Rekayi Tangwena

Chief Rekayi Tangwena (c. 1910 – 11 June 1984) was a traditional chief from Zimbabwe's eastern province of Manicaland. Chief Tangwena is well known as the man who helped Robert Mugabe and Edgar Tekere cross into Mozambique to join the Zimbabwe African National Liberation Army guerillas who were waging a fierce bush war against Ian Smith's Rhodesian government. However, Chief Tangwena was also well known for his fierce resistance to having his people evicted from their ancestral lands to make way for white settlers. Chief Tangwena continued to resist even after the people's homesteads had been destroyed by settler forces. He is buried at Heroes' Acre in Harare.