Special Advisor to President Emmerson Mnangagwa, Christopher Mutsvangwa has said that the country needs a break from references to the past such as Gukurahundi, referring to the massacres which occured in Matabeleland and Midlands in the early 1980’s. Government forces were accused of killing an estimated 20 000 people in their hunt for dissidents. President Emmerson Mnangagwa has been implicated in the massacres as he was the Minister for State Security while newly appointed Minister of Lands Agriculture and Rural Resettlement, Air Marshal Perrance Shiri was the Commander of the Fifth Brigade, during the tumultuous period. Former president Robert Mugabe once describe the Gukurahundi as ” a moment of madness.”
Speaking to the international news agency, Al Jazeera, Mutsvangwa said that every country has a chequered past and that people needed to stop focusing on the past as it distracted from the future. He said that references to the past were “simply unhelpful” and “irresponsible.” Said Mutsvangwa:
Zimbabwe needs a break.
To continuously re-dig its past, to settle scores from the past, as if it cannot grasp the future … It diverts energy away from what should be done.
Every country followed a tortured history … You make mistakes. You make false starts.
Speaking at his inauguration, President Emmerson Mnangagwa without specifically referring to Gukurahundi said that Zimbabweans needed to move on and to let bygones be bygones. Said Mnangagwa:
As we do so, we should never remain hostages to our past. I thus humbly appeal to all of us that we let bygones be bygones, readily embracing each other in defining a new destiny. The task at hand is that of rebuilding our great country. It principally lies with none but ourselves.
More: Al Jazeera
Zimbabwe needs a break from Mnangagwa, ZANU PF and all of the murderous thugs in the party.
Obviously if your son had been killed in Gukurahundi you would not be saying what you are saying. You have been on the right side of Zanu hence your speech.
You missed the point Toma completely!
I don’t think that if you ask for forgiveness is a sign of being week. I come that people can not speak of what happen in 1980 but we are alleyways talking about colonialism era?
spot on bro
If you are who did the killing you will talk like Mutshwanga and Mugabe you don’t know how we feel about this issue of Gugurawundi
To hell with zanu. Double standards is their pass phrase. If bygones were to be taken as bygones why then did they fight for what they refer to as independence? They should simply have accepted that the country was under colonial rule and were to let the neo- colonialists rule forever. Mhosva hairovi you murderer. You zanus are Gukurahundists and you must face the music one day. After the second world war they held Nuremburg trials for the sake of closure but here comes this zanuist who thinks otherwise. To hell with your line of thought Mtsvangwa.
I hate the Mtsvangwa line of thinking that to rule Zimbabwe you are supposed to be a war vet, Zimbabwe is for everyone. That is a bad thinking that cause serious problems to our peace loving people. Zimbabwe is not a personal property.
Chinokangamwa idemo muti hawukanganwi. I think you can understand much better if i put on your language phrase. We will never forget except if Zanu PF will bring back our love ones whom they massacred, butchered, killing them for nothing
Hakuna zvakadaro,these evil murderous Zanuiods should be mailed to face justice 4 Gukurahundi 1982-1987.Or else Ngwena and Shiri etal should hurled to the ICC in the Hague.The Gukurahundi victims should be compensated just like the dislodged White Farmers