The government has bowed to pressure from the late Vice-President Simon Muzenda’s widow, Maud, and turned the veteran nationalist’s two grass-thatched 124-year-old rondavels in Masvingo’s Mucheke suburb into a museum, amid reports President Robert Mugabe will officially open the site during the Zanu PF conference this week.
By Tatenda Chitagu
Speaking on the sidelines of the Simon Muzenda Memorial Golf Tournament held at Masvingo Sports Club in September this year, Maud challenged the government to at least erect Muzenda’s statue in Masvingo, as part of steps to preserve his legacy.
“I appreciate all that is being done to keep my late husband’s legacy alive. It is a good job that everyone is remembering my husband. My wish, however, is to have a statue of my husband erected in Masvingo, just like in Bulawayo, where the late Vice-President Joshua Nkomo’s statue was erected,” she said.
Maud said Muzenda started his political activism in Masvingo and, hence, it would be befitting for his statue to be erected in the country’s oldest city.
True to her wishes, Muzenda’s 124-year-old grass-thatched huts were eventually declared a national heritage site and cultural centre by the Friends of Joshua Nkomo Trust.
Yesterday, officials from the Friends of Joshua Nkomo Trust were renovating the huts and erecting stone walls around them.
Co-ordinator of the Joshua Nkomo Trust, Linda Shumba yesterday said the museum would document Muzenda’s liberation history, just like the Nelson Mandela Museum in South Africa.
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“The museum will have his pictures and others with liberation war luminaries. It will document his liberation history for future generations to come,” she said.
Muzenda, also known as the Soul of The Nation, died 13 years ago at the age of 80. He was declared a national hero and buried at the National Heroes’ Acre.
