Sydney Sekeramayi was more circumspect in direct discussions with Western representatives, but nevertheless made clear that the Gukurahundi massacres were no accident. 

The documents also record that Cephas Msipa talked to other members of Zanu who revealed that the killings were not simply the whim of a small coterie, but the result of a formal and broad-based decision by the leadership of Zanu-PF. Eddison Zvobgo, a member of Zanu’s 20-member policy-making body, spoke of a “decision of the Central Committee that there had to be a ‘massacre’ of Ndebeles”. That statement squared precisely with 5 Brigade’s ethnocentric modus operandi. Mugabe’s heir apparent, the current First Vice President, Emmerson Mnangagwa, was a member of the Central Committee. 

The army commanders who directed the killings are also shown in the documents to have been eager accomplices. Zvobgo commented that the first commander of 5 Brigade, Perence Shiri, had said the “politicians should leave it to us” with regard to “settling things in Matabeleland”.

Stuart Doran