Attempts by the opposition MDC-T to gain mileage from the death of its activist, Tonderai Ndira, by raising him to the pantheon of national heroes raises serious questions about the party's understanding of heroism and service to the people.

Maybe before delving into the whole issue of whether Ndira deserves to be called a national hero, there is need to define what heroism is.

Greek mythology, which gave the world these concepts, defines a hero as someone who meets the attributes of what is considered good and noble in the originating culture, primarily a willingness to sacrifice the self for the greater good.

However, in literature, particularly in tragedy, a hero may also have serious flaws that lead to his downfall, a case in point being Shakespeare's legendary character, Hamlet. Such heroes are often called tragic heroes.

Therefore, there is need to find whether Ndira, and Gift Tandare, just like Learnmore Judah Jongwe before them, fit into the criteria of what constitutes national heroism in Zimbabwe, or whether they are just MDC-T's tragic "heroes".

That is not an onerous task, since Zimbabwe has clear procedures of what constitutes national heroism.

The standards were not set by Zanu-PF, neither can they be defined by MDC; the standards were set by the heroes and heroines of the First Chimurenga, consolidated in the Second Chimurenga, and safeguarded in the Third.

Among the venerated men and women who fit that straitjacket are Mbuya Chahwe - the medium of the Nehanda spirit; and Sekuru Gumboreshumba - the medium of Kaguvi.

These venerated men and women fought against the colonisation of Zimbabwe and the pillaging of its resources; they laid down their lives in defence of the nation's sovereignty.

Their mantle was picked up by the "bones" Nehanda had predicted would surely rise, and duly did so on the 69th anniversary of her hanging by the forebears of MDC-T's bosom friends.

The bones rose in the form of seven gallant sons of Zimbabwe who fired the first shots of the Second Chimurenga in Chinhoyi on April 28, 1966.

So in the Zimbabwean context, a national hero is one who shows a willingness to die for the defence of the gains of independence, who resists colonialism in whatever form and is prepared to lay down his life in defence of the ideals of the Chimurenga wars.

MDC-T, which has shown utter disregard for the ideals of the struggle, is a counter-revolutionary Trojan horse that was formed as a knee-jerk response to the Government's resolve to complete the struggle by redistributing the land that was stolen from Nehanda and other forebears, to the landless majority.

MDC-T's position on land reform is well known, and Tsvangirai's opinion of the black man's position on the land is well documented.

He sees him as a "wild mushroom" that can be uprooted anytime by his friends from the West if his party gets into power. And we all saw Tsvangirai's friends invade Zimbabwe en masse to threaten newly resettled farmers when they mistakenly thought he had romped to victory.

The question is can Ndira, Tandare and Jongwe fit into that straitjacket? Did they die for an honourable cause or in virtuous circumstances?

By any stretch of the imagination, one was a murderer while the others were common thugs who cannot be equated to the late Father Zimbabwe Dr Joshua Nkomo, Jason Moyo, chairman Herbert Chitepo and venerated commanders like Alfred Nikita Mangena and Josiah Magama Tongogara, to mention just a few.

These men died for a national cause, fighting the very people sponsoring the MDC in its attempts to reverse the gains of independence, while Ndira, Tandare and Jongwe were victims of their own criminal acts.

If any comparison has to be made, they would fit well into the shoes of people like Morrison Nyathi, who sold out Nyadzonia, and Giles Mutsekwa, who served in the Rhodesian security forces.

Some background would suffice here.

Jongwe, a former student leader, committed suicide on October 22 2003 in remand prison, 16 months after his arrest for killing his nursing wife in cold blood after a domestic dispute.

The 28-year-old Jongwe stabbed his wife, Rutendo Muusha, eight times with the kitchen knife she was using to peel an orange. Rutendo died 10 hours later, at the Avenues Clinic, and the post-mortem report showed that Rutendo had died of two stab wounds on both sides of the chest, which ruptured her lungs.

She was also stabbed once in the neck, once in the shoulder, once in the face and three times in the hands. The wounds in the hand, the report said, were probably sustained as she tried to fend off Jongwe's swinging knife.

Yet when he took the coward's way out in Cell C6 at Harare Remand Prison, Jongwe was hailed by the MDC as "a national hero".

