WELSHMAN NCUBE
An article in The Standard (Harare) (Ncube breaks down over Gukurahundi) today describes the anguish of Prof Ncube as he recounted the terrible experiences of his family in the `gukurahundi' massacres perpetrated in Matabeleland by Mugabe's notorious 5th Brigade. At last! I wondered when these - quite literal - home truths which explain his determination to remove the ZANU (PF) regime by constitutional means would emerge. His private grief had to enter the public domain only when he was ready to introduce it himself.
Welshman, the consummate constitutional lawyer, has been unjustly accused of `supping with the devil' because he has been unrelenting in his quest for a change of regime. He is an extraordinary man; he has let nothing shift him from his objective, no matter how impossible the task may seem. His differences of political strategy which have so seriously separated him from Morgan Tsvangirai are not what this blog is about; it is about the impressive political integrity of a person who otherwise could have been driven mad, as was his beloved brother, as a consequence of the onslaught of Mugabe's agents on the people of his home region. But it has become clear that he has great resilience - possibly his seeking legal redress for his family's experience of torture and death is precisely what has made him so strong.
In the late nineties and well before the MDC opposition party was formed , Welshman attended a conference on the media held in Nyanga. This was the first opportunity I had to have a heart to heart discussion with him. His clear and unemotional views on the country's constitution were already well known. He had given generously and tirelessly of his time at every possible opportunity to explain the importance of the rule of law in a free Zimbabwe, but I was interested in what motivated him. It was on that occasion he told me quietly of his brother having been driven out of his mind by what he had witnessed happening to his family and his fellow Ndebele people.
From that day, I have never doubted that Welshman would hold firm to his resolve. He put in unconscionable hours designing a constitution for the country under the aegis of the NCA in 1998, he recruited some of the best brains and most dedicated characters in the MDC. The catastrophe of the MDC split, with Welshman leading the legal argument about the voting in the final countdown has resonated for me as starkly as the tragedy of suffering people, then as now, especially in Matabeleland.
Copyright © 2004 Diana Mitchell
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