‘JZ Moyo was killed a few days after addressing us’

WE continue our interview with Cde Kenneth Sibanda pseudonym Cde Lee Madiro or Mountain, a former freedom fighter who operated in Mashonaland Central Province during the armed struggle. 

Cde Sibanda, who served as a Lieutenant in the Zimbabwe National Army(ZNA) after Independence was trained at Mwembeshi in Zambia and the then Soviet Union before he was deployed to Guruve then Sipolilo in Mashonaland Central Province. During deployment, Cde Sibanda was appointed deputy to Cde Clive Mataure, who commanded the detachment that attacked Mushumbi Garrison in 1978. According to ZPRA that mission changed the course of the war in the area as civilians who along thought the Rhodesians were invincible changed their minds and threw their weight behind the freedom fighters. 

It was the battle that convinced the villagers that it was possible to defeat the Rhodesians on the battlefield. In the first instalment of the interview in last week’s edition, Cde Sibanda told our Assistant Editor Mkhululi Sibanda (MS) about how he crossed the border into Botswana en route to Zambia for military training after being inspired by the attainment of Independence by Mozambique and Angola in 1975. Last week’s interview ended with Cde Sibanda discussing his arrival at Nampundwe Transit Camp in Zambia. Below are excerpts from the interview. Read on . . .  

MS: In our conversation last week you were talking about moving into Nampundwe. Let’s resume the conversation from there.

Cde Sibanda: When we arrived at Nampundwe we found about 1 000 other recruits. The situation then was different from what the groups that came after us experienced when the numbers grew to about 10 000 or so at any given time. However, the supplies of food were very erratic and the initiation of the recruits that you had written about was the same as instructors would fool recruits by saying they should dress in their best clothes to receive Dr Joshua Nkomo. That was a ruse of initiating the recruits by those tough instructors into the challenging military drills. We also went through that routine in mid-1976.

MS: From Nampundwe where were you taken to?

Cde Sibanda: I was moved in a group of 1 000 plus to Mwembeshi Training Camp. Before us, the camp had been used by the famous Group of 800 which had the first female combatants to undergo military training. However, the Group of 800 before they could finish their training was moved to Mgagao, a ZANLA camp in Tanzania as it was the time of trying to combine ZPRA and ZANLA under the banner of the Zimbabwe People’s Army (ZIPA). Therefore, our group revived Mwembeshi as a training camp. 

MS: Who were some of the cadres that you were trained with?

Cde Sibanda: I was in the same group with now  Major-General (Rtd) Stanford Khumalo (Madliwa) who later on rose in our ranks to command the First Battalion that engaged the Rhodesian Army near Kariba for five days. I also trained with Cde Siboza (Mark Ndlovu) and Colonel Tsheza among other cadres. The camp commander was the late Colonel Eddie Sigoge with Stanely Gagisa as Chief of Staff. We had among the instructors, Jack Mpofu and Professor Malandu, an  accomplished academic who left academia to join the armed struggle. Prof Malandu was in charge of political orientation.

MS: What did your training involve?

Cde Sibanda: It was guerilla warfare and we covered combat tactics, military engineering use of weapons such as AK-47 rifles, machine guns and bazookas, map reading and explosives such as grenades. We also did obstacle crossings and like I said it was strictly guerrilla warfare training. After completing the training, Cde Jason Ziyaphapha Moyo presided over the pass-out parade as the reviewing officer. He told us that since we had finished training and were now proper soldiers we were going to be deployed to the front to face the enemy. We were shocked a few days later to learn that he had been killed by a parcel bomb. That was in January 1977. 

MS: After training at Mwembeshi what happened?

Cde Sibanda: Some cadres were deployed to the front while others were selected to go for further training abroad. I was one of those who were selected to go to the Soviet Union for further training. Our group was about 150. When we got to the Soviet Union the group was split into two with Madliwa leading the one that went to Odesa while some of us who went to Simferopol were led by Dumezweni Andrew Ndlovu.

MS: Why did they split you into two groups?

Cde Sibanda: It was because we were in the Soviet Union to pursue different courses. In my group we had cadres who were getting advanced training in company commanders’ course, platoon commanders’ course, anti-air, communications, engineering, use of Gun75 and reconnaissance. As for the group under Madliwa theirs was for senior commanders. They were being trained as battalion commanders, chief of staff and commissars. Our training programme was for nine months and after that the two groups were re-united before being flown back to Zambia.

MS: When you returned to Zambia where were you deployed to?

Cde Sibanda: We were sent to CGT2 where we found a group of guerillas coming from Somalia. There were about 50 of them and had gone there to do an officer cadet training. There was also the first group of Angola-trained guerillas, those ones were many as the Cubans and the Soviets had trained slightly above 2  000 men. There was a large number of trained personnel there.

MS: Who was the commander of the camp?

Cde Sibanda: It was Cde Tekenya. However, some cadres such as Madliwa were immediately deployed to Mlungushi where battalions were being formed to become battalion commanders. Some like us were then deployed to the front. I was deployed in a detachment that was commanded by Cde Clive Mataure and I was given the rank of Chief of Staff, which effectively made me the deputy commander. The detachment had three platoons under the command of now Lt-Col (Rtd) Nimrod Ndlovu (Fomoja), Cdes Twoboy (Mukahanana) and now Colonel Bhebhe who is still serving in the ZNA. 

MS: How was the detachment constituted?

Cde Sibanda: We had attachments in the form of sections from the engineers, reconnaissance unit, mortar crew and so on. From CGT we were driven along the Great East Road and when we got to Chipata we turned off and headed to the Zambezi River where we had our crossing point. 

To be continued next week with Cde Sibanda talking about moving to their operational area and their first encounter with the Rhodesian forces.