Zimbabwean Human Rights Activist Dies

PRESS RELEASE:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE


Contact:
Stanford G. Mukasa. NAP Communications
Phone: (724) 357 3097 Office
(724) 467 0001 (CELL)
email: mukasa@iup.edu
Date : January 20, 2008

The North American Province of the Movement for Democratic Change today joins millions of oppressed Zimbabweans in mourning the death of firebrand human rights activist, Miss Gertrude Mtombeni, who died at the weekend. Affectionately known as Gettie by her friends and colleagues, Miss Mthombeni was a visionary and a dedicated activist for human rights in Zimbabwe.

Miss Mtombeni, MDC secretary for the environment and a member of the party’s national council, joins the long list of MDC activists who have died in the struggle for the liberation of Zimbabwe from the oppressive dictatorship of Robert Mugabe regime. She was harassed, jailed and severely assaulted by Mugabe’s police from whom she sustained serious injuries in her body. Yet she never gave up the struggle. She once declared that, if by joining the struggle it meant a certain death for her “so be it.”

In addition to her struggle against the oppressive regime of Mugabe, Miss Mthombeni was also engaged in another struggle to maintain unity after the leadership split in the MDC in 2005.

When a splinter group in the leadership broke away from the MDC and established its head office in Bulawayo, there were widespread reports that the people of Matabeleland would join the splinter group. Miss Mthombeni was one of the MDC leaders who played a critical and strategic role in keeping the national unity of the MDC intact.

She addressed many rallies and stressed that the people of Matabeleland were not, and did not define themselves as, a tribal or ethnic group but part of the national character of Zimbabwe. She did not mince her words when she poured scorn and contempt on the so-called analysts and propagandists who spread malicious and misleading information that the splinter movement of the MDC would be attracted to the people of Matabeleland on the basis of their ethnicity.

When Miss Mthombeni visited the United States last year she made an effort, despite her deteriorating health, to visit and meet with the Zimbabweans in Diaspora. Her lasting advice to all Zimbabweans was “Love one another.”

We cannot agree more with what Miss Mthombeni’s compatriot in the struggle, Sekayi Holland, said, namely:

[Miss] Mthombeni worked under extremely difficult conditions in her Bulawayo province. [Miss] Mthombeni stuck to MDC principles whatever obstacle was cast in her way, in all her political and union work to the end. We will all Miss Gertrude Mthombeni.

The North American Province of the MDC sends our deepest condolences to Miss Mthombeni’s family, relatives as well as to the MDC. We have lost a colleague, a fellow citizen, and a friend.

But we make this promise that we will finish the struggle that she and her compatriots started. There can be no doubt that Miss Mthombeni’s deteriorating health was a direct result of all the torture and detention she suffered under the Mugabe regime.

To this extent, we hold Robert Mugabe and ZANUPF directly responsible for Miss Mthombeni’s death. If Mugabe thinks that by killing Miss Mthombeni and other freedom fighters he has suppressed the struggle for freedom and democracy he is dead wrong. The spirit and determination by Zimbabweans to free themselves from Mugabe’s oppressive rule live on and will continue until victory is won, no matter how long it will take.

When Mugabe regime and ZANUPF are defeated, dead and buried in the dustbin of history Miss Mthombeni’s name will forever be remembered and memorialized among Zimbabwe’s authentic and true heroes who shed their blood for the second liberation of their country from the evil dictatorship of Mugabe.

Chinga Maitiro. Guqula Izenzo. Change Behavior.