Gukurahundi massacre haunting late Mujuru beyond the grave, CIA report reveals. By N Garikai

“Rinemanyanga hariputirwi!” (Evil, no matter how well you conceal it, will always come out to haunt you!) goes the Shona saying. The Gukurahundi massacres are haunting the late Solomon Mujuru even in his grave.

“On February 11 1983, army Commander Nhongo (Mujuru’s nume-de-guerre) tells senior commanders of plans under consideration by government to purge army of 7 000 to 10 000 former Zapu guerrillas,” reads a declassified United States Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) report.

There is no doubt that President Mugabe carried out the Gukurahundi massacre to clear the deck for imposition of the de facto one-party dictatorship that rules the nation to this day. Whilst President Mugabe has himself since admitted to “moment of madness!” How can it be a “moment” when the massacre latest a good five years and left over 20 000 mainly innocent civilians dead. Some of the victims were murdered in the most horrific ways like being burnt to death or pregnant women having the wombs slit open!

Worse still, President Mugabe admitted to the moment of madness but has never done anything to address the serious consequences of the madness – compensate the victims of the atrocities and, even more significantly, dismantle the dictatorship.

All the senior Zanu PF leaders who sat beside President Mugabe throughout the Gukurahundi have all strenuously denied knowing anything about the massacres although they have all benefited greatly from the dictatorship. Even those, like VP Emmerson Mnangagwa who, at the time boosted in the local media of their role in the massacre, now claim they were misquoted.

“Solomon was a people’s person. He was their soldier, their commander, their hero. He worked hard to bring together Zipra and Zanla during the liberation struggle,” was Joice Mujuru’s reply when she was asked in her late husband had play a role in the Gukurahundi massacre. He was the Army commander throughout that period.

Joice Mujuru was a cabinet member and she never said anything to stop the massacre, she claims she did not know what was going on. How is it possible that over 20 000 can be murdered in a country and one does not hear of it; someone whose husband is commanding the soldiers doing the killing and is a minister in her own right! Of course, Joice Mujuru was lying, she knew about the massacre and her husband played a role, as the CIA report now confirms!

“Such unfortunate allegations by a so-called CIA report that are being released now, ought to have been made public when he was alive. The publication of that report only leaves us with questions given that the General cannot respond and more-so that he died in very mysterious circumstances,” commented Joice Mujuru’s spin doctor, Nyandoro.

Gukurahundi is a serious issue that has not been dealt with honestly and openly; it was a big mistake that the wound has been allowed to fester all these years and it would be folly to sweep the whole business under the carpet under the pretext that some of those involved are dead and therefore cannot answer for themselves. The late General had ample opportunity to stop the madness or, at least, explain why he failed to do so. Instead, he chose to spend most of his time looting and spending his loot instead.

As for the General dying “in very mysterious circumstances”; that is totally irrelevant as it neither proves he did not do what the CIA report alleges nor make him untouchable. In many ways, the many mysterious deaths surround Zanu PF leaders is itself an indictment of the regime’s total disregard of the sanctity of human life which is at the heart of the Gukurahundi massacre. Therefore that the murderous regime should turn on some of its own people is no surprise.

Joice Mujuru should come clean on what role she and her late husband as played in the corrupt and murderous Zanu PF dictatorship in her 34 years at the heart of the regime. Her claim that she saw nothing because “a puppy does not open its eyes the day it is born” is cutting no ice. No puppy takes 34 years to open its eyes. The truth about Zanu PF’s decades of misrule is now coming out, first it is a trickle but soon it will turn into a flood. In the end the whole truth will always come out regardless how well President Mugabe and his Zanu PF thugs have tried to keep it under wraps!

So Mai Mujuru, we ask you again; what do you know about Zanu PF’s corruption, vote rigging, murders, etc. Speak now whilst you have a chance; we know you have been very economically with the truth!