8 minutes ago
By Shingai Nyoka, BBC News, Tsholotsho
BBC
Thabani Dhlamini was 10 years old when he witnessed a massacre in his village
An incredible number of mass graves surround Thabani Dhlamini’s home in south-western Zimbabwe.
One identified by the BBC lies near the ablution block at a primary school in the village of Salankomo in Tsholotsho district. Teachers were killed and dumped there in the 1980s.
In another, just steps away from Mr Dhlamini’s house, 22 relatives and neighbors are buried in two graves – all killed by Zimbabwe’s military under the command of then-leader Robert Mugabe.
Mr Dhlamini was only 10 at the time – but the slightly built, soft-spoken farmer is still haunted by the memories.
“We were not able [to talk about it] and we were in fear to speak about it,” the 51-year-old told the BBC.
They were all victims of ethnic killings between 1983 and 1987, when Mugabe unleashed the North Korean-trained Five Brigade in strongholds of Joshua Nkomo, his arch-rival.
Some describe what followed as a genocide. It is not known how many people died – some estimates put it at more than 20,000 people.
Nkomo was a veteran freedom fighter from the south-western province of Matabeleland who, more than two decades after his death, is still fondly known as “Father Zimbabwe”.
The two men had a difficult relationship during the long liberation struggle against white-minority rule – Nkomo came from Zimbabwe’s Ndebele minority and Mugabe from the nation’s Shona majority.
They fell out two years after independence in 1980, when Mugabe fired Nkomo from the coalition government, accusing his party of plotting a coup.
Getty Images
Liberation leaders Joshua Nkomo (L) and Robert Mugabe (R) photographed weeks before Zimbabwe’s independence in 1980
Operation Gukurahundi was launched, which at the time the government said was a counter-insurgency mission to root out dissidents who had been attacking civilians.
“Gukurahundi” means “cleansing rain” in the Shona language.
Those targeted by the elite soldiers were mainly from the Ndebele ethnic group in Matabeleland and Midlands provinces, and the killings laid the foundation for lingering ethnic tensions.
Mugabe ruled for another three decades – only after he was deposed by his former deputy Emmerson Mnangagwa did it seem that Gukurahundi might be properly confronted, even though he has also been accused of involvement.
Mr Mnangagwa made a point of addressing the subject of reconciliation, given the criticism over how various initiatives to allow exhumations and reburials had foundered.
Even so it has taken seven years for President Mnangagwa to establish what he has called the Gukurahundi Community Engagement Programme. A series of village-level hearings, where survivors can air their grievances, is set to follow Sunday’s launch.
Mr Dhlamini said he would take part in the hearings.
“I want to free myself from what I witnessed, I need to vent out what I felt,” he said, tapping his chest.
He, along with a group of boys from his village in 1983, saw how soldiers frog-marched 22 women, including his mother, into a hut which they then set on fire.
When the women broke down the door to flee the flames, the soldiers mowed them down with their guns before they could escape.
Mr Dhlamini’s mother was the only survivor as she managed to hide along the side of a nearby grain hut.
The soldiers then ordered the older boys in the terrified group watching nearby to carry the bullet-ridden bodies of the women into the smoking hut and another alongside it.
Mr Dhlamini’s 14-year-old friend Lotshe Moyo was one of them – but because he was wearing a pin supporting Nkomo, afterwards he too was ordered inside, shot and both huts burnt to ashes.
Today their remains are still in the ruins – an overgrown area surrounded by a chain-link fence and lots of crosses. On a whitewashed brick wall, the names of the dead are inscribed.
“When we started talking about it my memory returns and it seems as if it had happened today. It makes me feel as if I can cry,” said Mr Dhlamini, who added that his mother had been so traumatized she had never been able to live in the village.
Victims and survivors’ families are divided over whether the new government initiative will bring healing and change their fortunes.
To this day, Julia Mlilo, 77, trembles when she sees a soldier
In the neighboring village of Silonkwe, 77-year-old Julia Mlilo shuffles slowly to meet us. She can barely walk now, but remembers every detail of what happened on 24 February 1983.
At the sound of gunfire she had dropped her hoe in the field where she was working and escaped into the bush with her husband and children.
When they emerged her father and more than 20 of her husband’s relatives had been badly assaulted and burnt, many beyond recognition.
“Only the heads were identifiable,” she said.
They gathered up the remains into a tin basin that had been used for bathing and buried them in a nearby pit.
The place where they were slaughtered and the area of their burial, adjacent to a field of crops, are now marked by reflective white and red crosses.
“I haven’t forgiven them, I don’t know what would make me forgive. Whenever I see soldiers I feel the pain and I start trembling,” Ms Mlilo told the BBC.
