Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai yesterday said there was a crisis in Zimbabwe over the Zanu PF monopoly to select national heroes and pledged to rectify the anomaly once he was solely in charge.
Report by Moses Matenga/Pride Gonde Tsvangirai was addressing mourners at the home of Vesta Saungweme Sithole, widow of the late Zanu president Ndabaningi Sithole, who was buried in Harare yesterday.
“I think we have a crisis in this country. There is a crisis of confusion on who is a national hero or heroine and that has to be sorted out. We might not do it in this coalition, but we will do it in future,” Tsvangirai said.
“I had no familiarity with Vesta at a personal level, but I only met her once when I came to see Sithole at his house. Vesta was totally exceptional in the sense that she was married by Sithole. There must be something unique about women who are married by politicians.”
Zanu PF secretary for administration Didymus Mutasa on Sunday said his party had turned down the request by the family for her to be granted heroine status. “We received the letter of request, but we said we cannot grant her hero status,” Mutasa said without elaborating.
Deputy Prime Minister Arthur Mutambara echoed Tsvangirai’s sentiments. “People like Sithole and Vesta are not MDC-T or Zanu PF, they don’t belong to a political party and no one owns them. As Zimbabweans, we should have a shared history and legacy. She was for everyone and it’s because of her that we have Zanu PF, MDC and Zanu Ndonga,” Mutambara said.
“Women who have been married by politicians such as Herbert Chitepo, Josiah Tongogara and Ndabaningi Sithole are easily forgotten, but I feel these women should be honoured and respected too.”
Sithole (71) died on September 20 in the United States of America after a long battle with cancer and her body was repatriated to Zimbabwe on Saturday. She is an ex-fighter, having joined the liberation struggle in 1960.
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She left her nursing career at Mpilo Central Hospital midway to join the liberation struggle in Zambia before moving to Tanzania where she married her first husband Jackson Mwakyelele a Tanzanian, before settling with the founding Zanu PF president following the death of her husband.
Lands minister Herbert Murerwa was the only Zanu PF minister present at the funeral, attended largely by MDC-T officials.
