TODAY, April 18 2024, Zimbabweans from Plumtree to Mutare and from the Limpopo to the Zambezi rivers are celebrating our 44th Independence Anniversary.
This is a special birthday occasion to reflect, not only on our epic liberation struggle, but also on our achievements since April 1980.
Murambinda Growth Point in Buhera District, Manicaland Province, is the main venue for this year’s national celebrations.
This is in line with the Second Republic’s spirit of devolution and decentralisation, which dictates that all national events of this magnitude are held on rotational basis to ensure that each province gets its fair bite of the cherry.
Last year, the focal point of the celebrations was Mount Darwin, Mashonaland Central Province.
However, it is important to remember that today’s activities at Murambinda B High School are just but a microcosm of what is happening throughout the country.
Various gatherings are enjoying themselves at their own equivalents of Murambinda B High School.
Indeed, this should be so, for like the thrust of the Second Republic, of leaving no-one and no place behind, the liberation struggle left no place untouched.
Each district has its own special memories of the heroic struggle for our independence.
That is why, after the unveiling of war shrines such as Pupu and Kamungoma, our call for the establishment of more such monuments has gained greater impetus.
These will always remain constant silent reminders of our resilience and determination to liberate ourselves as a united people.
Wherever we are celebrating our Uhuru, it will be meaningless without taking stock of what we went through, no matter how bitter.
The thousands murdered outside our borders, at places like Chimoio, Tembwe and Nyadzonia, by the racist colonial regime also make up part of this unforgettable history.
While we reflect on our historic and courageous struggle this day also provides us with an excellent opportunity to digest the results of what we shed our precious blood for: That our main reason for going to war was to dismantle racism and all it entailed is not debatable.
The war cry, ‘One person one vote’, summarised the burning desire by the indigenes to see the destruction of one of the key pillars of racism.
The ushering in of universal adult suffrage at our national polls stands as a perennial epitaph in the colonisers’ graveyard.
However, it is heartbreaking to learn that negative forces to the social, political and economic development of the indigenes are always on the prowl. Opposition parties, acting as proxies of our former colonisers, have for decades been
routinely deployed in a vain attempt to discredit our democratic general elections
Land was also at the forefront of the struggle for our liberation.
Regrettably, right now Zimbabweans are reeling under the yoke of illegal sanctions imposed by the West in retaliation for reforms that saw land being equitably redistributed.
But despite the prophecies of doom, we have made incredible strides in our agriculture.
Crops like tobacco and wheat, once the preserve of whites, have seen the indegenes excelling, defying predictions of doom by the whites.
Pfumvudza/Intwasa, a climate-proofing system of farming, has seen our smallholder farmers surviving comfortably on modest pieces of land countrywide.
Infrastructure, like dams, boreholes and irrigation canals, have gone a long way in mitigating the deleterious effects of climate change, notably the periodic El Nino phenomenon.
No doubt, in the absence of the illegal sanctions, our agricultural production would have reached unprecedented heights.
In 1980, we inherited an economy that catered mainly for a paltry 200 000 whites at the expense of more than 7 million blacks.
The white settlers used their economic muscle to suppress the indigenes by placing so many bottlenecks in the education system.
The revolution in the education system, after independence, has seen our country among the most literate in Africa.
Just imagine, at independence in 1980, we had only one university. Today, there are more than 24 public and private universities, not to mention colleges and technical institutions, thanks to what the late Eddison Zvobgo, during his time, described as the ‘most educated Cabinet in Africa’.
The Second Republic under President Emmerson Mnangagwa has gone a step further by implementing a revolutionary heritage-based system code-named Education 5.0
During the pre-independence era, blacks had limited access to healthcare, with those in the rural areas travelling long distances to seek healthcare in the urban areas.
That has since changed. Today, there are over 200 public and private hospitals and nearly 2 000 clinics countrywide.
Thanks to devolution, the number of health institutions is constantly expanding.
The education revolution has seen the graduation of more black doctors and nurses, some of whom are now being lured to offer their services in the Diaspora, the United Kingdom being one of the major destinations.
Unfortunately, healthcare is one of the sectors hit by the ruinous Western illegal sanctions.
Let us not forget, too, that our hard-won independence has been compromised by the persistent attacks on our currency. But, just as we won the liberation war against heavy odds, this is one battle we will win hands down.
The backing of our new currency, the Zimbabwe Gold (ZiG), with our strategic minerals is likely to see us using our own currency for all transactions by 2030.
ZiG is likely to anchor our economic stability and rid the country of the frequent bouts of currency volatility engineered in Washington, DC, and other Western capitals.
The list of our achievements since independence is endless, but it could have been even more remarkable were it not for some gremlins which are working tirelessly to sabotage the country in order to bring about illegal regime change.
The Western-inspired shenanigans notwithstanding, let’s enjoy ourselves with music and dance as we reflect on our achievements as 44-year-olds.
To the comrades at Murambinda, we are with you all the way as you watch our local football giants — Dynamos and Highlanders — battle it out for the Independence Cup.
What with the gala and the galaxy of stars who will be entertaining the nation from dusk till dawn tomorrow!
Happy birthday Zimbabwe!
