjection which is the nervous system of the death-
world. The articulation of life-worlds exists while the struggle continues,
370 T. Sithole
Douglass fighting Covey and Nkomo fighting Smith. Both express a new
political project which is informed by their subjectivity.
Conclusion
The ties that bind Douglass and Nkomo can also bring them into dia-
logue which is something immanent in their critique of subjection. By
way of authorial practice which takes the form of self-writing, they cri-
tique subjection in different spaces, times, struggles and existential loca-
tions. It is clearly evident both had (re)excavated the human question.
This question is still the spectre that haunts the present in the forms of
subjection that they critiqued—slavery and colonialism—which are still
in existence in the form of their lived aftermath. This is taking place in
the manifold of masks and still remains evident in the position of the
racialised body below the human line, the line which determines which
bodies can be enslaved and colonised. The spectre that haunts the pre-
sent is the continuity of subjection, and this cannot be divorced from
the unfolding of the pathologisation marked by the human line and its
attended paradigm of difference. The dehumanisation that Douglass and
Nkomo witnessed in their lifetime is the one which they subjected to cri-
tique and it is the very thing that still exists.
How, for example, is there still the question of subjection in the world
that is declared to be free and which espouses a human rights’ culture,
and yet, there are still disposable lives. This is the world that does not
fear contradicting itself in that it cannot account itself to those who are
dehumanised. Their plight counts for nothing, and as such, they can-
not make claims to call the human rights culture which is not of their
own making and not something they should be concerned about. The
pious Trinitarian entitlement of equality, liberty and fraternity cannot be
extended to Douglass and Nkomo as they fall outside the ontological
structure of the humans.
It is no accident that injustices continue to reign in the contempo-
rary era in the sense that what Douglass and Nkomo critiqued did not
unravel, but rather mutated—the yielding of the masked face and not the
human face. Thus, the implication is still that subjection cannot redeem
itself since it is the bedrock upon which the modern colonial world is
based. It is the world which exists outside relationality in that subjection
is the elevation of one humanity at the expense of another—that is, the
systematic and systemic dehumanisation of the latter. The dehumanised
humanity finds itself in the throes if existence that institutionalise, natu-

ralise and normalise subjection.
The self-writing of Douglass and Nkomo did not, by choice, take
place outside the discourse. There was no discourse since they were sti-
fled, censured and silenced. For the fact of being the cosmic hobo, they
were outside the grammar of being. They were writing precariousness,
while they were living it, a life plagued by horror, which, in many ways,
cannot be comprehended even on the textual level where their self-
writing took place. Their calls fell on deaf ears since their existence was
walled against—shuttered completely. The plight of a slave cannot be
heard amongst the chattel slavery apparatus and the settler colonial sys-
tem. The discourse of agency and structure counts for nothing and thus
collapses. The more the enslaved and the colonised cry out loudly for
their plight, the more they become inaudible.
What then to assume if the self-writing of Douglass and Nkomo was
not intended to be heard by their oppressors? It might well be asserted
that their self-writing in raising ethical questions was to facilitate the dia-
logue with the people, those whom they share the same aspirations with
and who struggle for liberation. Their self-writing is for those who suffer
from subjection and who demand the unmaking of the death-world and
making of the life-worlds.
References
Agathangelou, A. M. (2011). Bodies to the slaughter: Global racial reconstruc-
tions, Fanon’s combat breath and wrestling for life. Somatechnics, 1(1), 209–
248.
Butler, J. (2015). Senses of the subject. New York: Fordham University Press.
Derrida, J. (1978). Writing and difference (Alan Bass, Trans.). London:
Routledge.
Douglass, F. ([1845]. 1995). Narrative of the life of Frederick Douglass. New
York: Dover Publications.
Fanon, Frantz. ([1961]. 1990). The wretched of the Earth (C. Farrington,
Trans.). London: Penguin.
Gordon, L. R. (1998). Douglass as an existentialist. In B. E. Lawson &
F. K. Kirkland (Eds.), Frederick Douglass: A critical reader (pp. 207–226).
Malden: Blackwell.
JanMohammed, A. (2005). The death-bound-subject: Richard Wright’s archaeol-
ogy of death. Durham: Duke University Press.
372 T. Sithole
Mafeje, A. (2000). Africanity: A combative ontology. CODESRIA Bulletin, 1

and 4, 67–71.
Sartre, J-P. (1956). Being and nothingness: An essay on phenomenological ontol-
ogy (Translated and with a new introduction by Hazel E. Barnes). London:
Methuen.
Wilderson, F. B. III. (2008). Incognegro: A memoir of exile and apartheid.
Cambridge, MA: South End Press.
CHAPTER 16
Father Zimbabwe: Media, Memory

and Joshua Nkomo
Sylvester Dombo
Introduction
During his lifetime, he had a reputation of being a nationalist leader,
a dissident and later the vice president of Zimbabwe. In death, he was
to become more controversial as he was given the lofty title of ‘Father
Zimbabwe’. Further attempts to commemorate his life through a statue
created by North Koreans generated more debate as there were those
who thought that Mugabe was celebrating his defeat of Nkomo, whilst
others thought it was a genuine way to remember a liberation icon. Such
controversies were generated by and found expression through the press.
This chapter looks at the struggle over the memory of Joshua Nkomo in
Zimbabwe’s history through the lens of the press, both private and state
media. It argues that whilst the state media sought to overlook the con-
troversies surrounding the relationship between Nkomo and the ZANU
PF government, the private media effectively promoted debate on and
about his life pointing to his treatment at independence as demeaning.
The private press thus questioned the choice of the selection of makers
S. Dombo (*) 
Great Zimbabwe University, Masvingo, Zimbabwe

374 S. Dombo
of his statue, the place to erect his statue and what it meant to the state
vis-`a-vis what it meant to the veteran nationalists’ supporters.
The story of one of Zimbabwe’s iconic liberation war heroes bor-
ders on being a soap opera: for it have many twists and turns; he was
the most popular nationalists during the struggle so much so that he
could have been the first president of the country had the British left
sooner than 1980. At independence, he would lose the elections to
ZANU PF but was humble enough to join a unity government as a min-
ister. Before the independence euphoria was over, he was to be haunted
by the same people he probably nurtured politically and was seen as a
‘snake in the house’ whose head had to be crushed. Fast forward to 1
July 1999, Joshua Nkomo’s life had turned a full circle: those who once
saw him as a bandit, a sell-out and a dissident now gave him the tower-
ing title: Father Zimbabwe. It was none other than his erstwhile enemy
who proclaimed him as a founder of the nation of Zimbabwe. How did
such transformation come to be? Or why did it come so late in his career
(after his death)? Was it just a smokescreen or it was a genuine realisation
and appreciation of his contribution to the nation of Zimbabwe or was
it the usual ‘wafa wanaka’ rhetoric that is so common at Zimbabwean
funerals? What controversies did this honouring generate? Can such an
honour be labelled a ‘patriotic statue’?
This chapter interrogates the above questions and sees how they can
better inform us on the dramatic but painful change of fortunes that the
Nkomo name has gone through, both in life and in death. It uses the
press as a lens through which we may understand how Joshua Nkomo
is being remembered and simultaneously honoured after his death.
I generally divide the press into two: that which is pro-government
(state owned) and the private press which is deemed anti-government.
The main aim is to see how issues were presented about Joshua Nkomo
and his memorialisation, especially around the controversial statues in
Bulawayo and Harare. This chapter specifically deals with the nature of
the newspaper reporting, their selection of headlines and their attribu-
tion of agency towards certain actors (Williams 2004: 5).
This study is located within the discourses of contested pasts and
contested memories. As such, I draw largely from the work of Richard
Werbner on how different groups in Zimbabwe memorialised their past.
Werbner discusses the memorialisation of the elite soldiers at the Heroes
Acre, and contrary to this, there was what he termed counter-memorial-
isation by the ordinary people. His major argument is that personal and
16 FATHER ZIMBABWE: MEDIA, MEMORY AND JOSHUA NKOMO 375
collective memory has become increasingly contested and problematic

in post-colonial nation building (Werbner 1998). It is contested because
the elites have their own version of the past they would want to force
down the throats of the people ostensibly to aid in the building of a
nation. This leads to what Werbner terms as anti-memory, whereby the
past is imagined as buried and forgotten. Besides anti-memory, Werbner
also discusses immediate memory which he defines as memory that is
readily accessible, held to be unforgettable, always to be remembered
and kept very much alive (Werbner 1998). The concept of contested
pasts enables engagement with critical questions over what the past
means in the present, be it the pre-colonial, colonial, nationalist or post-
colonial past. In the context of Zimbabwe, Werbner argues that post-
colonial state-building and nation-building processes were predicated on
memories of African resistance and the national liberation struggle. He
elaborates:
In Zimbabwe a lot of effort has been spent on turning the memory of

‘political violence into prestige and legitimacy for itself and tribute for
others. Since 1980, Zimbabwe has been agonizing under a national-
ist regime whose political essence was founded on the history and mem-
ory of the national liberation struggle. This regime has been holding the
nation hostage to skewed and highly partisan and sanitized version of his-
tory and memory of national liberation struggle, presenting it in romantic
and heroic terms pruned of internal and external contestations. (Werbner
1998: 45)
Drawing from these works, this chapter is an attempt to investigate how

the memory of the liberation struggle icon is being appropriated suppos-
edly for nation building whilst putting ZANU PF and its members as the
fathers of this history at the expense of other players.
This chapter also draws from the work by Terrence Ranger, JoAnn
McGregor and Jocelyn Alexander’s impressive work on Violence and
Memory in Matabeleland which argues that the proclamation and
enactment of official memory of the liberation war have sought to
silence all alternative memories. In this work, the authors argue that
in Matabeleland, it remains difficult and dangerous for people to seek
to erect monuments to those slain in the 1970s and those who died
at the hands of the state in the 1980s (Alexander et al. 2000). Ivan
Murambiwa, the Director of the National Archives of Zimbabwe, aptly
summarises the state of the Zimbabwean memories on the conflict
376 S. Dombo
by arguing that Zimbabwe is divided into fragmented and fluid sec-

tions of victors and losers, victims and victimisers (Murambiwa 2008).
Murambiwa notes that due to the diversity of its shared memory, some
sections actively seek to protect their desired memories through collect-
ing documents, objects and stories that buttress their viewpoints whilst
at the same time seeking to erase unwanted memories of losses, atrocities
and repression (Murambiwa 2008).
This chapter also draws from Wendy Willems’ analysis of the politics
of coverage of the land reform in Zimbabwe by the press. She analyses
how meanings of land were contested in two daily newspapers, the pri-
vately owned The Daily News and the state-funded The Herald, in the
period from February 2000 leading up to the parliamentary elections in
June 2000 (Willems 2004: 5). In this chapter, I also attempt to draw
from the press how the issue of honouring Nkomo was covered by the
various newspapers in the country. What kind of stance did the news-
papers take and with what implications for their readership? I dwell spe-
cifically on the issue of the statues that were to be erected to honour
Joshua Nkomo in Harare and Bulawayo. I ask what kind of controversies
did they generate and how did these controversies have a bearing on the
lofty title of ‘Father Zimbabwe’ that is associated with Joshua Nkomo
today?
Statues and Politics of Memorialisation

Statues are a form of memorialisation. Usually, they are erected by those
in power to remember certain events or important individuals. They are
not just statues, but versions of the past depicted to the present by those
usually in power. Statues the world over have generated at the centre
of controversy. In 2003 after the invasion of Iraq by American forces,
images were broadcasted the world over showing the fall of the statue of
the then President Saddam Hussein. The most recent controversy on and
about a statue took place in Cape Town, South Africa, where the statue
of Cecil John Rhodes was removed from the University of Cape Town.
The removal was masterminded by the Rhodes must fall movement.
The statue was seen as a symbol of colonialism in an independent South
Africa. The controversy over statues boils down to symbolism, what peo-
ple in the present think and interpret from a given structure. The memo-
rialisation of Rhodes has also generated controversy also in Zimbabwe
from the colonial period right up to independent Zimbabwe. As Paul
Maylam shows, Rhodes’ grave at the Matopos in Matabeleland was a site

of contradiction and controversy. A campaign for its removal built up
in the late 1990s, led by a self-styled ‘war veteran’ Lawrence ‘Warlord’
Chakaredza. Chakaredza went on a tour of the UK telling people that
‘Rhodes’s remains will be fed to the crocodiles of the Zambezi River if
somebody does not collect them’.
What emerge from the story of Rhodes’ grave and statue is that they
tell a story and represent something. Rhodes was a symbol of coloni-
alism. What story did the Joshua Nkomo statue tell us in the present?
Or whose story did that statue tell? Whose voices were loud and whose
voices were silent in the statues? Can a statue really tell the same story
acceptable to all and sundry? This chapter attempts to unpack these
issues.
Nkomo and Mugabe Government: Uncomfortable

Bedfellows?
A closer look at the changing relations between Nkomo and his erstwhile
ZANU PF friends provides us with an opportunity to understand what it
means to remember him and how to remember him today. Even more,
it may imply even asking the dangerous question of a conversation on
how the statues and that history are presented to the public. Mugabe
and Nkomo had a long history that dates back from the days of the
National Democratic Party (NDP) when Nkomo was the President and
Mugabe was the Publicity Secretary. But before that, Nkomo was already
a prominent personality in the country. For example, besides his exploits
in Rhodesian Railways, Nkomo was the first African to be appointed on
a government commission in 1956. So in terms of experience in politics
as well as being recognised even by the authorities then, Joshua Nkomo
was always a senior to Mugabe.
The splits within the liberation movements in a way pulled Mugabe and
Nkomo apart. According to Chung (88), ZANU, having rebelled against
Nkomo in 1963, still saw him as a totally unsuitable leader for the lib-
eration struggle. That split was followed by violence in the Highfield loca-
tion in Harare between supporters of ZANU and ZAPU, further dividing
the rulers. In the end, the struggle for Zimbabwe was masterminded by
two parties, ZANU and ZAPU; in fact, one could say the two parties
were competing for political space in Zimbabwe. Mugabe and Nkomo
378 S. Dombo
became competitors. Although they later worked together as the Patriotic

Front, they contested the 1980 election as separate bodies, which was
won by ZANU. According to Nyarota (2006: 126), there was no love lost
between Nkomo and Mugabe although Mugabe included ZAPU in the
government of national unity since it had won 17 parliamentary seats in
Matabeleland. Whilst Mugabe became the prime minister, Nkomo only
became the Minister of Home Affairs, a complete reversal of roles from
what transpired during the colonial period. Nkomo accepted the Home
Affairs position because Mugabe had mockingly offered him the post
of ceremonial president. This shows that Mugabe no longer respected
Nkomo even though they were working together as one government.
Further testimony to the uneasy relations between Nkomo and
Mugabe can be seen in 1982 when Nkomo was accused of plotting to
unseat the government. Resultantly, the Mugabe government expelled
all ZAPU members from government and unleashed the notori-
ous Five Brigade in Matabeleland where close to 20,000 civilians were
killed (CCJP). There were several attempts on Nkomo’s life. Mugabe
had no kind words for his erstwhile friend when he said ZAPU and its
leader, Dr. Joshua Nkomo, were like a cobra in a house that had to be
destroyed. Nkomo was also known as the ‘Father of Dissidents’. As a
man of peace, Nkomo could not stand to see his supporters being butch-
ered by the government. In December 1987, PF ZAPU and ZANU PF
merged to form ZANU PF. According to Nyarota (2006: 127), ‘with
Gukurahundi’s wounds still raw; Nkomo’s Ndebele supporters accused
him of selling out, but he nevertheless accepted the sinecure of vice-
presidency’. This shows that Nkomo had the interests of peace at the
forefront. When Joshua Nkomo died on 1 July 1999, he had metamor-
phosed from nationalist-cum-dissident-Father Zimbabwe. As an honour
for his contribution to the independence of Zimbabwe, his remains were
interred at the National Heroes Acre in Harare. Besides interring him at
the national shrine, there were other attempts to honour and remember
this liberation icon. One such way of honouring him was through statues
that were meant to be erected in Bulawayo and Harare.
‘Just a Statue?’ Honouring Nkomo?

The story of Nkomo’s honour by the government borders on tragedy
and comedy. From the onset, two statues were supposed to be erected
in Bulawayo and Harare to honour the liberation icon. However, to
this date, only the statue in Bulawayo but not before it had generated
controversies of its own. In this section, I attempt to capture the vari-

ous perceptions of different groups of people in Zimbabwe. How did
these perceptions found expression in the press? The drama surrounding
Dr. Nkomo’s statue in Bulawayo started when questions were raised on
the makers of the statue as well as the size of that statue. This resulted in
the statue being removed on 16 September 2010, just a few days after
it had been erected. It did not last a few weeks from its ‘unveiling’ by
the Minister of Home Affairs Kembo Mohadi faced a barrage of criticism
from Nkomo’s family as well as his supporters.
As if it was something illegal, the Bulawayo statue was erected in
the middle of the night and was covered by a black cloth which the
Nkomo family alleged to be symbolic of mourning. Mohadi tried
to defend the black by saying that there was nothing mystic about
the black covering and besides ‘the statue was mere stone and not
the real remains of the late nationalist’. The Independent of 30
September 2010 reported that the first statue generated ‘a politi-
cal storm’ as top leaders in ZANU PF accused Mohadi of procur-
ing the statues from North Korea without consulting the Nkomo
family or the presidium. The other issue surrounding the statue was
that it did not capture the exact attributes of the late vice president.
These issues were succinctly captured by Edward Ginqusaba Nkomo,
brother to the late VP when he said:
I will speak on this issue because as the traditional head of the family I
have not been consulted by anyone including those who have been making
statements in the media and eve government itself has not consulted me at
any time. The picture that has been used is one of the worst pictures of my
late brother and appropriate consultations with the appropriate members
of the family would have resulted in the identification of a more suitable
picture. (The Chronicle 19 September 2010)
The Movement for Democratic Change also waded into the controversy
when it accused the government of abusing Nkomo’s legacy ostensibly
for its own benefit. Such views found expression in the private media. For
example, The Zimbabwean online newspaper carried and magnified the
voices of the MDC members who believed that ZANU PF was only hon-
ouring Nkomo so that they would be projected in good light by the peo-
ple of Matabeleland. One such MDC official was quoted as having said:
380 S. Dombo
They want their party ZANU (PF) to be identified alongside patriotic indi-
viduals like Joshua Nkomo. They want to fight the MDC using Nkomo’s
name. They want to say that ZANU and ZAPU fought the British dur-
ing the liberation struggle. In that way they want to dismiss the MDC
as British political pawns, while using Father Zimbabwe’s name as their
political fertilizer. But any Zimbabwean worth his/her salt should ask
of ZANUs geriatrics; which Zimbabwean leader was given red carpet
treatment in western capitals during Gukurahundi? (The Zimbabwean,
24.9.10)
The Zimbabwean further sought views from another MDC activist, Sam
Chigome, who disparagingly attacked ZANU PF for seeking to abuse
the memory of Nkomo for the impending 2013 elections:
The statue had been timed to boost ZANU (PF)’s electoral fortunes. By
erecting a statue of Joshua Nkomo, which is not bad at all, ZANU (PF)
want to help ZAPU garner more votes in Matabeleland. That way, ZANU
(PF) can disturb Tsvangirai’s vote and stop him from garnering more than
the 50% vote required. Nkomo’s statue was going to be used as canon fod-
der. (The Zimbabwean 24.9.10)
Whilst the private media focused on the possible link between the statue
and ZANU PF’s political fortunes, the state media dwelt primarily on the
squabbles the government had with the Nkomo family. Whilst the pri-
vate press interviewed politicians, the state media interviewed residents
and most of these had negative sentiments towards the Nkomo family
for being too demanding to be in control of the whole statue project.
Suggesting that the statue is not removed, the Nkomo family was further
accused of being arrogant. The Chronicle summarised its views on the
debate thus:
The erection of the late Dr. Nkomo’s statue has since inception been char-
acterised by tension between the Nkomo family and the Government, with
the former demanding absolute command on the project. (Chronicle 19
September 2010)
The Nkomo project comes across as a war of words between the Nkomo
family and the authorities. It further raised questions on the owner-
ship of not only of the statue but also of Joshua Nkomo. Whilst resist-
ing answering questions over the makers of the statue, Mohadi pointed
out that ‘it was just a statue. It is Zimbabwean, it is a statue of a

