Herbert chitepo biography

Zimbabwean politician

Herbert Wiltshire Pfumaindini Chitepo (15 June 1923 – 18 March 1975) was a Zimbabwean politician and nationalist leader who led the Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU) until he was assassinated in March 1975.

Although his murderer remains unidentified, the Rhodesian author Peter Stiff says that a former soldier of the British Special Air Service (SAS), Hugh Hind, was responsible.^[1]

Chitepo became the first black citizen of Rhodesia to become a barrister.^[2]

Early years

Chitepo was born in Watsomba village in the Mutasa District of Southern Rhodesia, now Zimbabwe on 15 June 1923.^[3] His family came from the Manyika clan (Samanyika) of the Shona people.

He was educated at St David's Mission School, Bonda, St Augustine's School, Penhalonga and then at Adams College, Natal, South Africa, where he qualified as a teacher in 1945. This was where he met Victoria Mahamba-Sithole, a South African whom he marrie