“I don’t trust the process because it’s being done by the government, but I will take part in it,” she said.
While Gukurahundi has ended, many believe they are still being punished.
Tsholotsho, como muchas partes de Matabeleland, sigue siendo un área desolada y abandonada, con poca o ninguna infraestructura y muy poco desarrollo en los últimos 40 años. Y desde la década de 1980, los hallazgos de varias comisiones de investigación sobre las atrocidades nunca se han hecho públicos. Durante la era de Mugabe, un programa para dar documentos de identidad a niños cuyos padres habían fallecido o desaparecido comenzó y continúa. Pero audiencias públicas anteriores y programas de exhumación se han estancado. En Bulawayo, la ciudad principal de Matabeleland, Mbuso Fuzwayo del grupo de presión local Ibhetshu LikaZulu habló con la BBC mientras recogía una placa de metal para conmemorar a los asesinados en Silonkwe. Varios placas encargadas por el grupo han sido robadas o destruidas – un signo, él cree, de que Zimbabwe todavía no está listo para enfrentar su pasado. El país tiene una larga historia de abusos a los derechos humanos e impunidad que se remonta al gobierno de minoría blanca cuando se llamaba Rodesia. “Tenemos muchas violaciones de las personas. Lo que sucedió durante la lucha de liberación es que no hubo nadie que fuera llevado ante la justicia”, dijo el Sr. Fuzwayo. “Después del genocidio, nadie fue llevado ante la justicia”, dijo, refiriéndose a Gukurahundi. “Lo que estamos diciendo es que una vez que la justicia tenga lugar, las personas comenzarán a respetar los derechos de otras personas”. Las sospechas y desconfianzas sobre el último proceso son un gran obstáculo para que el Presidente Mnangagwa supere, ya que se presenta como un intermediario honesto, con un genuino deseo de reunir a Zimbabwe y corregir el pasado. Él fue ministro de seguridad del estado durante las masacres, lo que explica la cautela sentida hacia él en el suroeste. Algunas de esa fuerte oposición proviene de líderes tradicionales que llevarán a cabo las audiencias. Cruces con cinta reflectante marcan el área de varias masacres en Matabeleland. El Jefe Khulumani Mathema de Gwanda Norte siente que el proceso está fundamentalmente defectuoso. “Necesita ser un problema nacional que se centre en las mejores prácticas internacionales, que es cómo se abordan los genocidios en todo el mundo”, le dijo a la BBC. Todo el mundo en la región fue tocado por las atrocidades y tiene una historia que contar. Cuando era un niño, el jefe fue golpeado por soldados. “Tenemos países que pasaron por genocidios. Tenemos Ruanda, tenemos Alemania, pero queremos crear y reinventar la rueda, lo cual creo que no es factible”, dijo. “No hay un solo genocidio que haya sido completamente resuelto cuando los perpetradores siguen a cargo de los resortes del poder”. El Jefe Mathema está decidido a recordar a las víctimas pero no cree que la última iniciativa revele la verdad. El Sr. Fuzwayo, cuyo abuelo fue presuntamente secuestrado y nunca volvió a saber de él durante las masacres, está de acuerdo. “No deben intentar decir que esto fue un asunto de Mugabe. Fue un asunto colectivo. El principal perpetrador podría estar muerto, ese es Mugabe – pero Emerson Mnangagwa permanece en ausencia de Mugabe”, dijo el hombre de 48 años. A pesar de la continua acusación, el Sr. Mnangagwa siempre ha negado las acusaciones de que desempeñó un papel activo en Gukurahundi y los gobiernos sucesivos han rechazado las acusaciones de que la operación equivalía a un genocidio. El Jefe Mathema dijo que las prioridades de las comunidades serían exhumar e identificar los cuerpos de las fosas comunes y permitir a las familias espacio para llorar a sus familiares apropiadamente. Pero cree que hay otra pieza del rompecabezas que el gobierno tendrá que completar – contar la verdad sobre lo que sucedió y el paradero de los desaparecidos. Esta nueva investigación pondrá a prueba la sinceridad del Presidente Mnangagwa – ¿las audiencias llegarán a escuchar a los perpetradores? ¿Se abrirán y proporcionarán respuestas a los supervivientes? ¿Los hallazgos de investigaciones anteriores ahora se harán públicos? “Hasta el día de hoy no sabemos por qué fueron asesinadas las personas – el motivo”, dijo el Sr. Fuzwayo. “Y no quieren hablar de ello y sigo creyendo que tienen mucho que esconder”. Please rewrite the following text”