Zimbabwean and it was a Zimbabwean concept. I am not at liberty to
reveal to you where exactly it was carved. This statue is a national project
and does not belong to the Bulawayo City Council, to the Nkomo family
nor to the residents. These are just its custodians since it is erected in the
city of Bulawayo. It has taken government a long time to complete this
project, hence it belongs to everyone’.
Mohadi was also quoted at length in the Newsday of 15 September
2010 registering his frustrations over the rejection of the first statue.
I am going to dismount it. We will decide which museum to take the

statue to. We should have done this three weeks ago. With me, this is
the end of the project or it is suspended indefinitely. I thought this was
a national project but if they (the Nkomo family) say they don’t want it,
who am I to say no? The Vice-President called me at his offices and we
discussed it and that is where it was agreed that the statue be dismounted.
This was a national project and not a Nkomo family project. This is not the
unveiling. I am removing it.
Just like the way it was erected, the statue was dismounted in the mid-
dle of the night adding further to the mystery surrounding the first
attempts to erect a statue in honour of Nkomo in Bulawayo. As will be
shown later, the government would come back to the Bulawayo statue in
December 2013 when it was finally unveiled by President Mugabe.
Karigamombe Debacle
Is it just enough to honour someone with taking into considera-
tion where that honour is bestowed at? How significant is the place
where one is recognised for his heroics? In addition, does it matter
who has been contracted to deliver the honour? The story of Joshua
Nkomo’s second statue that was supposed to be erected in Harare
gives us a glimpse into the issues raised. That second statue was sup-
posed to be erected at Karigamombe Centre in the heart of Harare.
Together with the one in Bulawayo, it was also designed by the
North Koreans. The North Koreans were contracted to create the
‘tomb of the unknown soldier’ at the National Heroes Acre. In addi-
tion, they had in 1981 sent 106 trainers to the country to train a
brigade that would, according to Mugabe, ‘deal with dissidents and
382 S. Dombo
any other trouble-causers in the country’ (Nyarota 2006: 134). The

Five Brigade was known as Gukurahundi, and it was swiftly deployed
to the two Matabeleland provinces and the Midlands to deal with dis-
sidents. However, they ended up committing atrocities against civil-
ians where close to or more than 20,000 were killed (CCJP 1997).
That episode in the history of the independent Zimbabwe still har-
bours ill feelings mostly by the Ndebele towards the government.
To make matters worse, the government has refused to apologise for
these atrocities. Thus, the memory of the Gukurahundi episode is still
fresh in the minds of the people who also blame the North Koreans
for the disaster.
Contracting the North Koreans to design Joshua Nkomo’s statue
therefore seemed either provocative or inconsiderate on the part of the
government to the feelings of the people of Matabeleland. It actually
seemed like a thinly veiled mockery of Joshua Nkomo. This was further
complicated by the attempt to have the Harare statue at Karigamombe
Centre in Harare. The Zimbabwean newspaper accused the ZANU
PF government of ‘trashing the legacy of Joshua Nkomo’ by insisting
on erecting the statue at Karigamombe centre. To some, it symbolised
ZANU PF’s victory over ZAPU. Pathisa Nyathi had this to say concern-
ing the choice of Karigamombe:
The problem comes with the name of the building. In some people’s
minds and in the context of ZANU and PF-ZAPU, Karigamombe build-
ing symbolises supremacy over Dr. Nkomo. It is surprising that someone
would want to put the statue next to a building associated with the down-
fall of Nkomo.
Nyathi’s sentiments were echoed by Joshua Malinga, a ZANU PF polit-

buro member who felt that Nkomo’s family ultimately had the right to
reject Karigamombe as the place for erecting the Harare statue. He fur-
ther stated that:
The history of Karigamombe is still fresh in the minds of many people, so

it is not appropriate for the statue to be placed there. If the family has a
right to decide where he should be buried then they should have a right to
say where his statue should be.
The government was saved from further embarrassment by a private

company that sought and was granted a court order stopping the erec-
tion of the statue at Karigamombe Centre claiming that it was private
property. But does the Karigamombe episode tell us about the legacy
and memory of Joshua Nkomo? As shown earlier, the private press effec-
tively linked the histories of PF ZAPU and ZANU as well as the names
and political symbols to effectively expose the machinations of ZANU
PF in honouring Nkomo. Karigamombe means one who fells the bull,
and in this case, the bull represented Nkomo and ZAPU with Mugabe
being victorious. This therefore begs the question that if the symbolism
is correct, how appropriate is this way to honour someone referred to
as Father Zimbabwe? Or how accurate is the Zimbabwean’s conclusion
that ‘the choice of Karigamombe smacked of ZANU PF’s triumphalism
over the Nkomo’s party whose symbol was a bull’? It would seem even
to those disinterested that the politics of honouring Nkomo with a statue
at Karigamombe was a thinly veiled mockery of the one intended for the
honour. President Mugabe’s grandfather was called Karigamombe. It is
also claimed that the building, formerly the Piccadilly centre, was used to
run operations during the Matabeleland massacres, or ‘Gukurahundi’, in
the 1980s, when Mugabe’s men attacked Nkomo’s ZAPU supporters. In
this vein, the Zimbabwean of 29 July 2010 quoting one Zenzo Ncube of
ZAPU Europe stated that:
It is a charade to erect Nkomo’s statue on a site that planned the mur-

der of his supporters and one that is named to his shamming. It is clear
that those who persecuted and humiliated our late national leader dur-
ing his life time still have burning desires to continue humiliating him,
his family and all those who support him and what he stood for, even
after his death.
What is more interesting is the fact that the state media did not ques-
tion the choice of Karigamombe as the location of the statue. They
simply capitalised on the court order by the owners of Karigamombe
Centre who approached the courts to stop the construction of the
statue there. The state media never addressed the problems inherently
associated with the choice of Karigamombe. As a result, the statue
meant for Harare has not yet been mounted and it is not clear when it
will be or if it will be.
384 S. Dombo
Unveiling the Bulawayo Statue

Following the debacle associated with the first Bulawayo state that was
dismounted and the Harare one that never was, attention was turned
back to the Bulawayo statue for the second homecoming. Although it
took a long time after the first episode had ended in shame, the Nkomo
statue was finally mounted and unveiled in 2013 by President Robert
Mugabe. This time, it was more than just a statue as there was the
renaming of Bulawayo’s main street into Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo Street
and the official opening of the Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo International
Airport. This was characterised by less controversy compared to the ear-
lier attempts to honour Nkomo. Except that it required a whooping
$600,000 to complete, the statue and other honours were well received,
befitting the contribution that Nkomo had made both to the libera-
tion struggle and to the development of independent Zimbabwe. In this
section, I look at the responses to the honour bestowed on Nkomo as
depicted in both the press and individuals and organisations.
A glimpse of what the statue meant can be seen from the statements
uttered at its unveiling. Of importance to note is that the triple honours
bestowed on Nkomo coincided with the Unity Day celebrations on 22
December, the day which marked the signing of Unity Accord between
Nkomo’s PF ZAPU and Mugabe’s ZANU PF. The statue was officially
unveiled by President Mugabe who said:
The statue we are gathered here to officially unveil and the street we have
renamed are the real story of Zimbabwe and Zimbabweans, our struggles
and our aspirations as a people. That story is embodied in the person of
Dr. Nkomo. Both the statue and the renamed street we commemorate are
a tribute to Dr. Nkomo for his leadership, his dedication and his ability to
translate the aspirations of Zimbabweans. (Nehanda Radio 23 December
2013)
This was a glowing and fitting tribute to ‘Father Zimbabwe’. The same
glowing tribute was also raised by the Nkomo family which thanked the
government for bestowing such honour to their father. She said accord-
ing to The Chronicle (20 December 2013) that ‘we have all waited a
long time to witness this great day, but am sure we can all sit here today
and agree that the long wait has been well worth it’. Further to that,
Nkomo’s son Sibangalizwe had this to say to Mugabe: ‘by this honour,
you have inscribed with indelible ink, the memory of Joshua Nkomo,
not only in Zimbabwe, but for the world’. Such words of praise show
that in spite of the earlier problems surrounding the statue, the family
of Joshua Nkomo was really looking forward to such an honour to their
father.
Ordinary citizens also sang praises to the government for honouring
Joshua Nkomo. One resident by the name Msimanga said this: ‘I think
what they have done is highly commendable and we are looking forward
to witnessing other projects associated with Nkomo’s name being treated
with utmost respect. People should understand the role he played dur-
ing the liberation war and after independence and it is not a favour that
his statue has been erected. The man deserved it because of the role he
played in the history of this country’.
Indeed, the statues and other honours on Nkomo were not an act of
favour as he surely deserved them. In an opinion article that appeared
in the Southern Eye of 01 January 2014, Dumisani Nkomo hammers
the point home that the honours were not an act of favour but that the
‘statue, the airport and Nkomo Street are also memorials for thousands
of his [Nkomo] supporters whose graves are not known’. The same sen-
timents were also echoed by Dumiso Dabengwa, a close ally of Nkomo
from the days of the struggle:
These honours that have been bestowed on Nkomo must not be seen as
generous favours from the present government but as highly deserved and
belated recognition of the liberation war and nationalist icon. Nkomo’s
contribution to the liberation of Zimbabwe and his legendary envisioning
of a united Zimbabwean nation are not negotiable achievements but indis-
putable marks of his heroism. The title “Father Zimbabwe” is not just a
loose label but it fits the description of Nkomo’s contribution to the birth
of Zimbabwe. (Nehanda Radio 23 December 2013)
Whilst some were celebrating, others remained sceptical as they believed

that the triple honours on Nkomo were meant to hoodwink the people
of Matabeleland to forget what the ZANU PF government had done to
them and to Nkomo during the early days of independence.
In spite of the relative lack of controversy on the second statue, there
was always a hint of regionalism from some of the people who spoke.
This taints the title ‘Father Zimbabwe’. The triple honours bestowed on
Nkomo were all done in Bulawayo, and one would be forgiven if they
mistakenly think they are honouring a former mayor of the city or some-
thing like that. Indeed, it would seem appropriate to refer to Nkomo
386 S. Dombo
as ‘Father Bulawayo’ in the absence of important landscapes outside of

Bulawayo being named in honour of him. The Herald of 18 December
quotes the Minister of State for Provincial Affairs for Bulawayo Eunice
Nomthandazo saying, ‘it is proper that we celebrate him in Bulawayo for
our people to see the strength of unity. It is a day that gives us hope to
look forward and work together’. One resident did not mince his word
when he accused the government of wanting to reduce Joshua Nkomo
to a regional leader. He said:
They want to appear as if they are doing something good. Nkomo was a
national figure and by erecting a statue in Matabeleland they are reducing
him to a leader of Matabeleland and that can be a bit offensive to some
people…the people of Matabeleland will never forget what happened to
ZAPU and Gukurahundi and in all honesty that is the smallest thing that
could be done in honour of a giant, a fallen hero from our region and they
will see through the political machinations of ZANU-PF. (Nehanda Radio
23 December 2013)
Statements like this clearly debunk the myth of a united Zimbabwe,

especially in the absence of a redress on some dark episodes of our coun-
try’s history. Whilst it cannot be doubted that Joshua Nkomo was a man
of peace, who sacrificed his political career to save his supporters from
being destroyed, the same cannot be said of his partners in government.
This by extension implies that an honour on Nkomo may not be enough
if it does not go on to address the problems faced by his supporters on
the ground at the hands of the government. The statue therefore, or
any kind of honour, has to be more about the Nkomo and his support-
ers rather than him alone. At the unveiling of the statue, Nkomo’s son
Sibangalizwe said ‘the people in Bulawayo commemorates 1 July as an
unofficial holiday’ (The Chronicle 20 December 2013). The act of cel-
ebrating an unofficial holiday is in a way a vote of no confidence on the
authorities for failing to fulfil the wishes of the people. And that it is only
done in Bulawayo says a lot about unity in the country.
Conclusion
In his lifetime, Joshua Nkomo was both a friend and a foe to the ZANU
PF government. This saw him at one time being referred to as ‘Father of
Dissidents’ and that episode saw him go into exile in the UK. Accepting
peace, he became the vice president of Zimbabwe, and by the time of

his death, he had attained the lofty title of Father Zimbabwe. But as one
Dinizulu Mbikokayise says in an opinion piece ‘Joshua Nkomo wished
hard and tried over time in words and in deeds to fit the title but never
came close to being father of the slippery and imaginary Zimbabwean
nation’ (New Zimbabwe 29 July 2010). He went on to accuse Nkomo of
exposing his only genuine and loyal followers, ‘the Ndebele people’ to
massacre, cultural annihilation, discrimination, economic marginality and
political orphanage in Zimbabwe in his pursuit of the illusion of Father
Zimbabwe. This suggests that there is no consensus on the applicability
of the title Father Zimbabwe to Joshua Nkomo.
However, this chapter looked at the story of Nkomo’s statues in Bulawayo
and Harare to get a glimpse at how the man is being remembered in the
present. It showed that the story of the statues can at best be described as
a soap opera and at worst comical. Indeed, for a person regarded as Father
Zimbabwe, the drama associated with his honouring is uncalled for and it
actually brought his title into serious disrepute. This chapter has also shown
that the press projected this drama differently, with the state media support-
ing the stance of the government whilst the private media opened debate on
a topic that could have been closed and shrouded in secrecy.
References
Alexander, J., McGregor, J. & Ranger, T. 2000. Violence and Memory: One
Hundred Years in the ‘Dark Forests’ of Matabeleland. Oxford: James Currey.
Relations.
Murambiwa, I. (2008, 19 April). The Zimbabwe archive. Paper presented at
the ‘Expatriate Archives and Museums’ workshop, British Empire and
Commonwealth Museum, Bristol, United Kingdom.
Nyarota, G. 2006. Against the Grain: Memoirs of a Zimbabwean Newsman. Cape
Town: Zebra Press.
Werbner, R. (1998). Smoke from the barrel of a gun: Postwars of the dead,
memory and reinscription in Zimbabwe. In R. Werbner (Ed.), Memory and
the postcolony: African anthropology and the critique of power (pp. 67–98).
London: Zed Books.
Willems, W. (2004). Selection and silence: Contesting meanings of land in
Zimbabwean media. Ecquid Novi, 25(1), 4–24.
CHAPTER 17
The Immortalisation of Joshua Mqabuko

Nyongolo Nkomo
Henry Chiwaura
Introduction
Joshua Mqabuko Nyongolo Nkomo was born on 19 June 1917 and
passed on 1 July 1999. He was leading African nationalist who actively
participated in the formation of such nationalist movement as the
Zimbabwe African People’s Union (ZAPU). By the time of his death,
he was the vice-president of Zimbabwe. He was conferred a national
hero status and was buried at the National Heroes Acre in Harare. The
chapter is focused on the immortalisation of Nkomo into Zimbabwe’s
cultural landscape. The immortalisation of Nkomo can shade light on
the complex nature of nationalism in Zimbabwe. The immortalisation
of Nkomo through a statue, grave, a museum, a foundation, the nam-
ing process and other processes contains statements about the country’s
inclusive and exclusive heritage, history and politics. A number of books
have been written by his associates and foes and one by him that are use-
ful in unpacking the progression of immortalising Nkomo. Nkomo’s
immortalisation into Zimbabwe’s social memory can be contextualised
H. Chiwaura (*) 
University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pretoria, South Africa

390 H. Chiwaura
by looking at his history and autobiography, family members, politicians

and the private sector. It is imperative to investigate how the memoriali-
sation process took place during the different eras of his life.
Nkomo’s family has its own reasons for remembering him, politicians
and the general public both within and without Matebeleland all view
his immortalisation from different perspectives. The four loose catego-
ries above view the immortalisation and memorialisation of JMN as a
way of looking at the past using the present symbols and cultures. Both
the government and Nkomo’s immediate family were involved in creat-
ing ‘Nkomoscapes’ in Zimbabwe, albeit for different reasons. The ruling
elite use heritage narratives and constructs to gain the present and to try
and control the future.
Nkomo’s dream of one nation constantly appears within the process
of memorialisation, but on the contrary ‘Nkomoscapes’ are regionally
based in Matebeleland despite assuming the moniker ‘Father Zimbabwe’.
The chapter concludes by asserting that Nkomo’s immortalisation
through various symbols and representations is not about the past as it
is intend to shape current discourses within the society. The well-doc-
umented conflict with Robert Mugabe also has an impact on the way
Nkomo is memorialised and immortalised in Zimbabwe. Sixteen years
after his death, Nkomo continues to live in the form of monuments and
memorials. He features in songs, books and academic articles. Buildings
and schools are named after him. A polytechnic college bears his name
and a scholarship fund-through the Econet Wireless Joshua Nkomo
Scholarship fund for the underprivileged students. His name has become
a trademark in African nationalism in general and Zimbabwe in particu-
lar. At one point, Nkomo was a legend in urban folklore when the gov-
ernment was humiliated by his escape into exile on 8 March 1983 and
created a fictitious story that Big Josh escaped the country dressed as a
woman. Joshua Nkomo’s political career got in full swing around the
1940s up to the time he passed on in July 1999. Attempts were made on
Nkomo’s life during the war of liberation by the settler regime and the
independent government. During his lifetime and after death, Nkomo
received various honours and awards that have immortalised his name
and legacy in the memory of Zimbabweans. Many people acknowledge
that Joshua Nkomo is one of the incontestable father and symbol of
the struggle for a free and democratic Zimbabwe. His father’s Christian
belief and his own personal conviction on customs and traditions had a
big influence on his adult life.
17 THE IMMORTALISATION OF JOSHUA MQABUKO NYONGOLO NKOMO 391
Family Background
Nkomo was born on 19 June 1917 in the Semokwe Native Reserve
in Matabeleland, his father a preacher, was working for the London
Missionary Society. He did his primary at London Missionary Society’s
Tshimale School and thereafter attended Tsholostho Native Government
Industrial School. From the Industrial school, Nkomo advanced to
Adam College in South Africa and to Hofmeyer School of Social
Science where he acquired a diploma in Social Science. Having attained
a diploma, he proceeded to the University of South Africa where he
acquired a Bachelor of Arts degree. He was a native of Matabeleland,
a siNdebele speaker, but owed his origins to the Kalanga group which
existed in the south-western part of Matabeleland prior to the arrival
of the amaNdebele around the 1800s, and so he could not claim the
noble lineage of abeZansi in the rigid and complex caste system of the
amaNdebele. Nkomo grew up in a society led by the settler Native
Administration.
His father’s Christian beliefs influenced his upbringing, and at
the same time, Nkomo was a secret admirer of the African philoso-
phy and thinking. He started his political life in 1948 as the president
of the Railway African Employees Association. In 1954, he became the
president of the Federation of African Workers’ Union, a position that
propelled him into his political calling. Nkomo led a number of politi-
cal parties during his fight for the liberation of Zimbabwe, namely the
African National Congress (ANC) and the National Democratic Party
(NDP) in 1960. When NDP was banned, he formed ZAPU in 1961 and
subsequently became the president of the Peoples Care Taker Council
(PCC) in 1962 after the banning of ZAPU. Nkomo spent 10 years of
confinement at Gonakudzingwa when PCC was banned. He was released
in 1974 and became the president and commander-in-chief of ZAPU
and Zimbabwe People’s Revolutionary Army (ZIPRA), respectively.
Nkomo was part of the Patriotic Front (PF) a unity between ZAPU
and ZANU that negotiated for a political settlement at Lancaster House
Conference that ushered independence in Zimbabwe. In 1980, he
became the country’s first home affairs minister. The period between
1980 and 1987 was marked by armed disturbances in Matebeleland and
parts of Midlands provinces. There were attempts to assassinate Joshua
Nkomo during this period, and he went into exile in 1982. Joshua
Nkomo was instrumental in bringing peace, and in 1987 on December
392 H. Chiwaura
22, he signed a historic Unity Accord together with Prime Minister

Robert Mugabe which united ZANU PF and ZAPU PF. Nkomo became
the vice-president of Zimbabwe in 1990, a post he held until his death
on 1 July 1999. Nkomo acknowledged that he was a mother’s boy and
very shy when young, and this made him less confidant. The lack of con-
fidence became a strength and weakness in his later life. He assumed that
because he relied on his mother he had to rely on other people in life as
well, a weakness that left him betrayed so many times.
A Hagiography Designed to Serve a Political Agenda

