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How to teach our children to be heirs of Zimbabwe – Part Four …the revolutionary personality

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By Dr Ireen Mahamba

THE first step for anybody who decided to join the liberation struggle was self denial, putting Zimbabwe first, before everything else, even unto death.
What would be clear in one’s mind and heart was that Zimbabwe had to be free; nothing else mattered more than that.
The heinous crime of the British taking our country, ruling our country was totally unacceptable, and therefore had to be brought to an end by all means.
One took this decision in the full knowledge that death was a more likely possibility than survival, but it never mattered hence we sang:
“Baba naMai
Sarai zvakanaka
Tiende kuhondo
Yokusungura Zimbabwe
Ropa rangu muchazoriona
Pasi pomureza”
Kwaiva kuenda kuhondo kundofira Zimbabwe.
When the children left for the struggle, the parents were not promised that they would return, but that they would find their children’s blood beneath the Zimbabwe flag.
It was a solemn decision, an oath to oneself first and foremost that you were leaving to go and die for Zimbabwe.
It was an irrevocable decision to fight until Zimbabwe was free.
Fighters were prepared to carry on in the bush even if it meant liberation would be attained by their grandchildren or great-grandchildren.
“Mwoyo wangu
Watsidza kufira Zimbabwe
Mumakomo nomunzizi ndichararama
Dakara pfumo rangu
Ramutsa Zimbabwe”
Chindunduma symbolising the origins of the liberation struggle, was enshrined in the children and youths whom we educated to carry on the struggle after us.
We were fully prepared for the long haul.
So the personality here is very simple, it began with self denial, putting Zimbabwe first.
Some left families, others school, university, others lucrative jobs, prestigious careers, and it was all for Zimbabwe.
This was the mood and spirit of the struggle, this was the personality that imbued the fighters, that drove the liberation struggle to its successful conclusion.
If we must drive Zimbabwe to the successful completion of her revolution, this is the kind of personality we must nurture in the young Zimbabweans of today, a personality so far removed from the personality of individualism and selfishness, which is the fulcrum of capitalism, the personality which asks: “What is in it for me?”
So Americans ask a dozen times each day.
What was in it for the combatants was the liberation of Zimbabwe, nothing else.
This is the attitude of heart and spirit that liberated Zimbabwe, and without this attitude of heart and spirit, Zimbabwe will go nowhere; we will never be heirs and masters of our socio-cultural, political, and economic heritage.
Inoramba iri nhaka iri muzita redu asi ichigobwa nokuchapfanywa navatorwa.
The liberation struggle provides a perfect template for teaching this virtuousness to our children. We have before us the lives of countless heroes, great sons and daughters of Zimbabwe who gave up everything for the sake of Zimbabwe.
We cannot exhaust this wealth of what it means to live and die for others. It is not enough for our children and youths to hear about these precious lives on the radio, or TV, or during election campaigns.
We actually have to teach these histories systematically, not only in history classes where this is severely restricted by the syllabus, but across the curriculum.
Each heroic character is studded with gold nuggets, we must pick these with our students so that at the end of the day they are transformed into conscious and committed fighters for the revolution.
Heroes of our struggle are not only those buried at the Heroes Acre, there are heroes in each village, district, town and city, throughout the country.
Some are dead, some are still alive, it is our duty to unearth them and teach our young to emulate them and live lives fuelled by these ideals.
Just as the liberation fighters burned with desire to free Zimbabwe, let our children and youths burn with desire to free Zimbabwe from the problems it faces today.
Let the hearts of the young burn with desire to be doctors to assist the poor in their village, let them burn with desire to be engineers so they can help harness our natural resources for the upliftment of our people, let them burn with desire to be agricultural scientists so that we will never want for food in Zimbabwe, let them burn with desire to be lawyers to stand for the truth and insure justice for rich or poor alike, let them burn with desire to be nurses, teachers, whatever they choose to be, let it be to serve this great nation and build for us an even greater Zimbabwe.
Dr Mahamba is a war veteran and holds a PhD from Havard University. She is currently doingconsultancy work.

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