The bands played but the funeral of Zimbabwe’s ex-president was a strange affair in a divided nation

At just before 11.30am, the thousands of mourners in the vast bowl of Zimbabwe’s national stadium stood and the casket carrying the mortal remains of Robert Gabriel Mugabe began its short journey across the green grass to the podium where it would lie during the long, hot hours of the funeral.

A military brass band led the procession. Then came the bereaved family and Mugabe’s successor, President Emmerson Mnangagwa, followed by foreign dignitaries, before a small crowd of ministers and officials from the ruling Zanu-PF party.

The man who brought freedom to Zimbabwe was once a hero to many – but he died a tyrant who will not be mourned

Robert Mugabe is dead, never to come back again, and so are millions of Zimbabweans who preceded him, dying from easily treatable diseases, and from the violence that visited anyone who attempted to resist his tyrannical rule.

The dreams of millions of young men and women – who, to this day, roam the streets of Zimbabwe with university degrees but without jobs or any decent income – were extinguished long before him.

The former Zimbabwean president will always be an African liberation icon, but his brutality will not be forgotten

“Wafa wanaka” – it is said that it is unAfrican to speak ill of the dead. But what choice does one have when the death of a once towering figure raises complex emotions, and not in a good way?

On 18 April 1980, Zimbabwe was born. In a colourful celebration that started the previous night at Rufaro stadium in Harare (then known as Salisbury), the independence flame was lit. Bob Marley sang Zimbabwe, a song he’d written at the invitation of the government. Hope filled the air as Robert Gabriel Mugabe, the nation’s first prime minister, took his oath of office and swore allegiance to the new nation. Julius Nyerere, the leader of Tanzania, prophetically cautioned Mugabe, saying: “You have inherited a jewel in Africa. Don’t tarnish it.”