HomeOld_PostsLet’s know more about our heroes

Let’s know more about our heroes

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IT is turning out to be a sad winter.
In recent weeks, we have trooped to various final resting places to inter gallant sons of the soil.
We have buried them at the sacred shrine the National Heroes Acre, at Provincial Heroes Acres and in the villages dotted around the country.
Comrades Nathan Shamuyarira, Stanley Sakupwanya, Norman Hwiza and Rtd Major General Elia Bandama recently departed to join the finest and brave of the country.
Heroes and heroines, it has been said, do not die.
But what worries me, what alarms me, what scares me and what depresses me is that our heroes and heroines may die.
I am sad for future generations.
I know about Cdes Shamuyarira, Hwiza, Sakupwanya and Bandama because I was fortunate enough to serve in the same struggle they distinguished themselves in.
Some of us were participants in the bush, in the villages, in the camps, so we know.
But what about those that were not there, what about those being born today, will they know.
Do we want them to know?
Where will they get inspiration from?
Will children born and bred today, both in the country and the Diaspora know the heroes of their land?
Do we value the stories carried by the men and women who fought and contributed in the country’s liberation struggle?
The likes of George Washington, Winston Churchill, Napoleon Bonaparte and Otto von Bismarck have not died.
They remain very much alive because their stories are not just constantly repeated by word of mouth.
Volumes of literature about them have been produced even films about them have been made.
Books chronicling not just their exploits, but even their childhood, just their childhood, have been produced.
These figures that will not die, left behind detailed diaries.
In the diaries they narrated their struggles, challenges they faced, their victories, their losses, their sources of inspiration and strength.
No information has been mundane; their lives have been recorded down to favourite pastimes.
Eulogies move us, but they do not delight.
Eulogies do not leave us awestruck, but wondering how and why such information was never made public.
But truthfully there is no reason to wonder.
The bottom line is that no effort or enough effort has and is being made to record the stories of our heroes.
It is sad, very sad to hear tales of heroics during burials.
We want to know of the exploits of our heroes and heroines while they live.
The story is much better coming from the horse’s mouth.
I challenge those that participated in the liberation struggle the mujibhas, the chimbwidos, the guerrillas, the commanders, the trainers, the refugees, the exiles, everyone who existed during this crucial phase of our history to record their experiences.
We have a unique opportunity in that a majority of the participants are still with us and thus this important story will not be distorted.
But there will come a day when we will all not be around, all of us who participated in the struggle.
Then what will our children do, rely on hearsay and distorted information.
People that know nothing about the struggle, people that have personal agendas, which are not good for the country, will provide information about the struggle.
Already Rhodies are producing volumes of literature on the liberation struggle, rubbishing victories made by cadres that are still alive.
Nothing is as sad as the story of the struggle being told by people who do not even know which end of the gun fires.

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