Memoires are written to fit certain ideological framework prevailing, and
Joshua Nkomo’s profile is not an exception. Nkomo wrote his full biog-
raphy titled ‘The story of my life’ which Vambe (2009: 80) argues that
in attempting to narrate his life story Nkomo subdues some facts about
inconsistencies that he lived in his personal and political life. Nkomo’s
narration is about his childhood existence in rural areas and the conver-
gence with colonialism. According to Javangwe (2011: 151), ‘Joshua
Nkomo’s The Story of My Life negotiates as well as buttresses his
claims to political significance in Zimbabwe through, first, situating the
self in the genealogy and history of nation and second, an early critical
consciousness of the political situation in colonial Rhodesia, and third,
through claims of political persecution both by the colonial governments
and the new government of independent Zimbabwe’. He details the pain
he suffered at the hands of Robert Mugabe and how he survived the
onslaught on his being. Vambe (2009: 80) argues that Nkomo could not
divert from the lure of the dominant ideology that inclined his political
misfortunes to the tribal divisions.
In attempting to tell the story of his life, Nkomo found himself sup-
pressing some facts about the contradictions he lived in his personal and
political life. Vambe (2009: 80) posits that ‘this irony at the heart of
autobiographical writings suggests that the storyteller unconsciously sup-
presses certain memories which may not “sit” comfortably with the ver-
sion of personal/national history that a story of self-inscription is forced
to authorise’. Twenty-five per cent of the book is devoted to deride the
government of Zimbabwe prior to the Unity Accord in 1987 and 65%
is on Nkomo’s autobiography and his involvement in liberation strug-
gle (Rupiya 2002: 83). Nkomo was motivated in his own words by the
‘Will… make it clear what went wrong and why’ (Nkomo 1984: 1).
Other reasons not cited in the biography might also have been to do with
the ‘free’ time Nkomo had in exile. Rupiya (2002) argues that Nkomo
might have been pushed by economic pressures as he needed to survive
in exile with an aide. ‘Advance cheque from publishers in such circum-
stances is not unknown to bring about greater focus to engage in such a
pastime’ (Rupiya 2002: 83).
Another autobiography from Fortune Senamile Nkomo has been
written titled ‘Father Zimbabwe, the life and times of an African
Legend’ which was launched in June 2013. Joshua Nkomo is an uncle
to Fortune, the writer. Asked about what difference his book has over
The Story of my life, Fortune responded by stating that the 16-year gap
is not mentioned in the earlier biography and that his book is enriched
by archival and comments from different people who interacted with
Joshua, while Joshua’s book is his own narration. Chigwedere (2003)
has written a historical account of Nkomo’s hunt by the Smith regime
titled ‘Chimurenga episodes: the hunt for Joshua Nkomo’s. Two obit-
uary booklets in memory of Joshua Nkomo have been written by the
ZANU PF Department of Information and the Ministry of Information,
Post and Telecommunications all titled Obituary: Dr. Joshua Mqabuko
Nyongolo Nkomo 1917–1999. One worth mentioning biography on
Nkomo comes as a chapter in Contemporary Black Biography: Volume
65 profiles from the international Black community. In 2014, a book
entitled Unity and Honour: 22 December 2013 was launched in honour
of Umdala Wethu. The book is a collection of speeches honouring the
late Vice-President Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo.
At least five books and several articles, chapters, theses have been writ-
ten about Joshua Nkomo within a short period of 16 years. The ques-
tion to ponder is why Nkomo’s life has invoked so much interest in this
short period. Maylam (2005: 2) work on Rhodes poses some questions
of interest fixed on certain individuals that is also applicable to Joshua
Nkomo. He asked whether it is a case of great man syndrome—‘that is
satisfying a popular appetite for peering into the lives of history’s chief
power players’ Maylam (2005: 2) or is it because Joshua Nkomo’s politi-
cal life and impact is captivating. To answer the question of interest in
writings on Nkomo, the majority of the works constitute political agenda
either as in his own biography he is criticising Robert Mugabe over polit-
ical persecution and in the case of Senamile Nkomo and others. Joshua is
portrayed as a great statesman, a unifier and a nationalist. Nkomo is rep-
resented as force against the onslaught from neocolonialism.
The obituaries are seen as a way by ZANU PF government to reach
out to the nonconformist Matebeleland Province, where the party has
394 H. Chiwaura
been losing elections to the opposition. Most of the works hold Joshua
Nkomo in the highest regard, and this is implicit from two points of view
one of the biographers is a relative and the others are from a government
that is seeking relevance. Joshua is seen mainly as a victim of colonial-
ism and ZANU PF. This picture of Joshua Nkomo has an obvious pur-
pose that he was a selfless leader not motivated by wealth and driven by
a sense of duty to drive out colonialism in Zimbabwe. Most of Nkomo’s
profilers are his close consociates like Fortune S. Nkomo, a cousin and
political companions, Aneas Chigwedere from the same party who want
to present their hero as favourably as possible. To date no critical biogra-
phy of Joshua Nkomo has been written, but few critical works are begin-
ning to appear in the literature (New Zimbabwe, 29 July 2010).
An exhibition marking the life of Joshua Nkomo was put up at the
Museum of Human Sciences in Harare in the year 2000. The museum
is under National Museums and Monuments of Zimbabwe (NMMZ),
the custodian of Zimbabwe’s cultural heritage. The exhibition titled
‘Joshua Nkomo the Man’ is one of the few exhibitions officially opened
by the president of Zimbabwe. The official opening by the state presi-
dent symbolises the significance of the Man being honoured. Year 2000
was the year the government lost the referendum to the opposition
party’s Movement for Democratic Change’s ‘no’ vote campaign against
a new constitution. It is in the same year the controversial compulsory
Land Acquisition Act Chap. 20.10 was repealed and enacted into law.
The exhibition gave the government an opportune moment to conjure
up its fading popularity as demonstrated by the loss in the referendum.
The exhibition was intended to travel throughout all the NMMZ muse-
ums but its life ended at the Natural History Museum in Bulawayo.
Presumably this is so because Nkomo came from Bulawayo, and they
thought it was befitting for the exhibition to be rested in his home town.
The exhibition is now part of the displays at Joshua Nkomo’s house,
Number 17, Aberdeen Road in Matsheumhlophe that was converted
into a memorial museum in 2007 in his honour under an agreement
between Joshua Nkomo Foundation Trust and NMMZ. The idea was in
line with Nelson Mandela Museum in South Africa.
A Different Opinion of Joshua Nkomo Representation

Not all people agree to the fact that Nkomo was a giant statesman. In an
opinion article in New Zimbabwe by Dinizulu Mbikokayise Macaphulana
published on 29 July 2010, he argues that Joshua Nkomo’s political
leadership which he puts forwards in his biography and historical legacy is

based on criminal falsehood of the title ‘Father Zimbabwe’:
Nkomo wished hard and tried over time in words and in deeds to fit the
title but he never came near to being ‘father’ of the slippery and imaginary
Zimbabwe. (New Zimbabwe, 29 July 2010)
Without critical profilers of Joshua Nkomo, it will be difficult to come

up with aspects like the political influence on his life, values and personal-
ity. Most of the judgements against him might be based on conjecture
and not facts. Recently, the co-Vice-President E. Mnangagwa allegedly
declared that the late Vice-President Joshua Nkomo was a sell-out. A
claim E. Mnangagwa attributed to former Rhodesian Prime Minister
Ian Douglas Smith. He claimed that the reason why Nkomo lost the
1980 elections was because he had a soft spot for whites (Newsday, 3
September 2015). VP Mnangagwa received substantial criticism for the
remarks with critics saying that he wants to demean Nkomo’s contri-
bution to the liberation of Zimbabwe. What VP Mnangagwa said was
undiplomatic and insensitive to the Unity Accord signed between ZANU
and ZAPU. The utterances opened old memories when Joshua Nkomo
was not respected by the ZANU politicians in the early 1980s.
The Creation of Nkomoscapes

After his death, Nkomo’s immortality started in earnest. The govern-
ment issued four sets of postage stamps on June 27, 2000 featuring
Joshua Nkomo. Not that he intended to immortalise himself, but he
was going to happy with the results of the efforts put up by his fam-
ily, the corporate world, the government and to some extent his own
determinations had a bearing on his immortalisation as well. His mod-
est Matsheumhlophe House was immediately turned into a house
museum. The other house in Pelandaba suburb in Bulawayo is partially
open to visitors by appointment; his grave and statue have all become
important sites of memory. Each of these places has its own his-
tory. The Pelandaba house attracts very few visitors at the moment the
house is occupied by Nkomo’s only surviving son Sibangilizwe. The
Joshua Nkomo Memorial Museum at Matsheumhlophe is managed by
the Joshua Nkomo Foundation and is open to both local and interna-
tional visitors. The statue along Joshua Nkomo Street in Bulawayo has
attracted a lot of controversies that are not necessarily linked to Joshua
396 H. Chiwaura
Nkomo’s name. The controversies are linked to the government’s inten-

tion and implication of immortalising Joshua Nkomo in Zimbabwe. The
family complained that NMMZ, a government institution responsible
for heritage management and protection, did not consult when decid-
ing to create the statue. The statue is also receives its fair share of visi-
tors especially local ones. Joshua Nkomo’s statue has a deeper meaning
to the people of Matebeleland given the way they responded before
and after its formation and the subsequent installation. The statue has
given the different actors a sense of identity, appropriation and a rallying
point since most symbols celebrated in Zimbabwe are predominantly of
Shona culture in origin (Ndlovu-Gatsheni and Willems 2010). One of
their illustrious sons was finally committed to Zimbabwean memory by a
government that one time persecuted them. Economically, the statue has
brought some financial reprieve to some people who have ventured into
tour-guiding and souvenir miniature statues and photographing visitors.
Nkomo’s memorable memorials in Bulawayo have somehow exorcised
Rhodes’ memorial impression.
Very few people visit Joshua Nkomo’s grave at the National Heroes
Acre monument in Harare outside national political events. Joshua
Nkomo is remembered as one of the few heroes whose burial was
attended by an overwhelming crowd estimated to be over thirty thou-
sand people, a record crowd witnessed at the shrine. The crowd came
by buses and trains from all the provinces of Zimbabwe. The National
Heroes Acre itself is a symbol of eternal peace for liberation war spir-
its and the country’s spiritual pacification. Joshua Nkomo is generally
regarded as the founding nationalist, a unifier, and ‘Father Zimbabwe’
is resting at the rightful place befitting his status. As Heroes day is com-
memorated every August, Zimbabweans are presented with an opportu-
nity to remember the illustrious sons and daughters.
Monuments and memorials are not simple physical features located
on landscapes. They are loaded with meaning and transmit individual,
community and national narratives. Overall purpose of monuments is
to carry societies forward deriving meaning and distinctiveness from the
past. According to Baya, statues reflect stories of power and identity. The
presentation of Joshua Nkomo in the form of a statue has generated a lot
of debate prior to the erection and after. Most of the debate was centred
on the size of the statue, location, who created the statue and the rea-
son of timing of the unveiling of the statue. The statue was mounted at
the intersection of Joshua Nkomo Street, formerly Main street and Eight
Street in Bulawayo. Nkomo’s statue was initially pulled down under the
cover of darkness in 2010 when the family complained that the statue
was too small for a man of his calibre and they were never consulted over
the location and size of the statue (Southern Eye 2015). The anomaly in
size according to Pathisa Nyati (www.pers.com) was resolved after agree-
ing on erecting the statue on a giant pedestal. Civic groups in Bulawayo
protested and criticised the fact that the statue was made in North
Korea, a country that trained the 5th Brigade army that terrorised people
in Matebeleland and Midlands provinces during the Gukurahundi geno-
cide. Nkomo’s supporters have always complained that Nkomo’s part in
the struggle narratives of Zimbabwe is downgraded by the ruling ZANU
PF government.
Nkomo has often referred to as lager that life nationalist leader now
appeared a giant even in statue presentation. A smaller statue on a small
pedestal would have been thought of as an insult to Nkomo’s status by
his sceptical family and followers alike. Nkomo’s family had been com-
plaining about the non-consultancy by the government over the erection
of the statue representing one of their own. The government has also
been criticised for taking long to complete projects linked to honour-
ing Joshua Nkomo. JN International Airport new terminal opened on
1 November 2013 in Bulawayo formerly Bulawayo Airport after tak-
ing long to refurbish. Joshua M. Nkomo Ekusileni Medical Centre, a
Harvard medical international associated hospital, is yet to be opened
to the public but construction is now complete, a project that has taken
more than 12 years to complete amid power struggles over ownership
and control. The idea of erecting another statue in Harare has been put
on hold as family and acquaintances protested over the proposed loca-
tion of the statue at Karigamombe Centre in Harare.
Karigamombe is a Shona name meaning ‘one that fells a bull’. ZAPU
used a bull as their party symbol before uniting with ZANU in 1987.
The move to locate the statue at Karigamombe Centre has been inter-
preted literary by Nkomo’s followers and sympathisers. The name
Karigamombe has links to Mugabe family. On the unveiling of the statue
Minister Moyo said ‘Dr Nkomo was a towering figure among nation-
alists who brought independence, peace and prosperity to Zimbabwe’
(Herald 2013). Nkomo’s life story search that political pedestal from
which any other account that challenges it is evasively dismissed as mis-
representation or deliberate defamation of Nkomo’s role in the building
of the nation of Zimbabwe (Javangwe 2011: 152).
398 H. Chiwaura
Besides Nkomo’s statue in Bulawayo, he has been represented in vari-

ous ways in Matebeleland in particular and Zimbabwe at large. Looking
at the map showing Nkomo’s major representations in Zimbabwe, one
would be inclined to think that Nkomo was a regional leader rather than
a national one. The Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo Foundation established
Joshua Nkomo’s Museum, that is in Matsheumhlophe which was the
late vice-president’s residency. There are also plans to turn his Pelandaba
house into a house museum under the township tourism programme
being fronted by the Zimbabwe Tourism Authority (ZTA) and National
Museums and Monuments of Zimbabwe (NMMZ). A technical col-
lege in Gwanda was named after him, namely Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo
Polytechnic College.
The large part of Nkomoscape manifests physically mostly in
Matebeleland region as alluded to earlier on. The pattern appearing
makes one to think that there is a deliberate attempt to confine Nkomo
in Matebeleland provinces. In other provinces, it is evident that Nkomo
features intermittently in the cultural landscape. The only outstanding
icon outside Matebeleland is his grave at the National Heroes Acre in
Harare and the naming of the Harare International Airport Road after
him, which again is mired in controversy. At the official opening of the
road, the plaque was written Harare International Airport Rd, a position
that puzzled many who knew that the road was named in honour of the
late vice-president. Currently, there is heated debate over the erection of
his second statue in capital city of Harare. In Masvingo province, nota-
ble Nkomo’s tribute is at Great Zimbabwe University, a state university
that has renamed its Faculties and critical centres after prominent mem-
bers of Zimbabwean and African community. The university’s Faculty
of Arts has been named Joshua Nkomo School of Arts and Humanities.
According to the vice chancellor,
The school has been named in remembrance of Cde Joshua Nkomo

who was the Vice President of Zimbabwe and who helped in uniting
Zimbabweans from different cultural backgrounds. (GZU Newsletter
2015)
The creation of Nkomoscape through the regional concentration of his

social memory in Matebeleland is pivotal in creating a sense of belong-
ing for the marginalised region. His grave, a statue, commemorations
underline the creation of a unifying factor among the marginalised
Matebeleland. Being a founder, a businessperson and a leader Nkomo

was in a position to influence which direction post-colonial Zimbabwe
should take. In the process of immortalising him, an identity and mem-
ory is being created around his personality. After his death pilgrimages,
nostalgic feelings by marginalised group have led some people to visit
his grave and other iconic remains. Nkomo is visited daily by kinfolk and
by victims as well (The Herald, 8 August 2015). For those who can-
not physically visit the grave and memorials in Zimbabwe, the Internet
has provided the space to meet, visit and commemorate Nkomo. By all
measure, Nkomo is doing well in death because of the well-calculated
immortalisation.
Mr. Strive Masiiwa, a prominent Zimbabwean business person and
Econet Wireless CEO, established a Joshua Nkomo Scholarship Fund
for the less privileged students in Zimbabwe since 2005. This was to
honour the immense support he received from the late vice-president
amid obstacles he faced in his endeavour to establish the Econet brand.
A number of school and housing cooperatives have been renamed after
him. Nkomo is not only remembered in physical form but also in the
immaterial. Songs have been composed to celebrate his life. Matonjeni
Cultural Association is lobbying the government to officially declare 1
July as a public holiday, and the president is the only person empowered
by regulation to pronounce a national holiday (Fig. 17.1).
Nkomo’s Personal Approaches to Immortalisation

Nkomo had tried to immortalise himself by investing in large-scale invest-
ment by acquiring property throughout Zimbabwe. He invested mainly
in farms, houses, commercial buildings and other projects. Notable
farm investments included Umguza farm. Nijo complex-Domboshava
road, Landos farm- Charter road in Chihota, Nuanetsi Ranch-Masvingo
Glaudina and Hampton farms in Gweru and Ukuthula farm in Matopos.
The Umguza farms operated under a cooperative and had the following
activities dairy, piggery, and women’s cooperative focusing on chickens,
gardening and sewing, a supermarket and butchery and a technical col-
lege with an enrolment capacity of 400 students. Among commercial
buildings that Nkomo had were Magnet House-Bulawayo, Salisbury
Motel-Harare, Snake Park Complex-Harare, Mguza Technical College,
Lido Motel Airport Road-Bulawayo, Castle Arms Motel at Richmond
suburb Bulawayo and Service Station in Harare and Black Cat (Berkshire)
400 H. Chiwaura
Fig. 17.1 Showing some of Nkomo’s representations in Zimbabwe

co-owned with ANC of South Africa. Other major projects initiated by

Nkomo and ZAPU were the Beitbridge Toll Bridge.
This was a joint venture with Israel and a Yugoslav company for the
construction of the toll bridge at Beitbridge. The DTZ Timber project
was initiated by Nkomo in the 1980s with the intention of setting up
a timber factory in Muzarabani north of Harare. He also initiated the
Zimbabwe Agricultural Industry Agency (ZIGRANDA) which was
under the patronage of DTZ. Under this project, two factories were set
to be set up in Bulawayo and Norton. Greencroft Coffee estate (GCE)
comprised of 3000 hectares of land in Vumba Mountains in Mutare. The
farm produced coffee, protea flowers, Kiwi fruit and cabbages for both
domestic and export markets. DTZ/OZGEO (Pvt) Ltd is a Gold and
diamond joint venture between DTZ and OZGEO, a Russian Company.
Currently, the company is extracting gold and diamonds in Penhalonga
along Mutare River and Chimanimani district, respectively. One of the
Nkomo’s dreams was to establish a state-of-the-art medical facility in
each province so that Zimbabweans would be served locally. He regis-
tered the Zimbabwe Health Care Trust (ZHCT). The first of these
medical facilities has been built in and completed in the Matsheumhlope
Suburb of Bulawayo. This hospital is yet to open for business 16 years
after his death. Nkomo’s business ventures cover most parts of the coun-
try and not regionally based which showed that he was not a tribal-
based.
Having spent more than 6 years in South Africa, Nkomo was in
close contact with African National Congress Youth leaders who influ-
enced his political thinking. Among the influential leaders from ANC
were the young Nelson Mandela, Oliver Tambo and Anton Lembede.
They met at a place called the Bantu Men’s Social Centre in the centre
of Johannesburg near where he was studying at Jan Hofymher School of
Social Science (The Sunday Mail, 14 June 2015). The social encounters
undoubtedly had a profound political impact on Dr. Nkomo that deep-
ened his dedication to his country’s liberation from colonisers. ‘Talking
to the ANC’s acting president, Oliver Tambo, in Algiers, Algeria in
1979, Dr Nkomo observed: “UMandela yindoda impela. Ngahlangana
laye eBlue Lagoon eBantu Men’s Social Centre kanenginengi” (Mandela
is a real man. I met him many times at the Blue Lagoon Bantu Men’s
Social Centre)’ (The Sunday Mail, 15 June 2015). Nkomo proceed to
establish a business venture named Blue Lagoon at Renkini bus station in
Bulawayo in memory of his active days in South Africa.
402 H. Chiwaura
Conclusion
Joshua Nkomo’s immortality is based less on books and monuments
than on the omnipresence of his name in Zimbabwe. In real life, Joshua
had a big physique and his immortalisation process is almost reminiscent
of his larger than life history. He is highly regarded as the founder of
nationalism in Zimbabwe and has been into politics since the days when
he joined the Railways workers union in 1948 till his death in 1999. His
political career was well decorated with a few imperfections. Those who
criticise Nkomo for signing the Unity Accord do not seem to under-
stand that he was a man of peace and unity. By signing the Unity Accord,
Joshua Nkomo avoided the unnecessary shedding of innocent blood in
Zimbabwe. If Nkomo was not a man of peace, he would not have asked
ZIPRA guerrillas to disarm after independence. Joshua Nkomo’s immor-
talisation is interlinked with that of Robert Mugabe.
There is clear competition between Robert Mugabe and Joshua
Nkomo from the early days of the struggle for independence. Who is
the father of the struggle? There has been a recent call by ZANU PF
Youth League to rename Harare international airport after Robert
Mugabe. What is of interest is the road leading to the airport is named
after Joshua Nkomo. The unsung heroes belong to the period before he
joined the struggle. It is about the nullification of the liberation struggle
to suit a narrative sympathetic to Robert and ZANU PF. When Robert
Mugabe was campaigning, he mentioned Joshua Nkomo only when he
was in Matebeleland. It leaves him as the only national leader the rest
of the leaders being village or regional leaders. At the moment, there
is a deafening silence on the mounting of Joshua Nkomo’s statue in
Harare. If erected, this would apparently depict him as a national leader.
Joshua Nkomo’s legacy can be aptly summarised by the following words:
empathy, transparency, honesty, discipline, commitment, persistence,
sacrifice, determination, accountability, justice, unity, peace, progress,
perseverance, caring, love, wisdom, generosity and tolerance (The Joshua
Nkomo National Foundation, 2003).
References
Chigwedere, A. (2003). The hunt for Joshua Nkomo, Chimurenga II episode.
Great Zimbabwe University Newsletter, October 2015.
Javangwe, T. D. (2011). Contesting narratives: Constructions of the self and the

nation in Zimbabwean political auto/biography. Unpublished doctor of litera-
ture and philosophy thesis, University of South Africa.
Maylam, P. (2005). The cult of Rhodes remembering an imperialist in Africa.
Claremont: David Philip Publishers.
New Zimbabwe. (2010, 29 July). Joshua Nkomo’s costly heroism.
Newsday. (2015, September 3). Nkomo A Sell-out: Mnangagwa.
Rupiya, M. A. (2002). The story of my life (review). Eastern African Social
Sciences Review, 18(2), 83–89.
Southern Eye. (2015, November 10). Grand Honour for Joshua Nkomo.
The Herald. (2013, December 18). Nkomo’s Statue Mounted.
The Sunday Mail. (2015, June 14). Dr Nkomo Early Years of Struggle.
CHAPTER 18
Whose Nkomo Is It Anyway? Joshua

