Word: shona
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...rank and file of the Patriotic Front have been recruited mainly from rural Tribal Trust Lands, where 40% of the country's 7 million blacks, employed mostly as day laborers, are concentrated. Zimbabwe Rhodesia's biggest black groups are the Shona, who form some 80% of the population, and Ndebele, who make up about 15% (whites constitute 3%). Like its leader Robert Mugabe, the bulk of the Mozambique-based Zimbabwe African National Liberation Army (ZANLA) are Shona. The Zambia-based Zimbabwe People's Revolutionary Army (ZIPRA) is dominated by Ndebele, like Leader Joshua Nkomo...
...groups have been hostile since the Ndebele, an offshoot of the Zulu, conquered the Shona during the 19th century...
...Central African Federation (1953-63), resigned from his government post after Prime Minister Ian Smith's unilateral declaration of independence for Rhodesia in 1965; a grateful British government promptly awarded Gumede an M.B.E. Bishop Muzorewa has been accused of playing favorites by appointing too many of his fellow Shona tribesmen to office; since Gumede is a Matabele, the second largest ethnic grouping in the country after the Shonas, his nomination as chief of state made good political sense...
Auxiliary. A guerrilla who has joined the government side, or a black who has been recruited as a counterinsurgent by one of the pro-government nationalist parties. Known in a Shona dialect as a Pfumo reVanhu (spear of the nation...
...with the U.S. caught in the position of reluctantly supporting the Muzorewa government and with the Soviet Union and Cuba looming ever larger in African eyes as the liberators of the oppressed Rhodesian majority. Some observers are dreaming of unexpected solutions, such as an alliance between Mugabe, himself a Shona, and Muzorewa. But this is probably wishful thinking. As one official of Nkomo's organization says, "This war will not stop. It is not possible at this stage to talk about a reconciliation between those who are inside the country and those who are outside." Despite last week's balloting...