By Tafadzwa Munjanja

On 18 April 2026, the Zimbabwe marked 46 years of independence from the painful and torturous colonial rule.

Far from the largely partisan gathering in Maphisa in Matabeleland South held by the ZANU PF government, the majority of ordinary citizens chose to stay home. Save for ZANU PF propaganda and praise singing to dictator, Emmerson Mnangagwa, the Maphisa gathering did not reflect a nation ‘celebrating’ close to half a century of independence.

Of course, many of the ordinary villagers bussed to the event had an opportunity to have a free piece of Chicken Inn and to watch Highlanders in action against that team owned by one of zviganandas .

It was a rare opportunity for the long-suffering villagers who are swimming in abject poverty authored by ZANU PF to have an encounter with a piece of roasted and coated chicken. This is how low Zimbabweans have become under Mnangagwa’s reign of terror. More than 49 per cent of the population is living in extreme poverty!

Back to Maphisa, the pitch in which Highlanders and Scottland played the Uhuru Cup final is worse than what football legend Moses Chunga once referred to as a “potato field”. It, however, served purpose to show how ZANU PF has marginalised Matabeleland region since independence.

46 years after independence, Zimbabwe does not have a single CAF approved stadium to host international matches. To put ZANU PF failure in context, Rwanda, a nation coming from a 1994 genocide that claimed close to a million of its population, has at least two stadiums that host international matches.

Maphisa is one of the poorest regions not only in Matabeleland but in Zimbabwe. What an irony that Mnangagwa and his looting committee disguised as a “Second Republic” had to fly and drive all the way from their plushy suburbs in Harare just to display their ill gotten wealth to the poor villagers.

For Mnangagwa, “the butcher of Bhalagwe” (as Jonathan Moyo once labelled him), Maphisa represented a return to a community he committed gross murders and violence against during Gukurahundi era. It was a return to a place of mass graves of his Gukurahundi victims!

The 46th Independence Day celebrations came at a time when Zimbabwe is at a crossroads because of Constitutional Amendment Bill No.3. The bill seeks to reverse the one man, one vote idea, which was one of the main agenda of the liberation struggle.

While the liberation struggle was fought to guarantee civil and political liberties, Mnangagwa has stolen away all those gains.

Pre-trial detentions have become the new normal under Mnangagwa’s dictatorship. As they were feeding the nation propaganda at Maphisa, ordinary citizens such as Madzibaba Veshanduko, Takunda Mhuka and Emmanuel Sitimah are languishing at Harare Remand Prison for exercising their right to speak against CAB3.

It is clear that Mnangagwa has stolen our liberty and independence. Zimbabweans must draw inspiration from our liberation war heroes and stop this rabid dictator!

Tafadzwa Munjanja is the Chief Ambassador of The National Democratic Working Group (NDWG) . Here, he writes in his own capacity as a patriotic citizen of Zimbabwe.