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Stephen Mpofu Correspondent
INSPIRED by their unflinching intrepidity informed by a fierce and unmitigated love of the motherland, they abandoned what frills of life existed then to engage a racist ruling culture in the bush, from which many of them did not emerge alive.

The above can only be the long and short account of commitment of a generation of young men and women, who were even prepared to pay the ultimate price to obliterate the shackles of oppression by racists to pave the way for liberation, independence and self-determination by the black people of this country.

But, 37 years of freedom down the line, what debt of gratitude does the Zimbabwean nation as a whole proudly tout in response to the needs of relatives of our heroes and heroines, who wallow below the poverty datum line, for instance?

The response to the above question is no doubt to be found in remarks by President Mugabe this week when commemorating Heroes’ Day.

“As a nation, we still need to do a lot more for and about our national heroes and war of liberation,” the President told thousands of people gathered to commemorate Heroes’ Day.

He said: “We should feel challenged to research comprehensively, record and preserve more about our heroes, but first and foremost, we have heroes’ families. We need assistance, I want to appeal to you to get the message out that the President is seeking assistance. Orphans of departed war veterans and surviving ones are suffering. Some are poor, they have somewhere to farm, but lack equipment and inputs,” he said.

In the circumstances — who knows — had the gallant sons and daughters of the soil who participated in the armed revolution had foreknowledge of a miserable life for their offspring and other relatives in a free Zimbabwe, they might have abandoned the revolution, convinced that their involvement in it was a thankless task.

But no, that generation of freedom fighters was made of sterner stuff, so that nothing detracted them from the paramount task before them, which was recovering the country from a foreign and racist ruling culture that had turned black people into slaves in their own native land.

The ignorance that pervades some Zimbabweans regarding the sacrifices that some of our people made to bring about the freedom we enjoy today is no doubt aggravated by a lack of authentic history of the armed revolution that brought freedom, peace and stability to our country.

But why, then, has it taken our revolutionary Government nearly four decades to assemble and or financially support historians and other scholars to write books chronicling the history of the armed struggle as a treasure trove for unwavering patriotism that should also unite all Zimbabweans against any machinations by imperialists seeking to reverse the clock of freedom and self-determination in order to promote and perpetuate hegemonic rule?

Is it not a tragic irony that a people known for its highest literacy rate on the African continent has lamentably failed to write a history of its own liberation struggle in which many young men and young women lost opportunities to develop themselves educationally and skills wise for the benefit of their children and other dependant family members, opting instead to bring freedom to the motherland?

Or did some of the literate freedom fighters succumb to a fierce desire to grow pot-bellies and thick waists for themselves so that the history of the armed struggle as an important and inspirational legacy for future generations paled off into insignificance?

There can surely be no excuse for the armed revolution’s becoming a myth, as it indeed does among born frees instead of becoming an everlasting reminder of the dangers that befall a nation that does not possess a grip of its own destination.

It is, however, not too late to change the course of events in order for Zimbabwe to remain truly our motherland and so the President’s impassioned plea on Monday should be regarded as an urgent call to those that have the means to support the needy relatives of the heroes and heroines with equipment and inputs, for instance, for use on land to provide food security and employment to those that are now in dire straits as revealed by the President.

And come to think of it — what role has God’s second covenant people after Israel, the symbolic vine, or the Church done to bring relief to the needy, whose relatives played a pivotal role in bringing about the freedom that today sees prophets, apostles and others wearing different religious tags criss-crossing cities or even the country and claiming to provide jobs to loafers, as well as mending broken marriages, not to mention bringing about showers of money into the pockets of the needy?

These people attribute the success of their various ministries to God’s power and grace.

But why have they not demonstrated the one weapon in their hands — the power of prayer and fasting — to transform the lives of such needy Zimbabweans as the relatives of the late or living freedom fighters? Or is the Church not aware of the suffering of the people mentioned above?

In fact, should not the Church be always with the people to know as much as possible what its flock as well as other people lack in order to minister to their needs?

An important suggestion has been made in Bulawayo to the effect that the Government can use the exciting new baby on the land, Command Agriculture to raise money to assist orphans of the late heroes and those of surviving ones to live better lives on the land they occupy.

Mr Felix Moyo, director of communication and marketing at the National University of Science and Technology also said the Government could use some mining claims not being fully utilised to raise money needed to improve the welfare of orphaned as well as the offspring of surviving revolutionaries.

Moreover, Mr Moyo pointed to the fact that the freedom struggle was fought to bring land on which such mines exist to the ownership of Zimbabweans for exploitation to their maximum benefit.

In his Heroes’ Day speech, President Mugabe noted that the budgetary allocation to the Ministry of Welfare Services for War Veterans, War Collaborators, Former Political Detainees and Restrictees, under Minister Tshinga Dube, was small and there was therefore a need for “a very a wide programme so that we have a huge fund to complement efforts by (Finance Minister Cde Patrick) Chinamasa, whose allocations are small given competing priorities.”

Thus, as time passes and the information about the plight of the relatives of the country’s liberators swells, it is to be hoped that Zimbabweans will rally behind President Mugabe’s call to chip in with adequate assistance.