'Mzee' SK Moyo was a real brother to all

I FIRST met SK in 1974 when I went to study at Makerere University, in Kampala, Uganda. I was in the company of around 10 young men who were former students of the University of Rhodesia from which we had been expelled the previous year.

All of us had spent part of the previous year as convicts in various prisons in Rhodesia, and we had then skipped the border to seek refuge in Botswana. Needless to say, the past year had been hell on earth.

After our arrival in Uganda, we discovered that there were some Zimbabweans (we were called Rhodesians at that time) who had been in that country many years before us. Some of them had studied there, especially at Makerere University, but others had been to various other institutions of higher learning.

Notable among these were professionals such as Dr B B Nyathi who had since married a Ugandan paediatrician. There was also Dr Stanley Sakupwanya, an orthopaedic, and so many others, including SK.

At that time SK had just obtained his degree from Makerere University and was then a lecturer at Nsamizi School of Social Work, at Entebbe.

These Zimbabweans became our parents. On weekends, or during vacations, we would visit them in their homes, and they would prepare us appetising meals. This is where SK's humane qualities came to the fore. He was a real brother to all of us. Although he was just about 30, and only a few years older than us, we called him "Mzee", ("Old Man" in Swahili). We called him "Mzee" because to us he was a respectable elder.

He was not married then, so there were not too many restrictions when we were in his company.

SK was a jocular, sociable and easy-going man who loved to wind down whenever the moment was proper.

On these festive occasions nobody could compete against SK on the dance floor.

You entered the stage with him at your own risk because SK could jive: the frantic pantsula, go-down, mbaqanga, whatever style with whatever complicated steps, kicks and leaps, all styles were easy to execute for SK.

At my doctoral degree graduation some years ago, the master of ceremony announced through the public address system that among the guests that evening was Ambassador Simon Khaya Moyo.

He was there not as a representative of the Zimbabwean Government in South Africa. No.

He was there because a close friend of his was graduating. At the end of the ceremony SK gave me as a present a coffee maker and 200 rand from his own pocket.

I will always remember SK as a friendly, warm-hearted and jovial man who loved every Zimbabwean regardless of tribal are racial origins. God takes the best.

May your dear soul rest in eternal peace, Mzee.