Nkomo’s Statue and Commemorative
Landscape
Thabisani Ndlovu
Introduction
This chapter employs heritage interpretation as a lens to read contesta-
tions over the statue(s) of the late Joshua Nkomo with a view to examine
the role of statuary in recent Zimbabwean historiography. The process
of unveiling the bronze statue of the late nationalist and Vice-President
of Zimbabwe, Joshua Nkomo, on 22 December 2013 at the intersec-
tion of 8th Avenue and Main Street, and the subsequent name change of
the latter to JM Nkomo Street, was a slow process mired in contestation
and controversy. While it took government more than 6 years to sanc-
tion the name change as proposed by the city council of Bulawayo, the
bronze statue (one of a pair) of Joshua Nkomo had to be taken down
before its official unveiling in 2010, following complaints by the Nkomo
family and Bulawayo public. It had been planned that the second of the
two statues would be erected in Harare’s Karigamombe Centre to which
there were objections by both the Nkomo family and the owners of the
T. Ndlovu (*) 
Walter Sisulu University, Mthatha, South Africa

406 T. Ndlovu
space for the proposed site, revealing the importance of the spatialisation
of pubic memory. The Bulawayo statue, which this chapter will focus on,
was (re)erected on the spot where that of Cecil John Rhodes used to be,
facing the same direction (North) suggesting some kind of dissonance.
Thus, the journeys of this statue and the stalled erection of its pair in
Harare strongly suggest an inquiry into the cultural and political capital
of the statue(s).
Looking at late Vice-President of Zimbabwe, Dr Joshua Mqabuko
Nyongolo Nkomo’s statue pedestalised on a prominent site at the inter-
section of 8th Avenue and Joshua Mqabuko Nomo Street as a stand-
alone statue, this is what one might notice: Facing North, the statue
stands on an elegant pedestal approximately three metres tall. The ped-
estal has three tiers and all of them feature red sandstone which blends
beautifully with the buildings near the statue, such as the Post Office
and Barclays Bank which are built of the same stone. The statue itself,
because of its bronze colour, blends in similar fashion. It is situated at
a traffic circle popularly known as a roundabout in Bulawayo. Black
and white kerbing forms the outer boundary between the road and the
statue. In keeping with the general strategy of erecting monuments, it is
at a busy intersection where it can be seen by a large number of people
passing through. Slightly inwards towards the statue is another bound-
ary of granite columns about half a metre tall, joined by a chain that runs
round the inner edge except at the ‘entrance’ to the statue. The four
granite columns to the east were knocked down by cars and have not
been replaced. Otherwise, all else is impressive. For example, from the
four general compass directions, there are lights close to the feet of the
statue that shine on the statue at night. There is also, on the Northern
side, about two metres high, a glass encasing for an ‘eternal’ flame
although the eternal flame is not on all the time. Nkomo is captured
standing straight, arms by his sides and on one hand carrying induku
(knobkerrie) as was his wont. Induku or rungu in Swahili, ‘has[…] sym-
bolic value in African society’ given that it can be used as weapon to
defend oneself but most importantly, it can be carried ceremonially ‘to
denote an African elder or leader’ (Larsen 2011: 274). Another African
leader famous for carrying induku was Jomo Kenyatta. Dressed in a suit
and tie, the pose of Nkomo’s statue is very demure and he has on his
face, what looks like a faint smile.
From the description above, and excepting the few blemishes, all
looks well and thought-out. But as Schultz (2011: 1238) observes,
18 WHOSE NKOMO IS IT ANYWAY? JOSHUA … 407
‘Commemorative devices provide a smooth veneer under which seethes a

host of contestations as different voices fight to be heard and struggle for
legitimacy’. To start with the pedestal on which stands Nkomo’s statue
is a revised or rebuilt one. The statue was erected on 13 August and dis-
mantled on 16 September 2010 before its official unveiling because of
objections from the Nkomo family and the Bulawayo public. The re-
erection of the same statue on a different pedestal took about 3 years.
While the (re)erection of the statue in Bulawayo might represent the
statue reaching its ‘final destination’, the journey of the Nkomo statue
is far from finished. It is difficult to forget that the statue that stands in
Bulawayo is one of two identical statues and that the other either lies
forgotten in Harare or its journey towards being erected is still under
negotiation. Just as for the Bulawayo one, the signposts and detours
on the road to erection are more significant than the ‘end’ of the jour-
ney for this statue. The first attempts to erect the statue at Harare’s
Karigamombe Centre were opposed by both the Nkomo family and the
owners of the proposed site. Nevertheless, the re-erection of Nkomo’s
statue should be seen as significant given that the post-independent gov-
ernment of Zimbabwe under ZANU PF does not have a culture of erect-
ing statutes to honour its politicians. That factor and lack of finance tell
us that there was a pressing need to eventually erect a statue for the late
Nkomo. There had to be significant reasons, which this chapter sets out
to identify and discuss.
The erection, pulling down and re-erection of one of Nkomo’s stat-
ues in Bulawayo, Matabeleland and the indefinite lack of progress in
erecting the other in Harare, Mashonaland, raises a couple of questions
concerning the statue’s current ‘life’ and possible afterlives. Some of the
questions are these: Does the late Vice-President deserve to have stat-
ues erected in his memory in both Harare and Bulawayo? What were the
government’s intentions in erecting Nkomo’s statue in Bulawayo and
have those intentions been realised? Why was the proposed and actual
erection of Nkomo’s statue mired in controversy? As a public monu-
ment, what are some of the public readings of this statue? What lessons
can be drawn from debates that emanated from the erection of Nkomo’s
statue? Most importantly, what kinds of future readings and uses are the
statue likely to elicit? In the manner that the statue goads these ques-
tions, it is not overstretching to say that in many ways, it represents unre-
solved narratives of Zimbabwean history and heritage. Such unresolved
issues can be framed through statuary by asking another question: Are
408 T. Ndlovu
we likely to see Robert Mugabe’s statue erected in Bulawayo in the next

ten to thirty years?
Drawing on heritage theories, particularly heritage interpretation,
this chapter analyses government and counter-government narra-
tives of Joshua Nkomo’s statue(s). The study is mostly based on desk
research. It makes use of literature on public monuments, particularly
statuary. Relevant newspaper articles from Bulawayo’s The Chronicle
and The Standard of Zimbabwe provide for analysis, key narratives
about Nkomo’s statue between 2010 and 2015—a period that spans
firm plans to erect a statue for Nkomo in Bulawayo, the condemnation
of the statue, its pulling down, its re-erection, failed plans to erect the
Harare statue, and continued conversations and opinions about the two
statues. It would not be fair to say that The Chronicle, as a government-
controlled paper, had an uncritical reception of Nkomo’s statue and
legacy by espousing the expected official panegyric. Some articles are
critical, albeit in a subdued way. It is only by putting together separate
articles between 2010 and 2015 that the potency of discontent regard-
ing Nkomo’s statue emerges. As expected, it is the independent press,
here represented by The Standard, which carries more critical arti-
cles. For example, Zimbabwe’s current Vice-President, Mr Emmerson
Mnangagwa, whose view that the late Dr Nkomo ‘represented white
minority interests’ (The Standard online 2015) might imply that the lat-
ter does not deserve a statue erected in his memory. Two interviews were
conducted by the author with Mr Phathisa Nyathi (November 2014)
and Mrs Thandiwe Nkomo-Ebrahim (November 2014). Nyathi is a
renowned Zimbabwean historian, social and political commentator, and
leading scholar on the history of Matabeleland. Mrs Nkomo-Ebrahim is
the late Vice-President Nkomo’s eldest daughter and family spokesper-
son. The author also visited the Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo Museum in
Matshamhlophe,1 Bulawayo. The museum had a lot of interesting mate-
rial on display and the curatorship was of a high standard.
In unveiling the statue of the late Joshua Nkomo, and simultane-
ously renaming Main Street to Joshua Mqabuko Street, President Robert
Gabriel Mugabe mentioned some key aspects that will frame the discus-
sion of this chapter. His words were:
The statue, a national monument, is therefore, part of the national herit-

age of Zimbabwe which embodies the national values and aspirations of
Zimbabweans. The statue and the renamed street allow us to continually
reflect on where we stand as a nation, also to introspect on what we

are doing, as people, vis-à-vis what Dr Joshua Nkomo stood for. (The
Chronicle 23 December 2013)
Mugabe’s comment here concurs with the common view that a statue
signifies both ‘portrait and proxy’ (Cherry 2013: 3). In this instance,
we ask to what extent the form of the statue bears a likeness to the late
Nkomo, and whether ideationally, it can be read as representing what
Nkomo stood for at a national scale. In other words, the statue of this
extraordinary person who is elevated as a model for present and future
generations personifies the nation ‘because it would otherwise be wholly
abstract’.
Textual framing in the form of copper plaques further corrobo-
rates Mugabe’s characterisation of the statue as national. As inscribed
on one of them at the base of the pedestal, the statue is a ‘NATIONAL
MONUMENT’. As such, the writing continues, the statue is pro-
tected by ‘THE NATIONAL MUSEUMS AND MONUMENTS ACT
CHAPTER 25:11’. There is a solemnity not only in Mugabe’s comment
and inscriptions on the pedestal but also in the realisation that Nkomo
had a road named after him. In fact, that same day of unveiling the stat-
ute and renaming Main Street, the Bulawayo Airport was renamed Joshua
Mqabuko Nkomo Airport in what The Chronicle of 23 December 2013
called ‘treble honours’ and a ‘fitting tribute to the icon’. The statue,
alongside the other two honours, confirmed the high heritage value of
Nkomo. Monuments, as Smith (2011: 1253) puts it, ‘stand as a solid
reminder of a person, an event, some accomplishment deemed worthy of
remembering long past the person or event occurred’. Following this line
of thought, one of the plaques justifies the erection of Nkomo’s statue
thus: ‘THIS MONUMENT WAS ERECTED BY ZIMBABWEANS
TO CELEBRATE AND IMMORTALISE THE LIFE AND WORKS
OF THE HONOURABLE VICE PRESIDENT OF THE REPUBLIC
OF ZIMBABWE, DR JOSHUA MQABUKO NYONGOLO NKOMO,
CHIBWECHITEDZA, FATHER ZIMBABWE, A TRUE SON OF
THE SOIL’. That inscription deploys overgeneralisations. It proclaims
Nkomo’s greatness as epitomised by his nicknames Chibwechitedza
(Slippery stone), Father Zimbabwe and the descriptor, ‘A true son of the
soil’. It homogenises Zimbabweans and implies that every Zimbabwean
not only contributed to the statue financially but also saw the need for it.
This declaration also implicitly identifies the government as the instigator
410 T. Ndlovu
of the statue and guardian that holds it in trust as a national heritage

monument.
The four nicknames that appear on the top of the pedestal, just below
the statue’s feet, are akin to captions whose aim is to illustrate how truly
national Nkomo was and how his memory continues in a similar vein,
at the same time hinting at Nkomo’s own family origins. On the north-
ern side, which is the front of the statue, the lettering reads, ‘FATHER
ZIMBABWE’, which through its prominence on the front of the statue,
appears to be an overall summation of Nkomo in English, which in this
instance apart from being an official language, is a lingua franca. On the
eastern side, which is the general direction of Mashonaland Province,
the appellation is in Shona, ‘CHIBWECHITEDZA’. Chibwechitedza is
chiShona for ‘slippery stone’, a name Nkomo got for his ‘uncanny ability
to elude the colonialist forces that were hunting him’ (The Chronicle 21
July 2010). On the western side, the general direction of Matabeleland
in relation to the rest of the country, the inscription is in isiNdebele
‘UMDALA WETHU’ which translates to ‘Our dear old man’ or as
Ndlovu-Gatsheni and Willems (2010: 201) put it, ‘Our Father’. To the
South, which is the general direction of Nkomo’s rural home of Kezi
and the general direction of Lesotho where his family originated from
(Curatorial information in the Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo Museum, vis-
ited November 2015) the tag is fittingly in SeSotho, ‘RAMATSATSI’.
The name literally means ‘Father of Suns’ and is said to be the name
of the ‘earliest known ancestor’ of Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo’s family
(Curatorial information at Nkomo museum, visited November 2015).
Thus Nkomo is represented or offered as an emblematic figure worthy of
emulation. But how consistent is this honour and image with Nkomo’s
role in the struggle against colonisation, his efforts in post-independ-
ent Zimbabwe and how he has been regarded by the ruling ZANU PF
party, particularly its leader, Robert Mugabe, throughout these peri-
ods? It becomes necessary to ask this question given that, like the statue
which had a journey to its pedestal in Bulawayo and the one still kept
somewhere in Harare, a fuller understanding of the value of the statue
requires a long shot view, one that takes into account journeys in the
construction of Nkomo’s stature, that is, representations of the late
Nkomo during and after the liberation struggle. In any case, and as
pointed out before, the erection, re-erection and public consumption of
the Bulawayo statue were and continue to be far from uncontroversial.
Before offering a brief history of the late Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo,

a few remarks on heritage will be instructive. Mugabe’s words at the
unveiling of Nkomo’s statue suggest that a national heritage monu-
ment is more than just a historical object or artefact. In fact, his utter-
ance highlights the most common view of national monuments or
heritage objects that they are public manifestations of collective memory
and national identity (Cummings 2013; Sorensen et al. 2009; Howard
2003). As Graham and Howard (2008) observe, at both personal and
national levels, heritage and identity are intertwined. Therefore, ana-
lysing national heritage monuments ‘provides an ideal way to trace
underlying continuities and discontinuities in national identity politics’
(Cummings 2013: 525).
One of the tasks of this chapter is to explore how Nkomo’s statue
can possibly be read as a symbol of the Zimbabwean nation, particularly
given that one of his nicknames is ‘Father Zimbabwe’. In addition to the
link between heritage and identity, Howard (2003) makes three salient
points concerning the characteristics of heritage. These points are sup-
ported by other heritage scholars. The first is a warning that: ‘Heritage
can indeed be perceived as a dangerous concept; it is frequently nation-
alistic, exclusive, sexist, elitist and backward-looking’ (Howard 2003: 4).
Given these politically charged and divisive descriptors, Howard (2003:
23) advises that scholars of heritage need to ask three key questions:
‘Whose heritage? Conserved for whom? At whose expense?’ What should
be added to this list of questions is: ‘For what purpose?’ This question
is necessitated by the fact that heritage monuments and narratives ‘are
not produced for nothing or for fun’ (Groote and Haartsen 2008: 181),
and heritage ‘benefits someone, and usually disadvantages someone else’
(Howard 2003: 4).
The second point Howard (2003: 46) makes is that there are mul-
tifarious readings of heritage monuments and as such, ‘[p]eople do
not always take away from heritage sites that which was intended’.
Interpretive possibilities are numerous. Consequently, heritage meanings
and values are always contested given that the erection of political pub-
lic monuments inherently carries approval, dissent and scepticism. What
puts heritage under constant dispute is that its meanings and/or values
are culturally or socially constructed, hence the conclusion that ‘herit-
age is a communicative practice’ (Groote and Haartsen 2008: 191) and
as such any research on heritage ‘needs to pay attention to questions
412 T. Ndlovu
of representation and the politics of the communication of meanings’

(Groote and Haartsen 2008: 182). The third point that Howard (2003:
157) makes is that ‘heritage is divisive by nature’. The inherent divisive-
ness of heritage is due to dissonance, described by Johnson (2014: 584)
as ‘lack of agreement and consistency as to the meaning of heritage’.
Dissonance is intrinsic to heritage because of the diverse positionalities
of consumers of heritage as well as political and other changes that con-
stantly shift the way people view certain heritage monuments, particu-
larly at national level. Thus, the multiple lenses through which we view
heritage, some of which include ‘nationality, gender, ethnicity, class, reli-
gion, personal history, poverty, insideness, expertise and age’ (Howard
2003: 213) in combination with the site of the heritage monument, and
the passing of time, are significant contributors towards heritage disso-
nance. One could add to Howards’ (2003) list, political party affiliation.
However, those with political power create and promote a dominant
view of heritage known as ‘Authorised Heritage Discourse (AHD)’
(Smith 2006: 3). AHD tends to be mediated by those in power through
various media channels.
Given the points above about heritage, I find the following defini-
tion not only comprehensive but also useful as it does, to a large extent,
inform the method used in reading Nkomo’s statue:
Heritage …[is] a process of conscious, purposeful remembrance for the

political, cultural or economic needs of those in the present; it involves a
subjective representation of valued objects, significant persons, places and
symbolic events of the past, closely allied with issues of identity and power.
(Marschall 2009: 347)
Thus, through selection and presentation, heritage is a construction and

has very little or no intrinsic value of its own. Values are placed on cho-
sen artefacts or natural landscapes. As a concept, heritage is ‘present-cen-
tred’ in the sense that ‘the contents, interpretations and representations
of the heritage resource are selected according to the demands of the
present and, in turn, bequeathed to an imagined future’ (Graham and
Howard 2008: 2). The choice of heritage interpretation as a lens of
analysis Nkomo’s statue should now be apparent because this method of
analysis ‘investigates the role of the past in the present and the various
kinds of actions—from governmental institutional practices to individual
leisure use and responses’, and it calls out ‘for investigation and analysis
aiming to understand how heritage becomes constituted, what it is and

does, and how different groups engage with it’ (Forest and Johnson
2002: 17). Statues themselves are a fertile subject of study regarding
memorialisation and national identity because ‘statuary offers a way of
understanding nation-building which moves beyond top-down struc-
tural analyses to more dialectical conceptualisations’ (Johnson 1995: 57).
Such conceptualisations require us to evaluate ZANU PF government’s
Authorised Heritage Discourse concerning the Joshua Nkomo statue.
The plaque on Nkomo’s statue attempts to summarise Nkomo’s
worth and contribution to Zimbabwe’s independence as well as the role
he played in post-independent Zimbabwe. Nkomo is described thus:
AN ICON AND VETERAN OF ZIMBABWE’S INDEPENDENCE

POLITICS, DR NKOMO IS REMBERED FOR HIS MANY ROLES IN
TRADE UNIONISM, ORGANISATION OF AFRICAN RESISTANCE
TO COLONIAL SUBJUGATION AND MISRULE, LEADERSHIP OF
THE ARMED LIBERATION STRUGGLE AND THE ATTAINMENT
OF ZIMBABWE’S INDEPENDENCE FOUNDED ON NATIONAL
UNITY AND ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT DRIVEN BY LAND
REFORM, INDIGENISATION AND MUTUALLY BENEFICIAL
COOPERATION WITH THE REST OF THE WORLD.
ZIMBABWEANS TODAY ARE FREE BECAUSE OF UMDALA

WETHU’S PRINCIPLED VISION, COMMITTED LEADERSHIP
AND TOTAL DEDICATION TO THE REBIRTH OF OUR NATION
AND ITS DEVELOPMENT. NEVER AGAIN WILL THE SUN SET IN
ZIMBABWE.
Brevity of the writing on the plaque is, of course, a result of limited

space. Be that as it may, Savage (2009: 10) makes a perceptive observa-
tion that ‘[p]ublic monuments are an inherently conservative art form.
They obey the logic of the last word, the logic of closure’, with the result
that ‘monuments strip the hero or event of historical complexities and
condense the subject’s significance to a few patriotic lessons frozen for all
time’. As such, to do justice to the discussion of this paper, it is necessary
to first of all flesh out Nkomo’s abbreviated history by focusing on key
moments in his political career. Academic opinions, the two interviews
with Phathisa Nyathi and Ms Thandiwe Nkomo-Ebrahim, Nkomo’s
autobiography Nkomo the Story of My Life (1984), the author’s visit to
the Nkomo museum in Matshamhlophe, media coverage of Nkomo
414 T. Ndlovu
pre- and post-independent Zimbabwe, will help determine the extent of

congruity or incongruity between the state’s version of Nkomo’s value
and others’ versions. What will be kept in mind is that ‘heroes’ sym-
bolic lives supersede their real lives, historic reality is “sanitised” by fore-
grounding some aspects and conveniently forgetting others’ (Marschall
2006: 185). It is clear that the state privileges certain myths and narra-
tives about the history, memory and value of Nkomo while suppressing
others.
Who Was Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo?

