Africa-Press – Zimbabwe. ZAPU secretary-general Mthulisi Hanana says President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s administration is unforgiving and vindictive and has perpetuated the legacy left by his predecessor the late Robert Mugabe of holding grudges against opponents.
This comes after liberation icon and former Bulawayo Provincial Affairs Minister Eunice Sandi Moyo was denied national heroine status.
Sandi Moyo died at Mater Dei Hospital in Bulawayo on Thursday last week after a long battle with hypertension, aged 78.
She was accorded a State-assisted funeral and was buried at Lady Stanley Cemetery in Bulawayo on Wednesday this week.
Speaking at Sandi Moyo’s memorial service at the Bulawayo Amphitheatre before her burial, Hanana said Mnangagwa’s government is unforgiving, vindictive and anti-ZAPU just like the Mugabe regime. He said,
Unfortunately, our mother is being denied her rightful status simply because she held different views of the powers that be.
This proves beyond doubt that the so-called second republic is as unforgiving, vindictive and anti-ZAPU as the first republic. ZAPU veterans seem to be overlooked even where they dwarf those who overlook them.
I admired her determination to advance the cause of former ZAPU and ZIPRA, her desire for the development of our country and her patriotism.
She was clear that when they were young they fought for the country and my generation too must do the same.
In 2019, I spoke at the funeral of Dumiso Dabengwa [late ZAPU leader], after which she [Sandi Moyo] asked me to speak at her funeral.
The contribution of Sandi Moyo must never be allowed to be wished away by anyone for whatever reason. She worked for this country.
She walked in the footsteps of women revolutionaries like Amai Ruth Nyamurowa who was denied heroine status in the 1980s.
She followed the footsteps of Umama uThenjiwe Lesabe, who also, albeit being a nationalist, was denied heroine status.
Hanana queried why the likes of Border Gezi and musician Soul Jah Love were accorded heroes’ status by the ZANU PF-led government. He said:
Maybe it makes sense to you elders, but I represent the younger generation of ZAPU that refuses to see sense in such things.
We cannot continue to have our icons being disrespected like this. We cannot continue to thank the government for State assisted funerals as if that money is from ZANU PF while it is the country’s money and we must all benefit.
He also questioned why some ZAPU members were quiet when their former colleagues were not being accorded the honour they deserved. Said Hanana:
We ask ourselves those who were ZAPU why are they quiet while things go wrong? We are tired of hearing that Mnangagwa has said this or that.
Tell your father Mnangagwa that he is too bitter now. Why is our mother being denied the heroine status that she deserves?
Why are 5th Brigade commanders declared National Heroes and our mother who never fought her people, is not?
In 2016, Sandi Moyo fell out with ZANU PF after being accused of belonging to the faction led by the then-former Vice President Joice Mujuru. This faction was allegedly plotting to oust former President Robert Mugabe from power.
Her troubles continued when the ZANU PF Women’s League demanded her removal in 2017, alleging she had undermined of the authority of the then-First Lady Grace Mugabe.
Eventually, Sandi Moyo was dismissed from the party, and in January 2018, she lost her parliamentary seat due to her alleged links to the G40 faction.
In 2018, she became one of the founding members of the National Patriotic Front (NPF), a group formed by Mugabe loyalists after his ousting in a military coup in November.
ZAPU and ZANU were nationalist movements fighting for independence that were formed in 1961 and 1963, respectively.
The parties merged to form the Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front (ZANU PF) in 1987 to end the Gukurahundi massacres.
However, some former ZAPU members, who were led by Dabengwa, withdrew from ZANU PF in the 2000s to restore ZAPU as a separate political entity.
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