WHILE the recent revelation by the British that it was one of their own that assassinated ZANU Chairman Hebert Chitepo and ZAPU’s Deputy Chief, Jason Ziyaphapha Moyo puts to rest speculation on the identity of the killers of two of Zimbabwe’s liberation icons, it immediately raises calls for compensation for innocent civilians who were massacred at Nyadzonia, Victory Camp and Chimoio.
Chairman Chitepo as he was affectionately known, was assassinated on March 18, 1975 by a former member of the British Special Air Service, (SAS) Alan ‘Taffy’ Brice who had been hired by the Rhodesian Central Intelligence Organisation (CIO), according to information recently published by The Sunday Mail.
The revelations were made by a functionary in Ian Smith’s colonial regime, Peter Stiff, an ex-British South Africa Police superintended.
The assassination of Chairman Chitepo was just, but one of the many dastardly acts perpetrated by the Rhodesians, but the identity of the masterminds of several attacks on innocent Zimbabweans remains a closely guarded secret of our time.
Now with the identity of Chitepo’s assassin in the open, there could not be a better opportunity to unravel the colonial legacy by pushing for the identities of those who orchestrated the Nyadzonia and Chimoio massacres among other genocides, Chibondo included.
On August 9 1976, the Special Counter-Insurgency Unit of the Rhodesian Forces, the Selous Scouts carried out a heinous attack on the Nyadzonia Camp in Mozambique, killing over 2 000 innocent unarmed men, women and children.
Yet another attack would be launched by the Rhodies a year later, the Chimoio massacre.
Operation Dingo, also known as the Chimoio massacre was a major raid conducted by the Rhodesian Security Forces against the Zimbabwe African National Liberation Army (ZANLA) headquarters at Chimoio and a smaller camp at Tembwe in Mozambique from 23–25 November 1977.
More than 3 000 ZANLA fighters were reported as killed and 5 000 wounded while only two government troops died and six were wounded.
Who were the people behind these attacks?
Why have they not been identified?
Why have the British who now want to preach so-called democracy and human rights to us not spoken against these horrendous acts?
Why are Zimbabweans silent about compensation when other people who suffered similar fates across the world are getting reparations? There are several examples of countries who have taken their former colonisers to task over the hideous acts of colonialists and are being compensated for their suffering.
With the Chairman Chitepo and Nyadzonia massacres in hand, there is good cause for victims of the Rhodesian brutality to take the legal route and demand for compensations.
Are we not as a country still smarting from the gory sight of that young man with a catapult in his neck whose remains were recently found at Chibondo?
Are we still not coming across mass graves throughout the country?
Malawi has just picked up from where the Mau Mau left when they got compensation from the British.
Five decades after British soldiers killed 51 unarmed freedom fighters in northern Malawi, survivors and relatives of the slain men are pushing the Malawi government to seek £100-million in compensation.
On March 3 1959 the British declared a state of emergency in what was then Nyasaland which ended in 1960 and implemented Operation Sunrise, arresting Malawi nationalists and others.
Anger over the arrests resulted in death for 51 demonstrators, detention for more than 1 300 and the wounding of many others.
Evidence from eyewitnesses and survivors indicate that the soldiers who killed the 51 men were acting under the orders of the Federal District Governor, John Brooke.
In honour of the slain freedom fighters, the Malawi government declared March 3 Martyrs’ Day, celebrated as a public holiday to honour those who lost their lives in the struggle against British colonialism.
But the victims and relatives of those killed on the fateful day want more.
They want compensation.
There is general feeling that the Malawi case has substance because of the precedent set in 2013 when, after a High Court case, the United Kingdom Government paid out £19.9-million in costs and compensation to 5 228 Kenyans who had been tortured by British colonial forces during the Mau Mau uprising between 1952 and 1960.
During the Mau Mau uprising against white settlers, the Kenya Human Rights Commission says 90 000 Kenyans were executed, tortured or maimed, and 160 000 people were detained in appalling conditions, although some historians have argued that the figure is much lower.
After the court case, UK foreign secretary, William Hague told The Guardian newspaper that his government regretted the abuses that marred Kenya’s progress to independence.
“Torture is an abhorrent violation of human dignity, which we condemn. We understand the grief felt by those involved … The British government recognises Kenyans were subject to torture and other forms of ill-treatment at the hands of the colonial administration,” Hague said.
It remains to be seen if our Government will come forward to push for compensation from the British over the Chitepo killing and Nyadzonia and Chimoio massacres.
After all, the Gurkhis of Nepal are doing the same to British more than a century after being forced to fight on the British side.