His cortege was paraded in the streets on its way to the City Sports Centre for body-viewing before it departed for his rural home in Samambwa village, Zhombe.

Throughout Jongwe's funeral, posters portraying him as a "national hero" were stuck at Harvest House and also adorned the walls and trees at his rural home.

The Daily News (October 30, 2002) quoted Tsvangirai as saying at the funeral: "I believe he could have died because he refused to sell out his cause, his country and the path he had chosen as a politician."

The MDC was at it again in the wake of Tandare's death, with the so-called Save Zimbabwe Campaign sponsoring full-page adverts in The Zimbabwe Independent and The Standard that claimed Tandare was a "national hero".

A statement titled "Rest in peace Zimbabwe National Hero - Gift Tandare", posted on the MDC-T website on March 12, 2007, claimed: "The nation today mourns the death in the fight for freedom of Gift Tandare. MDC would like to acknowledge the heroic efforts of Gift who travelled on foot from the suburb of Glen View to Highfield (a 10-mile walk) in a bid to express his right to self-determination. May his soul rest in peace; the people's hero - Gift Tandare."

If heroes can be defined by walking a distance of 10 miles (16km) on a tarred road, why doesn't the MDC respect those who walked thousands of miles in thick bush, criss-crossing the country for 14 years as they tenaciously fought Ian Smith's repressive regime?

The same heroes who made it possible for the MDC to exist as a political party, and for Tsvangirai to sit at the same table with the likes of Trudy Stevenson or David Coltart, who used to lord it over him at Trojan Nickel Mine?

But history will record that Tandare, who had just been released from prison where he did time for torching a Zupco bus during the MDC's ill-fated "final push" of June 2003, met his end as he terrorised police officers in Highfield.

He was not jailed for fighting for freedom, but for burning public property and robbing a Zupco bus crew of its daily takings.

This is not the stuff heroes are made of.

Real heroes fight to free the people, not to terrorise them. Forget the MDC's pretensions that it is engaged in a fight to free Zimbabwe.

Ndira - a dunce to all who knew him - was immediately elevated to the pantheon of Steve Biko - an African revolutionary icon - with the South African Sunday Times devoting acres of space to abet a non-existent profile.

In the 2 000-word piece they devoted to Ndira, the Sunday Times never mentioned his frequent brushes with the law, 35 in nine years, for what they were apart from trying to link them to political persecution. Even the fact that a Commission of Inquiry instituted by Tsvangirai to probe the barbaric attack on Trudy Stevenson and three other party members in Mabvuku had implicated Ndira was conveniently forgotten in favour of Pollyanna accounts that gave the façade of a saint.

Even poor Timothy Mubhawu also confessed to having been battered by Ndira during his time as MP for Mabvuku-Tafara. Ndira was also on hand when MDC youths nearly killed the party's director of security, Peter Guhu, at Harvest House.

Given the way Western ambassadors here, and their superiors back home claimed ownership of the MDC-T when they believed Tsvangirai and the MDC-T had romped to victory on March 29, it is now beyond doubt that the MDC-T is a counter-revolutionary Trojan horse that should never masquerade as a genuine Zimbabwean party, let alone be allowed to pretend to form a government.

By dint of that, every member of the MDC-T is a stooge in the mould of those who tried and failed to sell the struggle.

But it is not surprising why the MDC-T is so desperate for heroes, no one in its structures broke a sweat to serve Zimbabwe during the liberation struggle.

Tsvangirai himself spent no less than 24 hours in a liberation war camp, before fleeing to serve Rhodesia, first in a textile factory in Mutare and then in the shafts of Trojan Nickel Mine in Bindura. No doubt his efforts there went a long way in enabling Rhodesia buy napalm and FN carbines to use against freedom fighters.

The same goes for Giles Mutsekwa, Roy Bennett, David Coltart and other nameless and faceless pretenders in the quisling party's rank and file who gave their all to preserve Rhodesia by serving in its security services.

Any wonder they are still fighting to bring it back today?

Looking at what is considered "heroic" in MDC-T ranks, which is barbaric violence, it is not difficult to situate - at Harvest House - the ongoing wave of violence in some rural and resettlement areas, given the prevalence of Selous Scouts and RAR members in the party's ranks.