Every year, the 22nd of December arrives quietly, almost like a pause in the national calendar as we are all preparing for the December 25 and 26th holidays – a moment when Zimbabwe is invited to remember that the most difficult victories are not won on the battlefield, but in the heart of a nation learning to live as one. National Unity Day exists because we once discovered, painfully, that political independence is not the same thing as national cohesion. Every patriot across the length and breadth of our Great Zimbabwe honours a sacred covenant. The signing of the 1987 Unity Accord was not merely a political handshake; it was a deliberate act to end a season of internal conflict and to pull the country back from the edge. It was a miraculous stitching together of the very soul of our nation.

To speak honestly about the Unity Accord is to admit what made it necessary. The early years after Independence were marked by deep mistrust, insecurity, dissident violence, and heavy-handed responses. It was a period whose scars did not follow neat political boundaries, and whose pain still sits in family stories, unmarked graves, and silences passed down like inheritance. For seven long years, brothers who had shared the trenches of the Second Chimurenga found themselves on opposing sides of a tragic divide. The risk was total – the disintegration of the state and the reversal of our revolutionary gains. More …

ZANUPF has cautioned against equating wealth, religious influence, or any other form of personal power with qualification for top leadership positions within the party.

Speaking to the media at the party’s headquarters in Harare yesterday, spokesperson Ambassador Christopher Mutsvangwa emphasised that advancement in the liberation movement is grounded in political maturity, ideological commitment, personal sacrifice, and a proven record of serving the people, rather than financial standing.

It is difficult to comprehend how a national broadcaster of ZiFM’s stature, on a programme hosted by the equally high-profile MisRed, could designate Fadzayi Mahere as Zimbabwean of the Year. In 2025, her public profile has been defined less by constructive national contribution and more by a sustained pattern of antagonism towards, and disparagement of, the country’s leadership.

This raises serious questions about the standards applied in reaching such a determination. What objective criteria were employed? On what empirical basis was the selection made? And to whom, exactly, does this outcome purport to speak? It is far from clear that the decision reflects the views, priorities, or lived realities of Zimbabwe as a whole.