To understand Nkomo’s political history and that of the political party
he led the longest, ZAPU, is to understand the political history of
Robert Mugabe as well as the ‘old’ and ‘new’ ZANU PF. The political
and personal histories of both leaders are so intertwined that one under-
stands Vambe’s (2009) assertion that in Nkomo’s autobiography, we
get to know more about Robert Mugabe than Nkomo himself. Vambe
(2009) also suggests that ‘Perhaps Nkomo fails in his book to distin-
guish between ZIPRA and himself’ (90). To expect a neat distinction
between political party and its leader is a useful ideal but it is practically
insincere, especially when considering African politics. In African poli-
tics, political parties tend to bear a heavy imprint of the leader’s char-
acter and in the worst case, the leader’s whims and personal squabbles.
The edited collection of Drum Magazine articles by Couzens (1992),
Zimbabwe: The Search for Common Ground Since 1890 from the pages
of Drum Magazine, offers a freshness to the political and personal rela-
tionships between Nkomo and Mugabe and the parties that they led
or were part of from the late 1950s to independence at 1980. Granted
that the articles represent the viewpoint of the writer of each story as
well as Drum’s editorial policy, the contemporaneous nature of the sto-
ries, particularly the direct utterances of both Mugabe and Nkomo, gives
the researcher very rich material to work from. Some of the utterances
came to shape the relationships between these two political leaders and
their parties. That being the case, this chapter will analyse some aspects
of Joshua Nkomo and Mugabe’s personal and political relationships that
led to, with regard to this paper, Mugabe unveiling Nkomo’s statue,
renaming Main Street and renaming the Bulawayo Airport after Nkomo.
One of the plaques on Nkomo’s statue reads: ‘THIS MONUMENT
WAS OFFICIALLY UNVEILED BY HIS EXCELLENCY THE
PRESIDENT OF THE REPUBLIC OF ZIMBABWE CDE ROBERT

GABRIEL MUGABE ON 22ND DECEMBER 2013’. The Chronicle
went as far as to say that Mugabe had unveiled the statue of his ‘brother’
(The Chronicle 23 December 2013. In many ways, this message typi-
fies how throughout their political lives, Mugabe is the one who has
had more opportunity and power, perhaps 90%, of officially represent-
ing Joshua Nkomo, that is, the power to decide what sort of image to
accord Nkomo at different historical moments. Initially, Mugabe did this
positively as Nkomo’s ‘polished professional spokesman’ as captured in
Drum Magazine’s May 1964 issue (Couzens 1992: 222) under ZAPU
before the split that begot ZANU.
The abbreviated history of Joshua Nkomo on one of the copper
plaques tallies with some well-known historical facts, has a rather gar-
bled message on some facts and is entirely quiet on others. The narrative
suggests the absence of conflict and contestation. There are some his-
torical events that concur with the brief description of Nkomo’s contri-
butions pre- and post-independent Zimbabwe. Born in 1917 and died in
1999, Nkomo entered trade union politics in 1948 and led the Southern
Rhodesia African National Congress (SRANC) in 1957, National
Democratic Party (NDP) in 1960 and ZAPU from 1963 to 1987.
That the late Nkomo was a leading trade unionist and founding father
of Zimbabwean nationalism and liberation struggle is widely acknowl-
edged (Nkomo 1984; Couzens 1992; Ndlovu-Gatsheni and Willems
2010). Cain Mathema, Governor and Resident Minister of Bulawayo
described Nkomo as ‘the founding father of our liberation struggle’ (The
Chronicle, 31 August 2011). Equally justifiable is the claim by the plaque
that Nkomo was a symbol of resistance to colonialism. In anticipation
of the unveiling of Nkomo’s statue, The Chronicle of 1 December 2013
writes that ‘Dr Nkomo was befittingly named “Father Zimbabwe” for his
enormous contribution to the country’s struggle for independence from
British colonial rule and his post-independence role of ensuring unity
among Zimbabweans’. The paper unequivocally sees the late Nkomo
as deserving of a statue in Zimbabwean politics. But this is ‘Authorised
Heritage Discourse (AHD)’ (Smith 2006: 3). What are other possible
readings of Nkomo’s statue? To answer this question requires a focus on
what the plaque is quiet on.
Looking at Nkomo’s statue and taking into account Nkomo’s leader-
ship of SRANC, UNDP and ZAPU; the split of ZAPU that gave rise
to ZANU; ZANU’s charge during the liberation struggle that Nkomo
416 T. Ndlovu
was not committed to the armed struggle (Nkomo 1984); the brand-
ing of Nkomo as ‘Father of Dissidents’ in the 1980s, and the signing
of the questionable Unity Accord in 1987, one wonders if the erection
of Nkomo’s statue was done in good faith. Similarly, one starts ques-
tioning the conferment of attributes, some of them posthumously, that
Nkomo had claimed and been denied before signing the Unity Accord.
These include Nkomo’s commitment to unity, his role as founding father
of Zimbabwean nationalism as epitomised through the epithet ‘Father
Zimbabwe’. In their perceptive analysis of the representations and self-
representations of Joshua Nkomo, Ndlovu-Gatsheni and Willems (2010)
clearly delineate the numerous identities and subject positions that
Nkomo occupied pre- and post-independent Zimbabwe. They conclude
that the multiple and fluctuating representations of Joshua Nkomo were
for political expediency. Thus, both in life and after his death, Nkomo
‘continued to be a subject of appropriation, use and abuse’ (Ndlovu-
Gatsheni and Willems 2010: 204).
When he enjoyed national popularity in the early days of Zimbabwean
nationalism, Joshua Nkomo got rousing welcomes that in some cases
would bring the then Salisbury Airport to a standstill. This is captured
for example in Drum’s June 1962 article titled ‘Hero’s welcome for
Nkomo’ following ‘3 months at the United Nations’ where Nkomo was
‘dissecting the oppression in Rhodesia’ (Couzens 1992: 120). Perhaps
the height of Nkomo’s popularity was when he was crowned ‘King of
Zimbabwe’ in Salisbury’s Gwanzura stadium as captured in Drum
Magazine’s September 1962 issue (Couzens 1992: 124). The following
brief description captures the peak of Nkomo’s popularity:
With ostrich feathers, Joshua Nkomo was crowned King of Zimbabwe.

While many, many thousands of Africans and some Europeans packed
Gwanzura stadium, Dr Edward Pswarayi presented Nkomo with an orna-
mental spear, and then the crown. The chima drum, used only in king-
making ceremonies, sounded—its deep note heard for the first time in a
city.
Earlier, propped by a brass walking stick and dressed in tattered cloth-

ing, skins and fur head gear, 90-year-old Nyamasoka Chinhamora, uncle
to Chief Chinhamora, staggered forward from amid the chanting crowd
at Salisbury Airport with stretched hands and a voice trembling with age,
he pronounced: ‘Son of the soil, take this sword, the battle axe and the
knobkerrie. By presenting these weapons I have bestowed on you supreme

leadership. (Couzens 1992: 124)
In spite of his popularity, and perhaps because of it, Nkomo was to soon
face a challenge within ZAPU, which led to the splintering of the party
and the formation of ZANU. The formation of ZANU as a breakaway
faction from ZAPU was characterised by acrimony amongst the leaders.
This split contains most of the seeds for future altercations and ‘recon-
ciliations’. The main actors during the split were Robert Mugabe and
Joshua Nkomo. They became arch-rivals for most of their political lives.
An article in the Drum Magazine of August 1963 reports that the key
leaders of the breakaway faction were ‘Mr Robert Mugabe, Mr Leopold
Takawira, the Rev. Ndabaningi Sithole, Mr Washington Malianga, Mr
Enos Nkala’ (Couzens 1992: 180). The defectors and detractors are
quoted as saying that Nkomo was ‘the enemy of the people’, ‘cheap’
and ‘spineless’ (Couzens 1992: 180). But it was Robert Mugabe who
castigated Nkomo the strongest and said, amongst other utterances in
Drum’s May issue of 1964, ‘I know Nkomo. He is weak. I see through
him as I see myself in a mirror. I see through him and I see a coward’
(Couzens 1992: 222). Nkomo, in his autobiography, The Story of My
Life (1984), argues that what motivated the split was tribalism, with the
Shona speaking members deciding to band together and ostracise him
to a possible political wilderness. Although the breakaway faction denied
Nkomo’s prognosis for the split, one of Mugabe’s comments does reveal
the importance of ethnicity in the 1960s, something that came to influ-
ence the elections in 1980 and Gukurahundi in the early 1980s. The fol-
lowing excerpt underlines not only the importance of tribe or ethnicity
but also how personally politicians took issues:
Mugabe now says that from the start he was disappointed with Nkomo,
and disappointment soon turned to despair. What held him back? ‘You see
I was toying with the idea that if we sacked Joshua, unity would collapse
and he would go with Matabeleland. In the end I made up my mind that
unity which could get us nowhere was undesirable and a split that could
take us somewhere was preferable’.
Now bitter, he added: ‘It was Joshua who asked my wife to go with us
to Tanganyika. He has caused us much hardship’. Now, says Mugabe,
Sarah [sic] is coming back to face her 9–months’ jail sentence once she
418 T. Ndlovu
has nursed her baby and had treatment for a kidney complaint. (Couzens
1992: 222–223)
Thus, Mugabe was disappointed by Nkomo right from the start, had
very little regard for him as a leader and tolerated him for the sake
of unity, a unity that hinged on Nkomo controlling Matabeleland
which, numerically, would not count against the rest of the country
or Mashonaland. On his part, Nkomo felt Mugabe’s desertion most
keenly. Drum of May 1964 wrote: ‘Then came the split and Nkomo’s
shock at his denouncers was only excelled by his hurt at Mugabe being
among them’. ‘No, not Robert[…] not him too[…] he kept muttering’
(Couzens 1992: 222).
It is possible that Nkomo might not have been very effective in his
leadership, in which case, he should have been left to lead ZAPU to
self-destruction, to clearly demonstrate his ineptitude. Instead, Mugabe
decided to destroy Nkomo in a manner that was to become typical of
Mugabe’s intolerance for opposition:
Today, Mugabe… spends his time in an all-out effort to destroy his old
master. Now he insists that “it is only a matter of time before Nkomo is
finished.
….
In fighting Nkomo, Mugabe has shown a dedication equal to anything

he showed while backing him. He preached against Nkomo before the
United Nations, in Britain, West Germany and several African states, being
shadowed by Nkomoite George Silundika who followed behind, contra-
dicting everything he said. (Couzens 1992: 222)
Through his efforts, Mugabe’s clear aim was to get rid of Nkomo and
is quoted as saying: ‘Then I know Joshua will go, the present gov-
ernment will go. Then, of course, we [he and his wife Sally] will have
more children’ (Couzens 1992: 223). For Mugabe, the future had to
be free of Nkomo. Eighteen years later, in 1982, an attempt was made
on Nkomo’s life by what Nkomo concluded were ‘the armed killers of
Prime Minister Robert Mugabe’ (Nkomo 1984: 1).
In the armed struggle, ZANU fought through its military wing,
ZANLA and ZAPU through its own ZIPRA. After the Lancaster House
Agreement, Zimbabwe prepared for elections and Nkomo insisted that
the two parties contest the elections as the Patriotic Front, a coalition
that had been formed by the two parties to push through the last stages
of the armed conflict and negotiations at Lancaster House. In Drum’s
March 1980 issue, Nkomo is quoted as saying:
We believe that Zimbabwe will inspire ourselves and our neighbours as a

model. Unity is the keystone to peace and progress. The most effective
means to achieve this unity is the maintenance of the instrument created at
the insistence of the people—a front for all Zimbabwean patriots. For the
sake of our people and our children, self must take a second place to the
nation. (Drum 1980: 303)
In his autobiography, Nkomo writes that he had put this idea to

ZANU PF but got no response until he was forced, at the last min-
ute too, to enter the elections as ZAPU (Nkomo 1984). In short, the
idea of contesting elections as a united front was snubbed by ZANU
PF. Consequently, the country went to the polls with clear ethnic rifts
amongst the leaders, citizenry and former guerrilla soldiers.
ZANU PF won the 1980 elections and Mugabe offered Nkomo a cer-
emonial presidential position which Nkomo declined (Nkomo 1984).
In the end, he was appointed Minister of Home Affairs. On 9 and 10
November, interparty rivalry erupted in the form of gunfire between
ZIPRA and ZANLA forces. This was to be known as the first battle of
Entumbane or Entumbane I. The skirmish left 58 people dead and over
500 wounded, most of them civilians (Hull 1986). This unrest seemed
to have been quelled for a while, particularly with Nkomo calling for
patience and national unity. Entumbane II, which was fought between 8
and 12 August 1981, threatened to blow up into a civil war. In February
1982, all members of ZAPU were expelled from national government,
including Joshua Nkomo. Nkomo was subsequently branded enemy of
the state needing eradication. Whereas the formation of ZANU Nkomo
had been called ‘enemy of the people’ (Couzens 1992: 180), in post-
independent Zimbabwe he was branded ‘enemy of the state’. Writes
Nkomo in his autobiography:
Prime Minister Mugabe had publicly called for violent action against my
person. He said, quite falsely, that I was trying to overthrow his gov-
ernment. Speaking of my party he said: ‘Zapu and its leader, Dr Joshua
420 T. Ndlovu
Nkomo, are like a cobra in a house. The only way to deal effectively with a
snake is to strike and destroy its head. (Couzens 1992: 2)
Insults were also heaped on Nkomo, one of which was ‘Dumbuguru’

(big stomach), and mockery of Nkomo’s title ‘Father Zimbabwe’
resulted in ‘Father of dissidents’ (Ndlovu-Gatsheni and Willems 2010:
197). After an attempt was made on his life, Nkomo fled the country
to a life of exile in Britain. Also in fear of their lives and frustrated by
being overlooked in the creation of a new army, some ex-ZIPRA sol-
diers fled to the bush and became known as dissidents. Then followed
Gukurahundi—a brutal suppression ostensibly of former ZIPRA com-
batants turned dissidents. In reality, the North Korean trained Fifth
Brigade killed more than 20,000 civilians in Matabeleland deemed to be
Nkomo’s supporters between 1982 and 1987. Gukurahundi is Shona for
‘the first rains that wash away the chaff’. The memory of this period has
a great bearing on Nkomo’s statue, particularly some of the objections
from the Bulawayo community. For example, some residents rejected the
statue because it was made in North Korea, the very country imbricated
in Gukurahundi.
When Joshua Nkomo signed the Unity Accord in 1987, the move
was regarded by some as tantamount to surrendering since the merger of
ZANU PF and PF ZAPU resulted in a ‘new’ ZANU PF. In this arrange-
ment, some pro-Nkomo citizens of Matabeleland felt that Nkomo had
sold out (Ndlovu-Gatsheni and Willems 2010). Regarding Nkomo’s
image in the eyes of ZANU PF after the signing of the Unity Accord,
Ndlovu-Gatsheni and Willems (2010: 200) write:
After the signing of the agreement, the newly united ZANU-PF party
began to portray Nkomo in a more positive light as a selfless nation-
builder and unifier who put the nationalist interest above the party inter-
est. This was a convenient representation for both Nkomo, who wanted to
be remembered as an advocate of unity, and Mugabe, who did not tolerate
any political challenges and who was still committed to establishing a one
party-state in Zimbabwe.
It should be added here that another aim of Mugabe’s and ZANU PF

was to avoid addressing Gukurahundi. The hope was that the rhetoric
of unity would progressively erase or mute the atrocities of the Fifth
Brigade. Nkomo was eventually made one of two vice-presidents until
his death in 1999.
Various efforts to appropriate Nkomo happened in earnest after his

death. At a quite literal level, Nkomo was taken to the national Heroes
Acre to be buried there after he was declared a national hero. ZANU PF
has a hierarchised manner of conferring hero status starting with local
heroes, through provincial to national. Being accorded a national hero
status meant that Nkomo was not going to be buried in his home of
Matabeleland. His credentials when he died, chiefly that he had been
a senior member within ZANU PF with acknowledged contributions
to the armed struggle, meant that there would be no question about
his hero status. It is almost a foregone issue that if he had died lead-
ing an opposition party, he would not have been declared a national
hero. As Mpofu (2013: 153) points out, the Heroes Acre is a ‘discrimi-
nating space where some people are deliberately excluded on racial,
political, sexual orientation or ethnic grounds’. Not only had Nkomo
become what ZANU PF wanted, the party also foresaw multiple ways
of exploiting Nkomo’s image in death. The multiple constructions and
reconstructions of Nkomo’s image by ZANU PF for the sake of creat-
ing a legacy that would work in the service of ZANU PF made Nkomo’s
son, Sibangilizwe Nkomo, threaten to have his father exhumed from the
heroes acre (The Guardian online 6 July 2010).
No sooner had Nkomo been accorded a hero status and posthu-
mously given the title ‘Father Zimbabwe’ than ZANU PF started the
annual Umdala Wethu Gala. The timing of these galas and other com-
memorative efforts in honour of Nkomo revealed political expediency
more than a genuine intention to honour Nkomo:
After ZANU-PF’s loss of a significant number of parliamentary seats to the

opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) in the June 2000
parliamentary elections, the state broadcaster Zimbabwe Broadcasting
Corporation (ZBC) introduced in July 2001 an honorary music gala, the
Umdala Wethu (‘Our Father’ in siNdebele) gala, to commemorate his July
1999 death and to remember his contribution to the nation …. It was only
in July 2001 that the musical gala was introduced, reinforcing the idea
that political motivations were behind introduction of the gala. (Ndlovu-
Gatsheni and Willems 2010: 201)
ZANU’s strategy became one of arguing that those who voted MDC
were betraying Nkomo’s legacy of unity and those voting for ZANU
were characterised as voting for Nkomo and all he stood for, including
422 T. Ndlovu
land redistribution. It is too much of a coincidence also, that the rebuild-

ing of the pedestal for Nkomo’s statue picked pace and the unveiling of
Nkomo’s statue was done the year of Zimbabwe’s last general election,
2013.
The Road Towards the Erection and Re-erection

