Joice Mujuru

Joice Runaida Mujuru (née Mugari; born 15 April 1955), also known by her nom-de-guerre Teurai Ropa Nhongo, is a Zimbabwean revolutionary and politician who served as Vice-President of Zimbabwe from 2004 to 2014.

Previously she had served as a government minister.

She also served as Vice-President of ZANU–PF.

She is said to have downed a helicopter with a machine gun on 17 February 1974 after refusing to flee.

The helicopter downing incident has been vehemently denied by War Veterans chairman, Christopher Mutsvangwa after her expulsion from the party; other ballistic experts have also questioned the possibility of shooting down a helicopter with such a light weapon as narrated on her story.

By 1975, she was the political instructor of two successful military bases.

At 21, Mujuru was camp commander at the Chimoio military and refugee camp in Mozambique.

She took the nom-de-guerre Teurai Ropa Nhongo (Shona for "spill blood"), and then rose to become one of the first women commanders in Mugabe's ZANLA forces.

In 1977, she married Solomon Mujuru, known then by his nom-de-guerre Rex Nhongo, deputy commander-in-chief of ZANLA.

That same year, she became the youngest member of the ZANU Central Committee, a member of the National Executive.

Her political activity made her a target for the Rhodesian Security Forces, which tried to capture her but were unsuccessful.

As part of Operation Dingo, the ZANLA camp in Chimoio was attacked by Rhodesian soldiers on November 23, 1977.

Mujuru managed to elude capture by hiding in a well-used communal pit latrine.

In 1978, when her camp came under attack, Muruju—nine months pregnant at the time—was still an active combatant.

She gave birth only days later.

Upon return from the war, little was known of the origins of her name and her real name.

Her mother, in an interview for The Sunday Mail newspaper at her rural Mount Darwin home, spoke exclusively to journalist and media anthropologist Robert Mukondiwa, to whom she revealed that Joice was a name she had also adopted during her time away at the war.

Her actual name, he was told, was Runaida, which had been her late paternal aunt's name.

The Mujurus now live on a 3500 acre requisitioned farm, Alamein Farm, 45 mi south of Harare, which has been found by the Supreme Court in Zimbabwe to have been illegally seized from the farm owner.

At independence in 1980, Mujuru became the youngest cabinet minister in the cabinet, taking the portfolio of sports, youth and recreation.

She fitted secondary school in between her busy schedule after she was appointed minister.

As Minister of Telecommunications, she tried to stop Strive Masiyiwa from establishing his independent cellphone network Econet.

Masiyiwa had been given an ultimatum by the cabinet to sell his imported equipment to his rivals.

On 24 March 1997, Mujuru decided to issue Zimbabwe's second cellular telephone licence to the previously unknown Zairois consortium Telecel, cutting out Masiyiwa.

The Zairois consortium included her husband Solomon and President Robert Mugabe's nephew Leo.

After many legal fights, Masiyiwa won his licence in December 1997.

The ZANU-PF Women's League resolved at its annual conference held in September 2004 to put forward a female candidate for the party's vice-presidency, a position left vacant following the death of Simon Muzenda.

Mugabe bowed to pressure from a ZANU-PF faction led by Mujuru's husband, General Solomon Mujuru, to give a woman the second vice-presidency post—effectively sidelining Speaker of Parliament Emmerson Mnangagwa, widely seen as his favoured heir.

This ZANU-PF reshuffle was dubbed "the night of the long knives" by the Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation.

Mujuru was sworn in as Vice-President of Zimbabwe on 6 December 2004.

Mujuru was nominated as ZANU-PF's candidate for the House of Assembly seat from Mt. Darwin West in the March 2008 parliamentary election.

According to official results she won the seat by an overwhelming margin, receiving 13,236 votes against 1,792 for Gora Madzudzo, the candidate of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) faction led by Morgan Tsvangirai.

This ran contrary to earlier claims from the MDC that Mujuru had lost the seat.

She was married to Solomon Mujuru until his death in 2011 and was long considered a potential successor to President Robert Mugabe, but in 2014 she was denounced for allegedly plotting against Mugabe.

As a result of the accusations against her, Mujuru lost both her post as Vice-President and her position in the party leadership.

She was expelled from the party a few months later, after which she formed the new Zimbabwe People First party.

Runaida Mugari was born in Zimbabwe's Northeastern district of Mount Darwin, a Shona from the Korekore language group.

She attended a Salvation Army mission school, Howard High in Chiweshe in Mashonaland Central Province.

At eighteen years old, Mujuru was the only woman who trained in Lusaka.

After completing two years of secondary education, she decided to join the Rhodesian Bush War.