The Sunday News
WHENEVER the name Johnson Mkandla is mentioned, many associate it with the handling of either criminal or civil cases at the Bulawayo Magistrates Courts housed at the Tredgold Building in Bulawayo.
Some are not aware that the former regional magistrate spent some years in Rhodesian prisons for his activities in the struggle for the country’s independence.
Although Cde Mkandla had started his political activities in the 1960s that saw him being expelled as a teacher in Lupane District, it was in 1974 that he found himself facing the death penalty after his arrest for recruiting “terrorists” and being found in possession of arms of war. In that riveting trial that took more than six months before Rhodesian Chief Justice Sir Hugh Beadle, Cde Mkandla was charged together with now Vice-President of Zimbabwe, Cde Kembo Mohadi, Cdes Solomon Mathenjwa Moyo, Leonard Solomon Nkomo and Elkana Sibanda. He gives us an account of the events that led to his arrest, trial and time in prison in an interview with our Assistant Editor Mkhululi Sibanda. Below are excerpts of the interview:
MS: Before we get into your political activities readers might want to know who is Johnson Mthenjwa Mkandla.
Cde Mkandla: I was born on 15 August in 1939 at Fort Rixon to Jabezi Mkandla and Maria Mkandla. I am married to Mildred, uMaMoyo with four sons and a daughter. As for my schooling I attended St Chards in Fort Rixon, St Georges in Lupane and later on went to Empandeni Mission in Mangwe District and Lupane Mission. I later on did my secondary education at Inyathi Mission and I also continued with my schooling while in detention at Gonakundzingwa, Wha Wha and Conemara. Also, while in detention I read Political Science, Sociology and English. After the attainment of independence I then went to the Law School at the University of Zimbabwe to read for a law degree after which I worked in the civil service as a magistrate. I left the bench when I was a regional magistrate.
MS: When did you start your political activities?
Cde Mkandla: I started at an early age by being active in the National Democratic Party (NDP), the People’s Caretaker Council (PCC), the African National Council and ZAPU. It was through those political activities that I was expelled from teaching in 1966 by the Rhodesian government. I was teaching in Lupane District at that time and the regime felt I was a bad influence to the school children and their communities. Others who were expelled at the same time as myself were the late Vice-President John Landa Nkomo who was teaching here in Bulawayo at a school which I can’t remember but is in Tshabalala, the late national hero, Sydney Donald Malunga who was at Fatima Mission in Lupane, Jacob in Kezi and Mzaca Nkomo. After some time I then got a job as a sales manager at Mirtle’s Radio and Television here in Bulawayo. In fact I worked together with Sydney Malunga who was also the sales manager for another branch. We continued with our political activities despite what we had been subjected to before. It was period of great sacrifice during those days.
MS: What position or positions did you hold?
Cde Mkandla: I rose through the ranks in Zapu and became the party’s regional chairman for Matabeleland that covered all Matabeleland districts from Beitbridge to Victoria Falls. That is when I was given the most dangerous task of working with the guerillas who had been sent to the country to lay the groundwork for bigger operations and also to recruit people to go and join the armed struggle in Zambia. Those guerillas we were working under the intelligence department under Dumiso Dabengwa, which in the later stages of the armed struggle was transformed to the National Security Organisation (NSO). Those boys were given dangerous missions of living among the masses while at the same time carrying on with their operations.
MS: Take us through that period. What really happened?
Cde Mkandla: In my executive that role of working closely with the guerillas was given to me, Joseph Malunga and Cephas Nkomo who was the treasurer. Other members of the executive were not in the picture and those included Paul Themba Nyathi who then was the regional secretary. Even senior party cadres like Sydney Malunga who was the national executive of the party were not aware. Those guerillas were intelligence officers who had been deployed into the country like I had said above to come and recruit and spy on the operations of the enemy. Our role was to take care of their needs such as food, shelter and clothes. We were to provide them with the cover. However, they were not based here in Bulawayo only but were scattered around the region and I believe in some other parts of the country. Those were the events that led to my arrest by the Rhodesian government.
MS: So when were you arrested?
Cde Mkandla: The actual date that I got arrested I don’t recall but it was in 1974. We were facing charges of possession of arms of war and recruitment of terrorists as the regime would put it which was a serious offence as if one was found guilty he or she would be sent to the gallows. I found myself facing the death penalty and we were five of us. It was me, the current Vice-President Honourable Kembo Mohadi who was one of the intelligence officers who was in the country for operations, Elkana Sibanda another guerilla working together with Cde Mohadi, Leonard Solomon Nkomo who was in my executive and Solomon Mathenjwa Moyo from Lupane who was taking care of the needs of Mohadi’s unit in that part of the country.
-Next week Cde Mkandla will take us through his arrest, trial and how he and his co-accused who included Cde Mohadi escaped the hangman’s noose. Don’t miss your Sunday News copy for that riveting trial.