of Nkomo’s Statue
According to Ms Thandiwe Nkomo-Ebrahim (interview November

2015), the Nkomo family did not instigate the erection of a statue to his
name. The idea emanated from parliament. The following stages towards
the re-erection of the Bulawayo statue are of critical discursive signifi-
cance: delays in the initial erecting of the statue; the request to have King
Lobengula’s statue as well; regionalist discourses around the need to
have Nkomo’s statue erected in ‘his’ province of Matabeleland; failure to
erect the other statue in Harare; the persistent lobbying of government
to name Main Street after Nkomo, and visits to Nkomo’s statue, particu-
larly performance of rituals akin to sacralisation of the statue.
The Chronicle of 21 July 2010 had as one of its headings: ‘Work on
Nkomo statue to be completed soon’. It created a sense of anticipation
which ended in disappointment with both the statue and the pedestal.
The situation also divided the citizens of Bulawayo. The Chronicle of 31
August 2011 reports that ‘Dr Nkomo’s family complained that it [the
statute] did not capture the exact attributes of the late Vice-President.
They said the Government did not involve them in the whole project.
The family said the statue itself was very small and pitiful, hardly a street
statue at all, and neither the landmark nor monument that it should be’.
Nkomo’s brother, Mr Edward Ginqusaba Nkomo, said as ‘the tradi-
tional head of the family[…] he was never consulted about the statue, its
design, location and size’ (The Chronicle 17 September 2010). He also
added: ‘The picture that has been used is one of the worst pictures of
my late brother and appropriate consultations with the appropriate mem-
bers of the family would have resulted in the identification of a more
suitable picture’ (The Chronicle 17 September 2010). It will be argued
later that the picture ZANU selected, suited their ‘picture’ of Nkomo,
the kind that they wanted to present to the public—a non-threatening
Nkomo the party hoped would be shorn of political significance. Ms
Thandiwe Nkomo-Ebrahim said the size of the statue or portraiture
of her late father was not the problem. The problem was the low and
small pedestal that made the statue ‘look like a garden statue’ (interview
November 2015). She also said government had not consulted the fam-
ily as closely as it could have, especially regarding the ‘finer aspects’ of
the statue (interview November 2015). Some of the public objections
had to do with the fact that the statue had been manufactured in North
Korea, the very country that trained the Fifth Brigade that carried out
the Gukurahundi atrocities (The Standard online 18 November 2010).
The enduring sense of hurt at the hands of the North Korean trained
special task army unit, the Fifth Brigade, and the resultant death of over
20,0000 civilians in Matabeleland was demonstrated against the North
Korean football team in early 2010. The team had been scheduled to
hold camp in Bulawayo and play a couple of games against Zimbabwe’s
soccer teams in preparation for the 11 June–11 July FIFA World Cup in
neighbouring South Africa that same year. Ordinary residents and pres-
sure groups in Bulawayo spoke with one voice in telling the Zimbabwean
government that North Korea’s football team was not welcome in
Bulawayo (Newzimbabwe.com 2010) and threatened to demonstrate
everywhere the team would stay or play. Indeed, there were some threats
of physical violence against the North Korean football contingent.
The idea of accommodating the team in Bulawayo was seen as ‘glori-
fication of Gukurahundi’ and an ‘insult to the people of Matabeleland’
(Newzimbabwe.com 2010). Consequently, the team stayed in Harare
only. When it came to the manufacture of Nkomo’s statue, having it
made in North Korea was seen in a similar vein by some parts of the
Bulawayo community. To many, Nkomo represented Matabeleland
and its historical hurts. As for the Nkomo family, Ms Nkomo-Ebrahim
revealed that the family had a different sentiment: ‘Our family didn’t
mind where the statue was made but people from Matabeleland did. Our
family had forgiven and moved on’ (interview, November 2015). This
is in line with a feature article, ‘Joshua Mqabuko Nyongolo Nkomo—
The Man’ she had written in July 2013 for The Chronicle in which she
concluded that her father had possessed an ‘uncanny ability to forgive
and forget and let bygones be bygones for the good of the nation’ (The
Chronicle 13 July 2013).
Bulawayo residents were torn between those who wanted the statue
to stand and those who wanted it removed. Mrs Mpofu wanted the
statue to stand and commented:
424 T. Ndlovu
Government should engage the Nkomo family and talk to them over
this issue and let the statue remain…. Nkomo was a national figure and
anything that is done about him cannot be confined to narrow interests
because it concerns every Zimbabwean. If the statue is removed, that
would be a waste of public funds and yet the family which is so vocal
on this matter did not pay anything into that project (The Chronicle 17
September 2010).
In the same article, Mr Nkathazo Murefu takes a similar line of argument

because ‘there is not much to condemn except that the pedestal is low’.
This tallies with Ms Nkomo-Ebrahim (interview November 2015) and
Mr Phathisa Nyathi’s views (interview November 2015). The Nkomo
family insisted that the statute should be taken down and a proper ped-
estal erected, and the statue was indeed taken down. But not before the
family was accused of arrogance by Miss Beaula Dube who concluded
that it was ‘very unfair for the family to call for the pulling down of the
statue’. Another resident advised the government to disregard objections
by the Nkomo family:
Government cannot therefore heed the objections from the Nkomo family
without hurting feelings of the entire nation because Dr Nkomo cannot
be owned by one family. The man was in his entire life simply a colossus,
hence the name father Zimbabwe (The Chronicle 17 September 2010).
The charges against the Nkomo family and the insistence by some
Bulawayo residents that Nkomo or his memory is, in a manner of speak-
ing, ‘public property’, do bring to the fore the battle over the ‘owner-
ship’ of Nkomo and his legacy. The family was adamant that the statue
or at least the pedestal robbed Nkomo of the stature he deserved. The
Nkomo family and those who shared their sentiments won.
Another source of objection to the erection of the Nkomo statue in
Bulawayo was its site. In a paper titled ‘Dr Joshua Nkomo’s Statue with-
out Stature’ given at a lecture organised by the Southern African Political
Economic Series in Bulawayo, Mr Phathisa Nyathi pointed out that the
Bulawayo Community was offended by the pedestaling of Nkomo’s statue
on the exact spot where the statue of Cecil John Rhodes used to be. This
move, Nyathi argued, was read by some as ‘fitting Nkomo into the shoes
of Rhodes’. In other words, this constituted a form of heritage disso-
nance, as explained by Nyathi: ‘Rhodes’ statue was facing north in line
with the grand imperial plan of conquering Africa from Cape to Cairo and
it is unfortunate that Nkomo’s statue was also facing in the same direc-
tion’. Seemingly responding to this source of unhappiness, the Governor
and Resident Minister of Bulawayo, Mr Cain Mathema, tried to explained
away this dissonance thus: ‘Dr Nkomo, being the founding father of our
liberation struggle, the erection of his statue where there was Rhodes’
meant that everything that was done by Rhodes and the colonialists was
reversed by his contribution to self-rule’ (The Chronicle 31 August 2011).
The material that had been used to make the pedestal for the Nkomo
statue was inappropriate because it was concrete covered by relatively
thin slabs of granite which were bound to break at some point (Nyathi
interview, November 2015). Thus, durability as one of the defining
characteristics of national monuments had been compromised. The
last objection by the Bulawayo community as articulated in Nyathi’s
paper was the fact that the ‘statue, unlike the world-wide tradition, was
nameless’ (Nyathi 2011, page unknown). The last point shows a gross
omission by those involved in erecting the first statue. Perhaps, as Ms
Nkomo-Ebrahim concluded, the ‘the whole project lacked forethought’
(interview November 2015).
The attempt to mount Nkomo’s statue at Harare’s Karigamombe
Centre elicited numerous dissonances and strong reactions from the
Nkomo family and Bulawayo community. The Zimbabwe government’s
decision to erect Nkomo’s statue at Karigamombe Centre in Harare
incensed the Nkomo family who described the idea as a ‘mockery and
insult’ (The Chronicle 29 July 2010). As The Chronicle explained, ‘Dr
Nkomo was the leader of PF-Zapu, whose symbol was a charging bull.
Karigamombe is a Shona word which means one who fells a cow or
bull’. Phathisa Nyathi expanded: ‘The problem comes with the name of
the building. In some people’s minds and in the context of Zanu and
PF-Zapu, Karigamombe building symbolises supremacy over Dr Nkomo.
“Kariga” comes from “kuriga” which means to topple and we know who
the mombe (cow/bull) is’ (The Chronicle 29 July 2010). Unmentioned
by any of the commentators is that the late Nkomo’s surname which also
happens to be his totem literally means ‘cow or bull’. Totems in most of
Africa are regarded as emblematic of one’s family and clan. In that sense,
the suggestion by government looked like a celebration of Nkomo’s
‘defeat’—his decision to sign the Unity Accord in 1987, regarded by
some, as already pointed out, as a form of surrender.
Unsurprisingly, the Nkomo family viewed the honour very scepti-
cally and concluded that ‘the honour given to Dr Nkomo was in bad
426 T. Ndlovu
faith’ (The Chronicle 29 July 2010). The dissonance was not limited
only to the name of the centre. It also involved the former function of
Karigamombe Centre. In an article titled ‘Joshua Nkomo support-
ers insulted by plans to put up his statue in Harare’, the South African
Guardian quotes one objector saying that ‘the building, formerly the
Piccadilly centre, was used to run operations during the Matabeleland
massacres, or “Gukurahundi”, in the 1980s, when Mugabe’s men
attacked Nkomo’s Zapu supporters’ (The Guardian online 6 July
2010). Another aggrieved Nkomoite whose father was killed during
Gukurahundi and identified as Max Mkandla of the Liberators Peace
Initiative is quoted as saying, ‘The orders were originating from meet-
ings there and it is associated with Robert Mugabe and his family. It
is not a befitting place for a statue of Nkomo’ (The Guardian online
6 July 2010). Some of the complainants expressed unhappiness with
the general idea of erecting Nkomo’s statue in Harare. One of them
said, ‘Joshua Nkomo would feel bad if he knew his statue was there
[Karigamobe Centre, Harare]. He originated in Matabeleland and the
statue must be kept in Matabeleland’. The individual concerned was
claiming Nkomo and the latter’s memory through a regionalist perspec-
tive, as seen for example, through requests to have not only Nkomo’s
statue but that of King Lobengula as well. At this stage of the essay, it
should be clear that the suffering of the people in Matabeleland under
Gukurahundi emerges as an enduring memory at the centre of which
Nkomo is regarded as a victim alongside the people who perished or suf-
fered under the atrocities. There is also a sense in which some want to
appropriate Nkomo and his memory for the benefit of the Matabeleland
region only, something that subverts the government’s discourse of
Nkomo as a national hero.
The dissonance in the situation above had to do with the site of the
statue. As Phathisa Nyathi put it, ‘The idea is good but the place is
wrong’ (The Chronicle 29 July 2010). Given that a monument’s main
function is to remind, ‘[i]ts location, form, site design and inscrip-
tions aid the recall of persons, things, events or values’ (Stevens et al.
2012: 951), and as such all these factors need to be taken into serious
account. Johnson (1995: 55) puts it succinctly that ‘Space or more
particularly territory is as intrinsic to memory as historical conscious-
ness in the definition of a national identity’. Thus, spatialisation of pub-
lic memory is critical. Much as statues have no intrinsic meaning, some
of it, and at times a significant part, is derived from and enhanced by
the geographical spaces that they occupy. How the government was not
aware of the connotations of putting Nkomo’s statue at Karigamombe
Centre is difficult to understand.
Equally perplexing is how the government did not know who owned
the land on the proposed site for Nkomo’s statue. There was another
objection by ‘owners of Karigamombe centre’ who through the High
Court, ‘stopped the Harare City Council from erecting Dr Nkomo’s
statue at Karigamombe Centre on the grounds that the land belonged
to the Mining Industry Pension Fund (MIPF)’ (The Chronicle 13 August
2010). Phathisa Nyathi suggested that the statue be mounted at Harare’s
Africa Unity Square, whose name, centrality and stature would suit
Nkomo’s statue (interview November 2015) but that had not materi-
alised during the writing of this chapter. Hard to understand as all the
oversights by government are, what the drama around the objections
to have Nkomo’s statue erected at Karigambombe Centre reveals is the
myth of unity under the ‘new’ and unified ZANU PF. It also revealed
lack of trust in the government by both the Nkomo family and people of
Matabeleland because of enduring suspicions and hurts.
The path to the final unveiling of Nkomo’s statue also reveals not
only lack of trust in government but also subversion of the government’s
Authorised Heritage Discourse (Smith 2006: 3). To start with, when the
statue was taken down, the government did not seem keen to re-erect
it. The Chronicle of 26 September 2010 wrote: ‘Government has reiter-
ated that it has shelved indefinitely, plans to re-erect the statute of the
late Vice-President, Dr Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo, in any of the country’s
streets’. Co-Home Affairs Minister, Kembo Mohadi, was very categorical
about the matter, his tone suggesting that the statue was unlikely to be
re-erected:
I will say it again […] that I have taken it to the museum. It is going to
be part of my museum collections. There are no plans whatsoever of re-
erecting the statue in any of the country’s streets as of now and those who
want to see the statue can only go to the museum where we have decided
to keep it. (The Chronicle 26 September 2010)
However, the Governor and Resident Minister of Bulawayo, Cain

Mathema, expressed a different and hopeful sentiment. He was reported
as having said that ‘like most residents he wants the statue back at Main
Street, which he hinted, he would have wanted renamed Joshua Nkomo
428 T. Ndlovu
Way’ (The Chronicle 26 September 2010). In 2012, The Chronicle of

22 April (2012) carried a story titled, ‘Confusion over Nkomo statue’
in which these two government office bearers contradicted each other.
Mathema said that the government had made $80,000 available for the
re-erection of Nkomo’s statue but Mohadi challenged this claim, citing
financial problems in government. There were thus mixed messages on
the re-erection of the statue. Those who sounded keen like Mathema also
expressed the ambition to have Main Street named after the late Nkomo.
Frustrated with the slow pace or no movement in the re-erection
of Nkomo’s statue, the Matojeni Cultural Society (MCS) commemo-
rated the 13th anniversary of Nkomo’s death by putting ‘portraits
of the late nationalist at the pillar meant for the installation of the
statue’ (The Standard online 1 July 2012). On top of this gesture, the
Society’s leader, Albert Nyoni, made a statement to the effect that ‘the
group wanted to send a clear signal to the authorities, that people of
Matabeleland were eagerly waiting for Nkomo’s statue to be installed
to recognise his contribution for the liberation and development of the
country’ (The Standard Online 1 July 2012). The MCS added a con-
dition to their demand ‘to the powers that be’—that the statue should
not be from North Korea. They too, like Mathema, wanted Main Street
named after Nkomo (The Standard online 6 July 2012). In Nyoni’s
words, ‘How can a veteran nationalist fail to have a road named after
him in the city in his region?’ (The Standard online 6 July 2012). The
demands of the MCS were regional in outlook, suggesting that it was
the ‘people of Matabeleland’ who had a genuine need for the statue.
The Society was apparently imposing a regional claim on the statue. It
is not difficult to understand why that was the case. As Smith (2011: 10)
observes, ‘monuments are also erected to satiate psychic and emotional
needs of a community’.
These needs would become clear after the unveiling of the statue by
President Mugabe. In other words, the needs became manifest during
the ‘after-life’ of the statue, that is, after the government’s constrictive
rendering of the statue. Concerning the after-life of a statue, Cherry
(2013: 4) writes:
After-lives of statues refers to the fact that statues continue living on from
their many pasts into the present, they may sustain addition or demolition,
temporary accretions, adaptive re-use, appropriation, and material and vis-
ible change, and summon new visitors, uses, and appropriations.
In the case of Nkomo’s statue, the Matojeni Cultural Society sacralised

it on February 2014 (following Mugabe’s unveiling on 22 December
2013) when they ‘performed a traditional rite (ukuthethela)2 thanking
Dr Nkomo for being the great leader he was’ (The Chronicle 3 February
2014). They also performed traditional dances such as isitshikitsha.
Later that year, to commemorate Nkomo’s death on 1 July, the
Joshua Nkomo Cultural Movement (JNCM) oraganised two events—
one at Njelele3 in the Matopos and another in Bulawayo. Concerning
the latter event, the chairperson ‘revealed that for the main function in
Bulawayo, they will start with a walk dubbed General Josh 4 kilometre
walk to healing where they would walk from Blue Lagoon at Renkini
to the Dr Nkomo statue in the city centre’ (Sunday News 29 June
2014). The JNCM had turned the statue into a site of healing for the
hurts of Gukurahundi, amongst others that the state had downplayed,
suppressed or ignored. The only time that Mugabe deigned to acknowl-
edge Gukurahundi atrocities was when he described the operation as a
‘moment of madness’ (NewsDay online 18 May 2015). There has never
been any serious attempt at reconciliation, which would require that the
government in general and the key people that directed Gukurahundi,
tell the truth and express genuine contrition. In the absence of genuine
reconciliation, the Nkomo statue has become an ambiguous monument
for national unity, Nkomo and Matabeleland’s victimisation at the hands
of the government in the 1980s, site for mourning and healing and
indeed a node around which to address injustices of the past. An example
of the last point about addressing past injustices was the threat by the
ZIPRA Veterans Trust (ZVT) to block the erection of Nkomo’s statue,
arguing that ‘erection of the statue without returning his [Nkomo’s]
properties seized by government in the 1980s was the highest form of
hypocrisy by President Robert Mugabe’ (The Standard online, 17 April
2011). In his autobiography, Nkomo (1984) does mention the seizure
of his personal assets as well as those of ZAPU. According to ZVT, some
of the properties had been ‘taken over by senior Zanu PF officials’ (The
Standard online, 17 April 2011). Some of the ZVT members saw resti-
tution as a measure of how serious ZANU PF was in genuinely honour-
ing Nkomo whereas others thought that the block would permanently
deny Matabeleland the much needed statue of Nkomo. The former
group insisted that ‘It was better if Nkomo was not honoured than for
his name to be used as a “pedestal” for Mugabe and Zanu PF’s political
mileage’ (The Standard online 17 April 2011). It took the intervention
430 T. Ndlovu
of the Joshua Nkomo Foundation (JNF) under the chairmanship of

Francis Nhema, then chairperson of JNF, also Minister of Environment
and Tourism and also son-in-law to the late Nkomo when he was still
married to Nkomo’s daughter, Louise, to allow the erection of the statue
to proceed.
Linked to the slow pace and doubts over the erection of Nkomo’s
statue was the process of renaming Main Street after Nkomo. It took
government about 7 years to ratify the City of Bulawayo’s proposal to
that end. According to The Chronicle of 2 July 2013, efforts to change
the street name started on 29 July 2006 with Bulawayo Governor,
Cain Mathema, tabling the idea to the Bulawayo City Council (BCC).
The BCC could not effect the name change because Main Street was a
national as opposed to city road (Nyathi interview, November 2013).
Hence, the BCC lobbied the government but did not get an answer
until some days before the official unveiling of Nkomo’s statute. Before
the ratification by government, there was a lot of suspicion, frustration
and anger. The Chronicle of 2 July 2013 reported attempts by some
Bulawayo residents to send a message of frustration to the government,
hoping to prod it to hasten the renaming of Main Street. Part of the
report reads:
Unknown people changed Bulawayo’s Main Street to Joshua Nkomo

Street while hundreds of people yesterday attended commemorations of
the late Vice-President at Stanley Square.
The news crew observed that the ‘new’ signposts were made of wood
painted in black. Some of the signposts were nailed on the trees while
some are tied to cover the original street sign. (The Chronicle 2 July 2013)
This protest gesture was not heeded and as late as 9 December 2013,
BCC was reported as set to ‘re-submit the proposal to have Main Street
renamed in honour of the late Vice-President Dr Joshua Mqabuko
Nkomo to ensure that the renaming coincides with the official unveiling
of the statue in honour of the late veteran nationalist’ (The Chronicle 9
December 2013). In the same article, a resident is quoted as saying that
delays in the re-erection of Nkomo’s statue and renaming Main Street
were both ‘mockery of the late nationalist’s contribution to the libera-
tion and development of Zimbabwe’ (ibid). Thus, the road to the erec-
tion and re-erection of Nkomo’s statue was marked by contestation and
strife, challenging the common place idea that any monument classified
as national heritage belongs to all in that ‘nation’ and is timeless. The
statue, just like all national heritage monuments, proved to be ‘part of
political action’ (Sorensen and Carman 2009: 3).
Conclusions: Whose Nkomo Is It?

