WE present to you in real-time parts of President Robert Mugabe’s speech at the Heroes’ Acre where two late heroines, Vivian Mwashita and Victoria Chitepo are being buried.
Mugabe has started his address, apparently sounding slurred, as delves into the contribution of Mwashita and Chitepo during the liberation struggle.
As the 92-year-old president continues his speech on history, he says his late wife Sally accommodated by Chitepo.
“Mai Chitepo nemamwe madzimai kuno kumusha vakazvi organiser wo. Mudzimai wangu wokutanga achibva kuGhana wakagara kumba kwa Mai Chitepo tisati tachata saka Mai Chitepo vaiva Amai vangu. Dzakara washaya vaive vakabatana.”
“The brutal actions of the enemy, no country suffered more loss of life than ours as were were bombed in our liberation was camps in Zambia and Tete”
“They would bomb indiscriminately and they would not discern which are refugee camps and which are not.”
He describes Chitepo as courageous and nationalistic “(She was) influenced by her father an ANC cadre and husband Herbert first Zanu chairman…she made a lifelong commitment to the liberation struggle”
“Two people influenced her political career, her father was a member of the ANC in South Africa and her husband who was the first black lawyer in Zimbabwe…Mai Chitepo chose a bed of thorns..one of a lifelong commitment to the liberation struggle….They opened themselves to harm when they opened up their Highfield home to nationalists till they gave that house to Cde Joshua Nkomo.”
