Joshua Mqabuko Nyongolo Nkomo was a Zimbabwean politician who served as Second Vice-President of Zimbabwe under Robert Mugabe from 1987 to 1999. He was leader and founder of the Zimbabwe African People's Union party, and a member of the Ndebele people .He was a trades-union leader, who became president of the banned National Democratic Party, and was jailed for ten years by Rhodesia's white minority government. After his release, ZAPU contributed to the fall of that government, but then feuded with the rival ZANU group led by Robert Mugabe. Fearing for his life, Nkomo fled the country, before controversially allowing ZAPU to merge with ZANU.
Nkomo had many nicknames, including "Umafukufuku", "Father Zimbabwe", and "Chibwechitedza" . He was respectfuly and affectionately as "uMdala or uMdala wethu", our elder.
The country is ours, both white and blacks
Quoted in The Financial Gazette (28 January 1993), on the need for white people to cooperate under majority rule