If Nkomo’s nicknames on the pedestal of his statue are symbolic labels or
tags whose aim is to declare and remind us of his legacy, useful questions
to ask would be: who gave him these names? Was he always known by
them? What other nicknames or labels have been omitted? The signifi-
cance of asking these questions is that the nicknames and labels Nkomo
was given do tell us, to a large extent, how his image changed over his
long political life. They also tell us the kinds of affections and disaffec-
tions he elicited in political allies and rivals. Whereas nicknames such as
‘Big Josh’ (Couzens 1992: 265) and ‘The Lion of Zimbabwe’ (Couzens
1992: 302) were endearing and upheld Nkomo, respectively, others such
as ‘Father of Dissidents’ (Ndlovu-Gatsheni and Willems 2010: 197)
reveal not only disaffection but also outsiderness in relation to param-
eters of the Zimbabwean nation. In other words, such nicknames and
labels can tell us where Nkomo ‘belonged’ at separate moments of his-
tory and who commanded the political and moral right to claim him.
Nkomo ended up as ‘Father Zimbabwe’, a descriptor that was not
new but had been suppressed in post-independent Zimbabwe until his
death. At the height of his popularity in the early 1960s, he was ‘King of
Zimbabwe’ (Couzens 1992: 124). This period is described by Ndlovu-
Gatsheni and Willems in these terms:
In the 1950s and early 1960s, he was elected as leader of major national-
ist movements such as the Southern Rhodesia African National Congress
(SRANC), the National-Democratic Party (NDP) and ZAPU. Nkomo
modelled himself as a cultural nationalist who saw nationalist value in
Kalanga, Ndebele and Shona historical relics and symbols and frequently
drew from African traditional resources, mobilising graves of kings, monu-
ments, religious shrines and pre-colonial history. But he also represented
himself as a moderniser who transcended ethnic identities in order to
reconstruct and manufacture an inclusive form of nationalism.
One could argue that the idea of Nkomo as ‘national’ rang true or at
least closer to the truth at this point of his political career, hence the
432 T. Ndlovu
claim that black Africans were simultaneously making of and stacking on

him.
As already demonstrated, at the formation of ZANU PF, which coin-
cided with the creation of an anti-Nkomo discourse, began labels of
discredit such as ‘enemy of the people’ (Couzens 1992: 180) and the
association of Nkomo with Matabeleland. How much Nkomo could still
be said to be ‘national’ or have a national appeal diminished. Whether
he was outsmarted by the new ZANU PF or this happened as a result
of political ineptitude on his part is open to debate and is not what con-
cerns us here. The point is to stress that the negative image of Nkomo,
through the discourse of ZANU, would become magnified at independ-
ence with ZANU coming into power and having full control of state-
owned media. His ZAPU and ZIPRA’s contributions to the struggle
were almost muted in national historiography and monumentalisation.
One notes that Nkomo is conspicuously absent from any of the wall
murals at the national shrine, whose construction started in 1981. It is
Mugabe’s ‘besuited’ figure that dominates one of the two wall murals.
Ironically, Nkomo ended up buried at the Heroes Acre and got exhorted
as Father Zimbabwe yet his image is absent on the two murals that tell of
the country’s struggles to independence.
If, as his interment at the national shrine symbolises, Nkomo is a hero,
whose hero is he? This brings us back to his statue in Bulawayo. The
(re)erection of the statue and Nkomo’s burial at the Heroes Acre rep-
resent the ZANU PF government’s attempts at creating a post-colonial
national identity. Just like any other such attempt, it relies on eliding his-
torical complexities and divisions. National monuments constitute only
one node in the network of national memory. There are several others
such as enduring memories of victimhood. Nkomo’s exclusion from early
national historiography marked an outsiderness that was compounded
by Gukurahundi. Looking at his statue, it is hard not to think of it as
also memorialising victimhood, that of Nkomo himself and the people
of Matabeleland. As Achebe (1960: 145) puts it, ‘Wherever something
stands, another thing stands beside it’. Thus, in spite of the positive nick-
names on the statue, or because of them, other negative descriptors keep
flashing—‘cobra in a house’ (Nkomo 1984), ‘Dumbuguru’, ‘enemy of
the state’ (Nkomo 1984). Although ZANU has made great efforts to
manipulate the meaning of the statue and ‘appropriating’ his physical
body, there is still a sense that ZANU either rudely, or through sleight of
hand, wrested Nkomo from his family and the people of Matabeleland,
hence the tacit and sometimes open tussle over the ownership of
Nkomo’s memory.
One plaque on the pedestal of Nkomo’s statue states that one of
Nkomo’s critical legacies is ‘unity’. Indeed, towards the unveiling of
Nkomo’s statue by President Mugabe, Senior Minister of Sate Simon
Khaya Moyo said the unveiling ‘would be an important event in the his-
tory of Zimbabwe, demonstrating that the 1987 Unity Accord was irre-
versible’ (The Chronicle 9 December 2013). Mugabe himself harped on
this theme, claiming that some of Nkomo’s last words were ‘unity unity
unity’ (The Chronicle 23 December 2013). Related to this, Marschall
(2006: 351) observes that ‘In divided societies, heritage does not only
further polarise the entities but can also lead to the resolution of conflict,
to the reconciliation of former enemies and to harmony and unity’ (351–
352). The question to ask is: looking at Nkomo’s statue, is there a sense
of national unity and reconciliation that one gets? Obviously, the answer
will depend on the beholder, their personal history and other important
factors mentioned earlier on. But for people of Matabeleland, for whom
personal and national identity is still overhung by Gukurahundi, the idea
of unity is subsumed in victimhood. As Graham and Howard (2008: 5)
remind us, there is also ‘heritage of victimhood or monuments that com-
memorate atrocity. At the moment, Nkomo’s statue inadvertently sug-
gests a heritage of victimhood as seen, for example, through the healing
march’ by the Matojeni Cultural Society cited above. That sense of vic-
timhood is regional and by the same logic, the figure which embodies
that victimhood, Nkomo, is claimed by people from Matabeleland who
feel they have both the moral and political claim to one of their own who
was politically persecuted by ZANU.
The statue fails to be an unambiguous symbol of unity and reconcili-
ation largely because of the government’s failure to recognise individual
victims and survivors of Gukurahundi, a victimisation that Nkomo rep-
resented in life, and after his death. This is not to say that this is the
only reason but to highlight that it is the main one. There have been no
genuine efforts at proper reconciliation. The massacres are still referred
to as ‘disturbances in Matabeleland and Midlands regions’ (The Chronicle
21 July 2010) and by Mugabe as ‘a moment of madness’ (NewsDay
online 18 May 2015). With genuine reconciliation, it is likely that the
statue could have a less ambiguous meaning. The ‘national’ aspect, of
having had atrocities committed by the state and then the leaders of
the two biggest political parties at the time choosing the path of unity
434 T. Ndlovu
would make sense, and Nkomo’s role as the key person in begetting this
‘national unity’ would also make sense to the victims of Gukurahundi
as well. That way, Nkomo could, as one commentator put it ‘belong’
to all Zimbabweans—not one family, not one region of the country by
its entirety (The Chronicle 17 September 2010). His full contribution
to peace in post-independent Zimbabwe would be fully appreciated if
the full extent of what the late Nkomo managed to comprehend and
act responsibly on, that is to say, if it is brought out very clearly that if
in his place there had been an egocentric and dim-witted leader, there
would have been a full-scale civil war. Such an acknowledgement would
also diminish the feeling amongst some people of Matabeleland that
Nkomo’s memory is being misappropriated by ZANU PF for no other
purpose than legitimation.
If part of the government’s aim in (re)erecting the statue was to
diffuse public tension and anger in Matabeleland, then that has partly
succeeded. Cummings (2013: 608) writes that political elites use monu-
ments ‘to legitimate their ideologies […] and behaviour’, and to symbol-
ically placate a certain portion of the nation for past wrongs. The people
of Matabeleland can feel that their ‘representative’ has been somewhat
acknowledged at last, a sentiment that imbues one with pride, albeit of a
tainted variety. At the same time, they have an outlet, a site for mourn-
ing and possible healing. The duplicity of ZANU PF comes out not only
in the change of names and discourses concerning Nkomo but also in
how the party accorded Nkomo exactly those attributes he had earlier
claimed for himself. These are the very attributes that the Zimbabwean
government’s Authorised Heritage Discourse (Smith 2006: 3) wants us
to remember. For example, in his autobiography, Nkomo (1984) por-
trays himself as ‘the originator of the liberation struggle and symbol
of unity’ (Ndlovu-Gatsheni and Willems 2010: 197), something that
ZANU fought very hard to suppress until 1987. Nkomo’s statue stands,
as we have already seen, and as justified by the writing on one of the
plaques and his nickname on the northern side (Father Zimbabwe),
because he was a senior nationalist and unifier. In other words, the politi-
cians in ZANU ‘had permanent political interests rather than permanent
opponents. Through use of political rhetoric, they built enemies and
through the same process, they rehabilitated those enemies as long as
it was convenient for their political stakes of the day’ (Ndlovu-Gatsheni
and Willems 2010: 2014). Such politicking has not gone unnoticed, ren-
dering Nkomo’s statue quite dissonant.
While it is clear that for ZANU, the erection of Nkomo’s statue is

yet another regime legitimation and political survival exercise, the statue
itself defies a singular reading, alerting us to the polymorphous mean-
ing of monuments and the salient point that statuary is neither neutral
nor disinterested. Thus, much as monuments are a tool in the ‘forma-
tion and transformation of national identity’ (Cummings 2013: 525),
this process is fraught with contestation. Indeed heritage is inherently
divisive and dissonant (Howard 2003), but one should qualify this state-
ment. The less thoughtful and inclusive the instigation, building and
mediation of a monument is, the more divisive and dissonant it becomes.
Nonetheless, the privileging of dissonance and the notion of divisiveness
in reading heritage, as opposed to suppressing these two, opens up pos-
sibilities of interpretation beyond Authorised Heritage Discourse (Smith
2006: 3). Through such an approach, this chapter has demonstrated that
public statuary is part of historical narrative and both are imbricated in
present meaning-making. The journeys of Nkomo’s two statues indicate
the vitality of historical memory against the nation state’s ‘amnesia’. The
restlessness, anger, debates, pressure, threats and all manner of reactions
in Bulawayo that accompanied the erection and re-erection of Nkomo’s
statue in Bulawayo exposed the role of long-term memory and identity,
versus ZANU’s mediated attempts to elide ethnic and regional divi-
sions—indeed, this party’s attempts to appropriate Nkomo’s memory for
both use and abuse. Attempts to erect the statue in Harare brought to
the fore, some of the suspicions of the Nkomo family and Bulawayo pub-
lic that the exercise of honouring Nkomo was in bad faith.
The Bulawayo statue generated some unintended meanings, some of
which served ZANU as the instigator and some subverted the very same
party and its goals in (re)erecting Nkomo’s statue. The demure looking
stature, it could be argued, is ZANU’s attempt at presenting a peace-
ful (read ‘non-threatening to ZANU) figure’. A statue’s pose has com-
municative significance. Cummings (2013: 613), for example, writes
about Lenin’s outstretched hand as a ‘haranguing pose [which] sug-
gests movement and revolutionary dynamics’. In comparison, Nkomo’s
statue is passive. It does not suggest any form of exertion or expression
of a strong feeling or conviction. With the faintest of smiles, it is difficult
to tell if there is anything about the statue’s pose that suggests leader-
ship or indeed, the idea of unity which the ruling ZANU PF identifies as
Nkomo’s key legacy (clasped hands held in front of the chest, for exam-
ple, might have illustrated this). Ms Nkomo-Ebrahim wished the statue
436 T. Ndlovu
showed some ‘action’, for example, a gesture that ‘he was addressing a
crowd or any of the things he used to do very well’ (Nkomo-Ebrahim
interview November 2015). She decried the fact that as represented
by the statue, ‘he [Nkomo] is just standing’ whereas in his life he ‘was
always an active man’ (ibid). So on the one hand, Nkomo became a tool
in the re-invention of the Zimbabwean nation by re-inserting him and,
by extension, people of Matabeleland into the country’s historiography.
Nkomo and people from Matabeleland had felt excluded from the mak-
ing of the nation but could, to some extent and through the statue, have
a sense of Zimbabweanness from the symbolic collective suggested by
the nation states’ acceptance and celebration of Nkomo. On the other
hand, Nkomo’s statue refused to be contained within the meanings privi-
leged by ZANU. To harp on Nkomo-Ebrahim’s sentiments, her late
father’s statue reveals that it is not just standing there.
Discourses about, and rituals performed at, the statue, particularly
their ethnic and regional bias, question ZANU’s metanarrative of her-
itage, dredging up victimhood under Gukurahundi and also reminding
us of disparaging and discrediting names that Nkomo was once called
by ZANU. Even though the statue could be said, within limit, to pla-
cate anger and hurt over Gukurahundi, it is very doubtful that it is fos-
tering unity and nation building at the moment. Looking at Nkomo’s
statue, does one think of it as a symbol of reconciliation given that rec-
onciliation is a two-way process that reaches out to the injured party at
grassroots? Very unlikely. Rather, the statue stands there as a symbol of
wounded Matabeleland; a reminder of unreconciled hurts. But this can
change. In fact, the statue can be one of the rallying sites for the facili-
tation of reconciliation and closure, as well as a more genuine sense of
nationhood and unity.
The erection of a statue in the memory of the late Vice-President
Dr Joshua Mqabuko Nyongolo Nkomo, if one allows for positivity, can
be seen as an attempt by the ZANU PF-led government to forge, per-
haps enhance, national identity. At least the re(erection) of Nkomo’s
statue in Bulawayo offered that opportunity. The as yet un-erected
statue in Harare offers another similar opportunity. For these oppor-
tunities to bear fruit, there should have been, and there could still be,
more reflection and efforts towards inclusivity. A genuine acknowledge-
ment and dialogue about past hurts in Matabeleland and a re-writ-
ing of official historiography are two such conduits towards achieving
a real sense of not just belonging to the nation but also revealing the
truly national character of Nkomo. Monuments give the illusion of

permanence and the sacred. Yet they too, like the diffuse narratives of
nationhood, change. Nkomo’s statues (assuming the one in Harare will
eventually be erected) will stay alive, waiting to be imbued with mean-
ings that make his memory truly national and therefore belonging to all
Zimbabweans—past, present and future. Only then will there be a sense
of moving on and moving forward.
Notes
1. Since colonial times, Matshamhlophe has been misspelt ‘Matsheumhophe’
following white colonialists’ pronunciation.
2. Ukuthethela refers to a traditional ritual of communicating with one’s
ancestors and involves pouring a libation to the ground. It is normally per-
formed in times of trouble, asking the ancestors to intercede.
3. Nkomo used to consult the Njelele shrine even as early as the days of NDP.
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Index
A Autobiography, 6, 10, 13, 18, 24–29,

Africanism, 6 35, 37, 94, 117, 122, 129,
African National Congress (ANC), 27, 140, 186, 187, 189, 190, 213,
74, 81, 85, 88, 93, 95–100, 124, 214, 216, 218, 227, 231, 240,
132, 137, 140, 141, 150, 158, 246–248, 300, 320, 325, 327,
160, 161, 163, 169, 184, 288, 328, 390, 392, 393, 413, 414,
301–305, 308–311, 313, 314, 417, 419, 429, 434
321, 391, 401
African nationalism, 308, 309, 330,
334, 336, 390 B
Angola, 4, 76, 82, 99, 101, 103, 119, Big Josh, 111, 390, 431
122–125, 131–133, 150, 158, Biko, Steve, 3, 115
166–168, 175–177, 180 Botswana, 16, 24, 81, 86, 103, 121,
Anti-Air, 162, 167 123, 151, 160, 187, 303, 308
Anti-colonialism, 4 Britain, 10, 52, 55, 57, 58, 63, 68,
Armed liberation struggle, 14, 29, 91, 82, 92, 102, 109, 110, 123, 127,
149, 151, 152, 154, 158, 161, 136, 137, 149, 151, 156, 159,
165, 413 174, 183, 185, 263, 271, 272,
Armed Struggle, 18, 24, 26, 28, 35, 319, 418, 420
60, 69, 73–75, 77, 78, 80, 84, Bulawayo, 16, 21, 22, 33, 34, 40, 50,
85, 88, 92, 95, 96, 98–100, 102, 51, 53–55, 64, 76, 86, 130, 137,
105, 106, 121, 122, 139, 168, 142, 154, 164, 166, 187, 200,
230, 248, 306, 311, 416, 418, 238, 267, 290, 291, 303, 304,
421 316, 317, 319, 374, 376, 378,
Arms Caches, 8, 22, 23, 187, 290 379, 381, 383–387, 394–399,
Assembly Point, 168, 169 401, 405–410, 414, 415, 420,
© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2017 447

