SIMON Muzenda, who had his last breath on September 20, 2003 at Parirenyatwa Hospital, was declared a national hero and buried at the National Heroes Acre in Harare. On Friday, the nation commemorated 16 years since his passing on.
Despite the fact that he was declared a national hero, it appears that Simon Vengesai Muzenda late former President Robert Mugabe’s trusted deputy, a rough-hewn, one-time carpenter, will be remembered not so much for his stalwart support of the war to end white-minority Rhodesian rule but for his complicity in the corruption and repression of years by Mugabe and his party, Zanu-PF.
Like his Boss who died in Singapore recently, Muzenda had been in failing health, with problems including hypertension and diabetes, for two years, so his death came as no surprise.
He had retired from almost all public life, and been in China for medical treatment. When he returned home, he was admitted to the coronary care unit of Parirenyatwa hospital, Harare’s main government facility, where he lapsed into a semi-conscious state, according to medical sources.
Just two weeks before his death, the state-owned media hotly dismissed reports that he was in declining health, and announced that he was making “remarkable progress” towards a full recovery exactly as is the case with current Vice President Constantino Chiwenga who incidentally is also in China for treatment.
By trying to deny the obvious, the government press further confirmed its tarnished reputation for not telling the truth, and dragged Muzenda’s demise into unseemly politicking.
Muzenda was born in the Gutu district of southern Zimbabwe, one of the country’s poorest and most arid areas. He attended a church mission school, and later obtained a diploma in carpentry in neighbouring South Africa.
He became a local leader of the African nationalist movement against the white Rhodesian government, for which he spent most of the period from 1962 to 1972 in jail or under orders curtailing his movements. He went into exile in neighbouring Zambia, and later to Mozambique, where he worked with Mugabe to reorganise the Zanu party and its guerrilla campaign against the Ian Smith regime.
Muzenda was known for his unflagging loyalty to Mugabe. One of the least-educated members of the ruling inner circle, he was rewarded for his allegiance with high office that brought him status and wealth. When Zimbabwe became independent in 1980, Mugabe, as prime minister, appointed Muzenda as his deputy, and he served briefly as foreign minister. When Mugabe became executive president in 1987, he named Muzenda as his first vice-president.
With a gruff, plain-spoken manner, Muzenda was generally respected in Zimbabwe’s early years as a no-nonsense man of the people. But, in later years, he appeared more rough and crude. In 1990, his campaign for a parliamentary seat was marred when the opposition candidate Patrick Kombayi was shot and left permanently disabled. Two state agents were convicted of attempted murder, but were then pardoned by Mugabe shortly after the judgment. Although Muzenda was not implicated in the shooting, it affected his standing with the public.
In later years, he was often a figure of ridicule for his halting English, fondness for bulky woollen sweaters and sometimes clumsy politicking. In the parliamentary elections of 2000, he told a rally that Zanu-PF was so popular that “if we put up a baboon as a candidate people would vote for it”.
A year before his death he was at the centre of controversy when the Commercial Farmers Union accused him of leading a group that forcibly – and illegally – ejected a white farmer in his southern home province of Masvingo.
The rise and fall of Muzenda’s reputation mirrors that of Mugabe and the Zanu-PF party.
· Simon Vengayi Muzenda was born October 28 1922; died September 20 2003 and was buried at the National Heroes Acre a week later.