Detention camps: hearth of defiance, nationalism

Vincent Gono, News Editor

AFTER several failed attempts at breaking the spirit of courage and nationalism that had pervaded the native communities, the colonial regime decided to set up detention camps to banish those who provided inspiration and ideology to the revolting Zimbabwean masses.

The history of the liberation struggle and that of the sons and daughters of the soil whose lives, blood, tears and sweat watered the tree of liberation whose shade we enjoy today can never be complete without mention of such punitive detention camps such as the notorious Gonakudzingwa, Sikombela and WhaWha.

Instead of breaking their resilience, the three detention camps became the hearth of defiance in nationalist politics. They became the political space where ideas were shared as to how they could break loose the yoke of colonialism.

The three were geographically mapped and designed to sap out ounces of fighting energy from the leaders of the revolution.

Gonakudzingwa was situated in the Gonarezhou National Park in Chiredzi district of Masvingo Province and was just as the name depicts — an area where those who were deemed unfit to live in a society where white rule dominated were banished. 

It was the equivalent of the Robben Island of apartheid South Africa where Nelson Mandela was also banished.

Those who were kept in the camp were regarded as purveyors of a deadly contagious disease that was unwelcome to the colonial regime as they threatened its existence and all that it stood for and they were deemed desirous of a quarantine from others.

The camp remains one of the most outstanding areas from where the story of political detainees, the execution of the liberation struggle and the country’s independence could be told and the National Museums and Monuments of Zimbabwe (NMMZ) has been working on ensuring that a feasibility study that will pave the way for its reconstruction is completed after the area was cleared of landmines by the Zimbabwe National Army.

In an interview yesterday, NMMZ acting director Mr Darlington Munyikwa stressed the importance of the detention camps which he said were part of the liberation heritage sites from where the story of the armed struggle that brought independence could be told.

He said his department has moved mountains in research and ensuring that all that needs to be done is done.

“We are happy that all documentation is now in place. The research was done and the two detention camps — Gonakudzingwa and Silkombela have been gazetted as national monuments.

“There were delays in researching Gonakudzingwa. The major handicap was that the area was infested with landmines. We only moved in after getting official communication from the Zimbabwe National Army that the area had been cleared of the landmines,” said Mr Munyikwa. 

The intention, according to him, is to create a theme park — a recreation of the camp or some sections of it to give visitors some appreciation of what restriction and detention camps were like.

“We aim to reconstruct some of the structures and to then interpret the camp life from different perspectives, political, social and in relation to the experiences of the camp inmates and the impacts of the entire system not only on the families of the affected inmates but also on the national political development that then ensued, leading to the decisions by the liberation movements to go for the armed struggle. A theme park therefore recreates and also interprets the site to enable visitors to understand the values of the heritage site,” he said.

His department, he said, was moving in to conduct archaeological as well as oral interviews with both surviving inmates and the local communities that were more directly impacted by the establishment of the camp. 

Gonakudzingwa in Chiredzi District of Masvingo Province was established by the white regime in April 1964 after WhaWha in Gweru was set up in February of the same year and later Sikombela in Gokwe South District in Midlands Province in June 1965 for purposes of curtailing the nationalist movements that were growing in the early to mid-1960s.

The three detention camps were constructed as a quick response to the growing number of African nationalists who felt the need to fight the repressive white regime.

There were striking similarities in the geographical location of the three detention camps. Apart from providing punitive accommodation to the black nationalists, the camps were established in the remote, inaccessible parts of the country.

Leaders of the revolution mostly from Zapu who were detained at the Gonakudzingwa detention camp include but are not limited to Cdes Joshua Nkomo, Naison Ndlovu, Josiah Chinamano and his wife Ruth Chinamano, Joseph Msika, Jane Lungile Ngwenya, Chief Mangwende, Njini Ntuta, Willie Musarurwa and Sikhanyiso Ndlovu.

Sikombela served as a detention camp mainly for the Zanu nationalist leaders such as Cdes Simon Muzenda, Enos Nkala, Edgar Tekere, Ndabaningi Sithole and Edison Zvobgo. 

Gonakudzingwa was located within the expansive wildlife zone of Gonarezhou, an area that was and is still famed for being home to big fauna such as elephants, buffaloes, lions and rhinos.

According to Munyaradzi B Munochiveyi in his book Prisoners of Rhodesia — Inmates and Detainees in the Struggle for Zimbabwe Liberation 1960-1980, by any measure Gonakudzingwa was unattractive for human habitation. Temperatures could sour to peaks of 118 Degrees Celsius. The area was exceptionally dry. It had an altitude of 1 000 feet and was consequently hotter than the rest of the country. Malaria was endemic in the region.

Because of its geographical location which was made worse by its arid conditions the detainees believed and accepted that it was more of a deliberate ploy by the Rhodesian authorities to make them suffer in the camp than just a matter of mere accident or coincidence.

And true, the belief was that after experiencing a torturous life at Gonakudzingwa, the leaders were going to be deterred and go back to influence their black constituencies against rising against the white minority rule. 

The late Father Zimbabwe Cde Joshua Nkomo noted in his autobiography with a deep sense of humour how his colleagues and friends Cde Msika and Cde Stanislas Marembo had developed a habit of taking an early morning walk around the detention camp.

He wrote, “One morning they met a lion, a big male on the path and they came flying home. “The animals (that lived around Gonakudzingwa) were dangerous but not hostile by intent . . . it was their jungle, not ours. But nobody was going to escape while they were around.”

Munochiveyi further noted the experience of detained political activist Victor Kuretu during his first days at the detention camp.

He had this to say, “When I first got to Gonakudzingwa, I remember wondering whether we were still in the same country or not. The place was unbearably hot and we used to pass blackish sweat during the first days. The water there was no good. When we boiled the water, we would remove some whitish residue that looked like lime. We had problems with wild animals at Gonakudzingwa because it was located in the Gonarezhou Wildlife Reserve. At night and early morning, lions would roar very loudly. We also saw elephants roaming near the camp.”

The camp was therefore deliberately set in an animal area to ensure that even with no security whatsoever, no one was going to attempt to escape. And yes, there was no security at the camp for escaping was just like jumping from the frying pan into the fire. The detainees were convinced that the authorities knew that no one would dare attempt to escape because the lions and elephants made sure they would not run away.

And with the aggressive animals, they knew that they would not be worried about supervision and security and to synthesise that argument the only supervision was from a little frontier police post on the Rhodesia/Mozambique railway line called Villa Salazar.

Detention camps of Gonakudzingwa and Sikombela’s nature were therefore established to halt any liberation movement’s pursuits at freeing the country from the tight grip of the oppressive Smith regime and they were in essence torture and brutality centres.

Mr Munyikwa highlighted that although the makeshift structures at Gonakudzingwa were no longer erect, efforts were in place to make the detention camp a historical monument from where the political history of the country could be told.

He said the challenge was that the architecture of Gonakudzingwa was not like that of Sikombela in that Gonakudzingwa was more of a makeshift structure that was erected on a concrete slab. There were metal structures and rondavels that had no permanence.

“People need to understand the architecture of Gonakudzingwa. It was not a permanent structure but a kind of makeshift one. We therefore do not have anything monumental, it is the same with Sikombela, there are no structures to talk of but we have done all the work at the two detention camps.” 

He said he was pleased with the work so far saying everything was to make the notorious detention camp a national site from where the country’s liberation struggle and independence history could be told.