African Histories and Modernities, DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-60555-5
448 Index
422–425, 427, 429, 430, 432, Decolonization, 2, 49, 70, 77, 81, 82,
435, 436 84, 88
Detente, 151
Dhlakama, Alphonso, 76
C Dissident, 22, 30, 34, 188, 189, 373,
Cabral, Amilcar, 3, 92, 120 374, 378
Cameron, Hazel, 2 Douglas, Frederick, 341
Castro, Fidel
Chibwechitedza, 8, 17, 57, 111, 193,
194, 210, 238, 409, 410 E
Chigwedere, Aeneas, 2 Econet Wireless Joshua Nkomo
Chikerema, James, 14, 53, 56, 95, Scholarship, 390
119, 158, 161, 305 Ethnicity, 6, 8, 14, 16, 65, 93, 302,
Chinamano, Josiah, 66, 111, 268, 307, 412, 417
290, 312 Exile, 6, 10, 15, 24, 25, 28–30,
Chirau, Jeremiah (Chief), 109, 161, 56–59, 66, 76, 79, 85–88, 124,
179, 181 141, 188, 202, 208, 292, 300,
Chitepo, Herbert, 3 307, 315, 317, 327, 328, 333,
CODESA 338, 386, 390, 391, 393, 420
Cold War, 37, 92, 122, 123, 134, 140,
150, 152, 155–160, 167–170,
175, 176, 180, 184 F
Cold War coloniality, 2, 11, 36 Fast-Track Land Reform, 32
Colonel Hashim Mbita, 97 Father of Dissidents, 4, 8, 24, 30, 118,
Colonialism, 1, 3, 4, 11, 20, 28, 35– 143, 208, 237, 239, 240, 317,
37, 39, 51, 59, 79, 80, 92, 103, 331, 336, 378, 386, 416, 420,
104, 107, 118, 120–122, 125, 431
127–130, 136, 144, 156, 174, Father Zimbabwe, 111, 230, 233,
194–202, 205–208, 210, 216, 300, 387, 393, 409
220, 221, 239, 245, 302, 318, Federation, 52, 53, 81, 260, 262,
321, 342, 343, 350, 359–361, 303–305, 391
364, 365, 370, 376, 377, 392, Fifth Brigade, 2, 4, 14, 23, 24, 30,
394, 415 139, 141, 142, 239, 240, 268,
Colour Bar, 64 292, 317, 318, 331, 332, 420,
Commemoration, 33, 39, 143 423
Cuba, 36, 63, 66, 81, 123, 153, 177 First Chimurenga, 17, 57
FRELIMO, 63, 74, 81, 85, 88, 95,
96, 100, 101, 103, 106, 124,
D 137, 150, 311
Dabengwa, Dumiso, 23, 76, 86, 87, Front for the Liberation of
96, 124, 130, 137, 144, 154, Zimbabwe (FROLIZI),
187, 318, 385 95, 97
Decoloniality, 11, 125, 221 Frontline States, 19, 68, 97
Index 449
G K
Geneva Conference, 68, 94, 102, 133, Karigamombe debacle, 381
159, 160, 165, 178 Kaunda, Kenneth, 28, 65, 67, 101,
Global imperial snares, 119 115, 133, 165, 174, 185
Gukurahundi, 23, 30, 139–142, Kissinger, Henry, 100, 127, 132, 151,
144, 189, 190, 268, 270, 280, 159, 161, 177
284, 291, 293, 317, 318, 329,
331–333, 378, 380–383, 386,
397, 417, 420, 423, 426, 429, L
432–434, 436 Lancaster House, 36, 67, 68, 75, 110,
131, 134–136, 144, 152, 154,
155, 162, 163, 166, 168, 170,
H 183, 185, 186, 263, 271, 419
Hagiography, 12, 50 Lancaster House Agreement, 63, 69,
Harare, 30, 33, 40, 76, 78, 79, 84, 91, 110, 131, 136, 186, 301,
85, 131, 142, 169, 187, 189, 311, 312, 418
267, 268, 275, 289, 312, 319, Lancaster House Conference, 3, 11,
330, 374, 376–378, 381–383, 18, 19, 36, 79, 87, 123, 131–
387, 389, 394, 396–399, 401, 136, 262, 312, 391
402, 405–408, 410, 422, 423, Land Reform, 32, 38, 253, 263,
425–427, 435–437 271–273, 276, 285, 376, 413
Hauntology, 39, 323, 324, 326, 327, Leadership, 6, 17–20, 22, 28, 34–36,
338 51–56, 58–60, 62, 64, 65, 68,
Humanism, 115, 215, 250 69, 93, 94, 96, 97, 100, 102,
104, 116, 118, 121, 124, 128,
129, 132, 135, 151, 173–176,
I 178, 180–183, 185, 187, 188,
Immortalization, 39, 40, 389, 390, 190, 207, 209, 213, 219, 231,
395, 399, 402 238, 246, 272, 279, 290, 294,
Imperialism, 33, 34, 80, 103, 120, 307, 314, 336, 384, 395, 413,
121, 125, 127, 135, 174, 225 415, 417, 418, 435
Imperialism of decolonization, 11, 36 Lord Soames, 136, 185
Integration, 165, 169, 187, 198, 240,
276
M
Machel, Samora, 65, 119, 161, 175,
J 337
Joint Military Command, 96, 151 Mama, Mafuyane, 7
Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo International Mandela, Nelson, 4, 16, 28, 220, 249,
Airport, 34, 384 286, 300, 303, 314, 320, 394
Joshua Nkomo Memorial Museum, Mangena, Nikita, 97, 151, 165, 167
395 Marxism-Leninism, 124
450 Index
Mashonaland, 7, 8, 16–18, 20, 33, 99, 111, 116, 122, 124, 126, 133–
111, 116, 228, 231, 305, 407, 144, 168, 173, 175, 176, 178,
410, 418 179, 181–183, 185–190, 193,
Masuku, Lookout, 15, 23, 76, 130, 208, 209, 219, 220, 227, 231,
132, 137, 187, 224, 268, 281, 239, 240, 267, 275, 276, 283,
286, 317 285, 286, 288–294, 311–313,
Matebeleland, 75, 86, 87, 291, 294, 315–318, 320, 324–326, 328,
390, 391, 393, 396–399, 402 331–334, 336–338, 373, 377,
Matopos, 9, 17, 25, 228, 257, 377, 378, 381, 383, 384, 390, 392,
399, 429 393, 397, 402, 408–411, 414,
Matopos Hills, 8, 9, 24, 247, 334, 415, 417–420, 426, 428, 429,
336 432, 433
Media, 39, 73, 77, 79, 87, 88, 188, Muzorewa, Abel (Bishop), 14, 19, 68,
189, 373, 379, 380, 383, 387, 79, 84, 85, 93, 95, 97, 99, 100,
412, 413, 432 102, 109, 110, 128, 137, 151,
Memoir, 16, 39, 117, 323–328, 333, 153, 161, 179, 181, 184–186,
334, 337, 338 290, 313
Memorialization, 38, 39, 280, 282,
284, 288, 294, 374, 376, 390,
413 N
Memory, 1, 39, 40, 70, 205, 206, 282, Narration of the nation, 5, 10, 11
284, 294, 373, 375, 376, 380, National Democratic Party (NDP), 17,
382–384, 389, 390, 393, 395, 56, 57, 60, 61, 67, 93, 94, 120,
396, 398, 399, 401, 406–408, 174, 238, 305, 306, 377, 391,
410, 411, 414, 420, 424, 426, 415, 431
432–437 National Diplomat, 188
Midlands Region, 2, 4, 6, 8, 14, 30, Nationalism, 1, 4, 6, 9–11, 13–17,
433 20, 34, 40, 53, 56, 65, 70, 279,
Moyo, Gorden, 3, 11, 35 335–337, 389, 402, 415, 416,
Moyo, Jason Ziyaphapha, 3, 53, 83, 431
95, 102, 121, 151, 157, 160 National Monement, 37, 56–58, 64,
Mozambique, 3, 7, 63, 65, 74, 76, 79, 65, 69, 93, 98–100, 116, 119,
82, 85, 97, 100, 103, 119, 122, 127, 132, 150, 157, 176, 222,
124, 132–134, 136, 150, 151, 223, 230, 233, 238, 261, 275,
158, 159, 163, 175, 178–180, 306, 307, 431
185, 254, 260, 263, 311, 312 National Unity, 18, 20, 25, 26, 30,
Msika, Joseph, 53, 64–66, 111, 268, 32, 77, 96, 110, 143, 239, 275,
305, 307 276, 291, 312, 316, 317, 378,
Msipa, Cephas, 7, 117 413, 419, 429, 433, 434
Mugabe, Robert Gabriel, 2–6, 8–10, Nation-building, 5, 14, 20, 21, 30,
13–16, 20–24, 26, 28–30, 31–33, 34, 35, 38, 249, 290, 331, 375,
36, 37, 39, 57, 68, 69, 75, 76, 413
78, 85–87, 95, 101–103, 110, Ndebele culture, 246–250
Index 451
Ndebele-speaking people, 6, 23, 317, Nyandoro, George, 53, 56, 95, 305
318, 337 Nyasaland, 52, 64, 260, 262, 303, 304
Ndiweni, Khayisa (Chief), 109, 161 Nyathi, Pathisa, 2, 3, 11, 35, 153,
Ndlovu-Gatsheni, Sabelo J., 3, 4, 382, 413, 425–427
15–17, 18, 22–24, 29, 30, 34, Nyerere, Julius, 26, 65, 84, 115, 157,
38, 94, 111, 116, 117, 121, 161, 336
122, 125–130, 135, 136, 138,
139, 142, 143, 221, 230, 234,
239, 248, 281, 285, 286, 290, O
291, 302, 308, 318, 324, 331, OAU Liberation Committee, 83, 88,
334–336, 347, 396, 410, 415, 95–97, 105, 162, 178
416, 420, 421, 431, 434 Operation Gukurahundi, 88, 188,
Negotiations, 19, 27–29, 36, 52, 189, 281, 282
57–59, 62–64, 67, 69, 79, 94, Operation Murambatsvina, 274
95, 98, 101, 102, 105, 174, 177, Organization of African Unity (OAU),
179–181, 183, 185, 198, 203, 19, 65, 81, 83, 84, 88, 94–100,
262, 263, 313, 419 102–105, 111, 157, 162, 176,
New historicism, 11, 12 178, 180, 181, 306
Ngwali/Mwari, 8, 25
Njelele, 9, 111, 429
Nkomo, J.M., Street, 40, 405 P
Nkomo, Joshua Mqabuko, 1–40, Pan-Africanism, 6, 55, 115, 117
49–70, 73–77, 79, 81–89, 91–95, Pan-Africanist Congress (PAC), 125,
97–111, 115–145, 151–154, 310
156, 157, 160, 161, 164, 165, Paradigm of peace, 37, 213–215, 231,
167–169, 174–191, 193–201, 233, 248–250
203–210, 213–234, 237–250, Paradigm of war, 35, 37, 216, 224,
253, 256–271, 275, 276, 279, 225, 248–250
280, 281, 283–294, 299–307, Patriotic Front (PF), 19, 20, 74–78,
311–321, 323–339, 341–371, 84–87, 99, 101–104, 108–111,
373, 374, 376–387, 389–402, 116, 137, 138, 141–144, 159,
405–437 178, 180, 182–186, 190, 220,
Nkomoscapes, 390 224, 271, 291, 294, 312,
Nkomo’s Statue, 379, 380, 382, 383, 373–375, 377–380, 382–386,
396–398, 402, 406–409, 411– 391–394, 397, 402, 407, 410,
416, 420, 422–430, 433–436 413, 414, 419–421, 425, 427,
Nkrumah, Kwame, 28, 55, 115, 157, 429, 432, 434–436
189, 199 Patriotic Front-Zimbabwe African
Non-Aligned Movement, 74, 80, 124 People’s Union (PF-ZAPU), 2–4,
Northern Rhodesia, 52, 260, 304 6–8, 12, 14, 19–23, 29–32, 239,
North Korea, 23, 150, 156, 165, 239, 240, 279, 290, 294, 312, 313,
379, 397, 420, 423, 428 315–317, 323, 324, 331–334,
337, 338, 382
452 Index
Patriotic History, 40, 75, 77, 190, Self-representation, 13, 238,

191, 294, 334, 338 246
Peace-making Self-writing, 12, 117, 342, 346–353,
Pearce Commission, 95 355, 356, 358, 359, 361, 365,
People’s Movement for the Liberation 370, 371
of Angola (MPLA), 74, 81, 88, Shona-speaking people, 6, 307
96, 99, 100, 124, 125, 137, 175, Shuttle Diplomacy, 101, 151, 158,
176 177
Philosophy of liberation, 11, 37, 195, Silundika, George T., 80, 82, 119,
200, 203, 204, 206, 208–210, 156, 418
213, 220 Sithole, Ndabaningi (Reverend), 58,
Political consciousness, 39, 116, 300, 68, 94, 119, 129, 161, 179, 230,
301, 303 307, 311, 417
Political formation, 6, 7, 14, 116, 117, Slippery stone, 17, 238,
119–122, 124, 126, 145, 195, 409, 410
227, 240 Sociogenic approach, 38
Southern Rhodesia, 35, 51–54, 56,
59, 63, 64, 66, 94, 157, 214,
R 255, 260–262, 301, 304–306,
Ranger, Terence, 13, 16, 19, 64, 75, 330
77, 116, 123, 375 Southern Rhodesia African National
Realpolitik, 2 Congress (SRANC), 6, 17,
Regular Army, 153, 164, 166, 167 50–57, 67, 93, 120, 156, 238,
Revisionism, 11, 15, 117 415, 431
Rhodesia, 2, 7, 22, 25, 28, 29, 35, Southern Rhodesia Bantu Congress,
36, 56–58, 60, 64, 65, 67, 68, 54
79, 80, 82, 83, 85, 87, 92, 93, Soviet Union, 2, 36, 37, 58, 66,
95, 98, 100, 101, 103, 106, 107, 76, 86, 89, 92, 122–124, 126,
109, 120, 123, 125, 128, 131, 129–131, 133, 134, 141, 150,
132, 134, 135, 137, 149–153, 152–157, 159–162, 164–168,
159–161, 163–166, 174–177, 170, 176, 177, 184
179, 180, 184, 185, 195, 200, Statue, 34, 40, 142, 373,
203, 205, 210, 214, 219, 223, 374, 376–386, 389, 395–398,
225, 238, 248, 256–260, 262, 405–410, 413, 415, 420,
263, 283, 289, 290, 303, 325, 422–436
331, 366, 392, 416 Struggle-within-the struggle, 13, 40,
Rhodesia Railways, 247, 301, 304 41, 117
Subjection, 29, 195, 341–351,
353–365, 367–371
S Subjectivity, 224, 347, 348, 350, 353,
Savimbi, Jonas, 76 355, 360, 370
Second Chimurenga, 333 Supra-nationalist, 5, 28, 336
Index 453
T Z
Thatcher, Margaret, 127, 130, 131, Zambia, 10, 21, 22, 64–67, 76, 79,
133, 164, 184, 185 81, 93, 97, 101, 103, 105, 121,
Todd, Sir Garfield, 15, 64 124, 133, 134, 152, 154, 160,
Tongogara, Josiah, 26, 136, 168, 178, 162–164, 167, 168, 174, 176,
181, 182, 263, 312 178–180, 183, 185, 254, 260,
Trade unionism, 413 263
Transitional Justice, 281, 285, 286 Zero Hour, 76, 130, 152, 153, 155,
Triple helix of identity, 6 167
Truth and Reconciliation Commission, Zimbabwe, 1–10, 12, 13, 15–19, 21,
281 24–26, 28–33, 35–41, 49, 50,
Tshombe, 21, 92, 93 56, 58, 65–70, 73–89, 91–105,
Turning Point Strategy, 130, 152– 107–111, 115–123, 125, 126,
155, 160, 166–168 128–144, 150, 152, 153, 155,
157, 158, 160, 161, 163,
164, 166, 168, 169, 174–179,
U 182, 184–190, 193, 194, 197,
Umdala Wethu, 8, 9, 33, 74, 193, 203, 208, 210, 219, 223–225,
194, 210, 393, 410, 413, 421 230, 231, 233, 234, 237–240,
Umdala Wethu Gala, 143, 421 245, 253, 255–260, 262–264,
Umkhonto we Sizwe, 158, 160, 169, 266–268, 271–276, 279–286,
311 288–294, 299–307, 311–321,
Unilateral Declaration of 323–329, 331, 332, 334–338,
Independence (UDI), 80, 366, 373–380, 382–387,
82, 120, 141, 149, 174, 389–392, 394–402, 405–411,
177, 325 413–416, 419–425, 430–434
United States of America (USA), 63, Zimbabwe African National Liberation
68, 81, 83, 92, 94, 100, 101, Army (ZANLA), 7, 8, 14, 16, 18,
122, 123, 125–130, 134, 137, 20–22, 26, 58, 75, 77, 78, 86,
140, 144, 145, 151, 156, 159, 91, 97, 101, 110, 116, 122, 124,
161, 164, 170, 175, 177, 179, 129, 136, 150, 158, 159, 168,
180, 184, 263, 282, 305 174–176, 178–185, 187, 231,
Unity Accord, 2–4, 29–31, 77, 86, 240, 263, 286–288, 311, 316,
92, 97, 141, 142, 144, 151, 169, 317, 418, 419
240, 271, 279, 280, 290, 293, Zimbabwe African National Union
333, 338, 384, 392, 395, 402, (ZANU), 6–9, 13, 15, 18–21, 23,
416, 420, 425, 433 26, 28, 58, 65, 68, 69, 75–79,
81, 85–87, 91, 93–99, 101, 102,
104, 109, 110, 116, 122, 124,
V 125, 129, 130, 133, 134, 136–
Vambe, Maurice, 12, 13, 392, 414 138, 141–144, 150, 151, 158,
Viscount Aircraft, 164 161, 169, 173–176, 178–181,
454 Index
183, 184, 186–190, 220, 224, 266–268, 270, 275, 276, 286,
230, 239, 263, 268, 270, 271, 290, 302, 306, 307, 311, 312,
275, 276, 290, 291, 293, 294, 317–320, 332–334, 336, 377,
307, 311, 312, 316, 317, 325, 378, 380, 382–384, 386, 389,
327, 336, 373–375, 377–380, 391, 392, 395, 397, 401, 414,
382–386, 391–395, 397, 402, 415, 417–420, 429, 431, 432
407, 410, 413–415, 417–422, Zimbabwe National Army, 21, 165,
427, 429, 432–436 169
Zimbabwe African National Union- Zimbabwe People’s Army (ZIPA), 15,
Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF), 78, 97, 103, 104, 151, 158, 176,
1–8, 10, 12–15, 19–34, 37–40, 178
169, 188–191, 239, 240, 271, Zimbabwe People’s Revolutionary
274–276, 280, 291, 312, 313, Army (ZIPRA), 2, 4, 6–8, 11, 12,
315, 316, 324–328, 331–334, 14–16, 20–24, 28, 36, 37, 57,
336–338, 386, 420, 421 58, 66, 67, 74–78, 82, 85–88,
Zimbabwe African People’s Union 96, 116–118, 121, 123, 124,
(ZAPU), 2, 4, 6–9, 11, 14, 16– 129–131, 133, 138, 140, 141,
20, 23, 26, 29, 31, 33–36, 49, 162, 165–168, 174, 176, 179,
57, 58, 60, 62–69, 74–83, 85–88, 180, 182–185, 187, 188, 204,
91, 93–102, 104, 108–111, 208, 231, 239, 240, 253, 263,
116–118, 120–125, 127–134, 266–268, 276, 281, 286–288,
136–138, 140, 141, 144, 150– 311, 315–320, 324, 331–334,
152, 154–166, 168, 169, 174, 337, 338, 391, 402, 414,
176, 180, 183, 186–191, 204, 418–420, 429, 432
208, 238, 239, 253, 262, 263, Zvogbo, Eddison, 70

Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo of Zimbabwe Politics, Power, and Memory

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AFRICAN HISTORIES AND MODERNITIES

JOSHUA MQABUKO NKOMO

More information about this series at

African Histories and Modernities

Library of Congress Control Number: 2017944542

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2017

Cover illustration: © Keystone Pictures USA/Alamy Stock Photo

Printed on acid-free paper

This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by Springer Nature

“This book is not a biography of Nkomo”, Ndlovu-Gatsheni pre-emp-

Essays in this book are trenchant in their criticism of what Ndlovu-

University of the Witwatersrand Prof. Robert Muponde

1 Introduction: Writing Joshua Nkomo into History

Part I Imperialism, Nationalism, Liberation and Leadership

2 The Contributions of Joshua Nkomo to the Liberation

3 Joshua Nkomo and the Internationalization

4 Joshua Nkomo and the Quest for Unity and Peace

5 The Entrapment of Joshua Nkomo Within Global

6 Lancaster House Talks: Timing, Cold War

Part II Legacy, Diplomacy, Political Philosophy and

7 Joshua Nkomo: Nationalist Diplomat, ‘Father

8 Joshua Nkomo: The Trial of a Philosopher

9 Unearthing the Legacy of ‘Father Zimbabwe’:

10 Making Sense of Joshua Nkomo’s Political Behaviour:

11 Joshua Nkomo on Land: Exploring His Vision for Land

12 Joshua Nkomo on Transitional Justice in Zimbabwe 279

Part III Nation-Building, Persecution, Autobiography

13 Joshua Nkomo and Nelson Mandela: Ideas of Nation and

15 Self-Writing and Subjection: Frederick Douglas

16 Father Zimbabwe: Media, Memory and Joshua

17 The Immortalisation of Joshua Mqabuko Nyongolo

18 Whose Nkomo Is It Anyway? Joshua Nkomo’s Statue

Further Reading 441

About the Editor

Henry Chiwaura is a Lecturer in Archaeology, Museums and Heritage

Blessed Ngwenya is a Lecturer in the Department of Communication

of South Africa. He holds a doctorate in social anthropology from the

ANC African National Congress

ZANU Zimbabwe African National Union

Fig. 17.1 Showing some of Nkomo’s representations

Introduction: Writing Joshua Nkomo

This introduction draws partly from my earlier work on Nkomo (Ndlovu-

© The Author(s) 2017 1

to power at the end of colonialism are rarely remembered fondly. They

Those politicians that lost independence elections however hard they

In Msipa (2015: 95)’s reading of Nkomo’s body language, phoning

military forces were dominant during the liberation struggle—the party

When Mugabe described Nkomo as a snake inside his house, he was

be protected from danger. Between 1983 and 1986, Nkomo endured

From my earliest youth I thirsted for freedom. When I became a man, I

This is not a history—one day, if I am spared, I may contribute to the writ-

What this book reveals are the shifting invocations of nationalism

decolonization’ with the aim of producing a neo-colony presided over by

valorised what they termed ‘peasant consciousness’ and installed the

began to explore how the rise of hegemonic Marxist-Leninist-Maoist

and participated in ZIPA (Zimbabwe People’s Army who actively led

The Political Making of Nkomo

such as Chaminuka, Mzilikazi, Lobengula, Mambo and Monomotapa

Chief Sigombe Mathema of Enqameni in Wenlock also ‘presented asse-

Conference as a united Patriotic Front (PF), their long-standing antago-

Nkomo as ‘Father of Dissidents’

its refusal to disband and be swallowed by ZANU-PF, Nkomo, his party,

It was partly these inflammatory speeches that caused panic among

12 Joshua Nkomo on Transitional Justice in Zimbabwe 279

Part III Nation-Building, Persecution, Autobiography

18 Whose Nkomo Is It Anyway? Joshua Nkomo’s Statue

Fig. 17.1 Showing some of Nkomo’s representations

The Political Making of Nkomo

Nkomo as ‘Father of Dissidents’

Nkomo and the Unification of the Nation (1987–1999)

Nkomo as ‘Father Zimbabwe’

Organisation of the Book

The Contributions of Joshua Nkomo

Early Trade Unionism and Leading the Southern

Return from Exile and Leading the National

Nkomo’s Political Career with the Zimbabwe African

Joshua Nkomo and the Internationalization

Nkomo’s Role in the Shadows

Airbrushing and Patriotic History

Internationalization of the Struggle for Zimbabwe

Joshua Nkomo and the Quest for 