Sungura musician suffers stroke

VETERAN sungura musician and Ngwenya Brothers frontman, Tedious Matsito, is under the weather.

He suffered a stroke in December last year while he was in South Africa for his festive season tour.

"It's a double tragedy," his wife Patience told H-Metro in an interview at their Kuwadzana 5 house last Friday.

"We wanted to keep it a secret and solve our problems but since you are here, it's obvious that it's now for the public," she added.

The Manyemwe eMhuru hit-maker is struggling to speak, so his wife had to respond to most of the questions.

"It's now better, at least he is now able to say one or two words. He managed to greet you and told me to allow you to come in for an interview.

"When it (stroke) attacked him, he was not even able to speak and was struggling to swallow," said Patience.

Patience is not good at health jargon and she only knows that her husband suffered a stroke that mostly affected his jaws.

Matsito is now able to walk with his crutches, though he was struggling earlier, a sign that he is recuperating.

"It happened while he was in South Africa in December. He had gone for a series of shows and after only one show he was attacked by stroke while he was sleeping.

"He was admitted in South Africa for four days before we took him back home where we are visiting doctors here and there," she said.

Though he was willing to talk and respond to some of the questions, it was difficult to understand him, he was mumbling, and his wife had to intervene.

"He is now fine bamunini, we are hoping that with God's grace he will be back on stage very soon.

"We just have to accept what is there because it's God's will. He loves his job and that's the only way he can support his family," she said.

Since December last year, Matsito has visited the hospital on few occasions and there are no physiotherapists attending to him as demanded by his condition.

His wife said they don't have money for that, classifying it as 'luxury', and he can only get that service when he visits the hospital, once in awhile.

This is despite the fact that he also needs to go for regular check-ups on his amputated leg as well as servicing the artificial leg.

Matsito reiterated that he doesn't want to live a beggar's life, but he has no choice.

Misfortune continues to trail him.

He needs help!

"The problem is money, we don't have money. We can't even afford a physiotherapist," she said.

In fact, they have since stopped visiting the hospital because their two children are sitting for Advanced Level this year and to them that was a priority.

"It would be unfair to stop children from going to school," said Patience.

"Actually, we have stopped going to hospital because of money. MaTwins edu ari mumba umo are in Form 6 and they wanted money for registration and tuition fees and we had to prioritise that.

"Besides, the money is not even enough for all they want at school, they are just improvising," she said.

Matsito managed to accompany the H-Metro crew to the gate using his crutches and waved his hand as the car left his house.

A former gardener, Matsito formed Ngwenya Brothers along with his brothers Jabulani and Mike and went on to release several hits that made them darlings with sungura music lovers in the 90s.

While his brothers died along the musical journey, things went up-side-down in 2008 when he was involved in a fatal accident with his band while on their way from a tour of Mozambique.

He had health problems since then and he even spent more than two years in hospital.

In 2012, he had his leg amputated and BancABC gave him some hope after securing an artificial leg for him.

In 20013, music promoter Patson 'Chipaz' Chimbodza who was at his peak then, organised a fundraising function for him at Gwanzura Stadium.

Two years later, a benefit gig was also organised though it flopped and was surrounded by controversy.