Zimbabweans will commemorate Heroes' Day this year in a somber and melancholic mood. The celebrations that graced the streets of Harare when Robert Mugabe was deposed in a military coup, which many Zimbabweans hoped would signal a turning of the tide, have been dashed. Not only has it become evident that the numerous human rights violations of the Mugabe era will continue under the newly elected president and his “new order,” but also that the violations will be more brutal and will be committed with impunity for the world to see. The massacre committed by the presidential guard following the harmonized elections on 30 July, which resulted in the deaths of six unarmed civilians, as well as the brutal crackdown on opposition supporters, candidates and election agents that followed are evidence of the worsening of the situation, which will take a toll on Zimbabweans and a profound regression of fundamental freedoms over the next five years. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay What is even more poignant about the atmosphere surrounding this Day of Heroes is the paradox between what those responsible for current events insist they are and who they present themselves as being through their actions. For a long time, ZANU PF and its governments have appropriated Zimbabwe's "hero" status and positioned themselves as the "people's liberators" who, as Chris Mutsvangwa recently put it, gave this country to the people. Heroism has been packaged in the sterile political version that recognizes only those who: fought in the liberation struggle; meaning those who marched across the borders, mobilized the “povo” and literally fought the Rhodesian soldiers; with an added bonus for those who shot down a Rhodesian helicopter or two; or have been threatened with detention, hunted down or detained for short or long periods in Rhodesian prisons, for expressing a political opinion regarding the need for the black majority to achieve the same civil status as the white minority; o aligned their political thinking and strategies during and after the war of liberation with ZANU PF, and firmly supported the vision of a ZANU PF-led government (with Robert Mugabe as its lifelong leader); oThey are male and, if female, they are related to a male who meets the criteria a, b and c and is very high up the ladder of officialdom of the party structure. The selective, subjective and inconsistent application of these criteria has mired the process of recognizing heroes and heroines in mystery and secrecy, as these criteria are sometimes applied jointly and simultaneously (e.g. the denial of hero status to Ndabaningi Sithole, who , although he fought in the liberation struggle and was detained for his political thinking, he did not support Mugabe and therefore no space was left available for him), but in others the rules do not apply cumulatively (e.g. Border Gezi, the whose credentials for the war of liberation were vague, but his zealous service to Mugabe brought the government and ingenuity creating a paramilitary youth wing that subjugated rural populations into voting for ZANU PF secured him a good place at the Heroes Acre.) Many have previously noted how the national hero status has been politicized leading to what appears to be only former President Robert Mugabe's friends and family being recognized as heroes, excluding deserving individuals and including the undeserving . In all these constant conversations, discussions about the marked exclusion ofwomen's contribution to the liberation struggle have been anecdotal. Rightly labeled the “forgotten heroines” in a 2012 exposé, Zimbabwe's women freedom fighters remain unknown and unrecognized. One account reflects on how the promise of a more just and equitable Zimbabwe inspired women and fighters to participate in the liberation struggle; yet they were systematically denied this ideal for which they sacrificed themselves. Those who dominate the “female heroine” narratives are either understood to be in the realm of the mystical, making them demigods and not just women (like Mbuya Nehanda) or they were related with male political figures, so their recognition comes by association. and not because of him. The likes of Sally Heyfron Mugabe (wife of Robert Mugabe), Johanna “Mama Mafuyane (wife of Joshua Nkomo), Sabina Mugabe (sister of Robert Mugabe), Victoria Chitepo (wife of Herbert Chitepo) Julia Zvobgo (wife of Edison Zvobgo) , Sunny Ntombiyelanga Takawira (wife of Leopold Takawira) and Ruth Chinamano (wife of Josiah Chinamano) are often presented as mere beneficiaries of “hero status” through association with their male relatives; denying the fact that these women, in themselves, were fierce and courageous and that they gave their lives and well-being to the fight, as much as any male hero. Mostly men's names dominate what are often presented as the three definitive phases of the Zimbabwean war. history; a glorious pre-colonial past in which our ancestors thrived economically, politically, socially and scientifically, inventing magnificent infrastructure projects such as Great Zimbabwe and the Khami Ruins; producing expressive art such as the rock paintings in Domboshawa, Matobo Hills and sculpting beautiful works of art such as the Zimbabwe bird; a gruesome colonial past where our ancestors were unjustly robbed of their beautiful land, where the black majority was segregated from the white minority, their land expropriated and their dignity robbed; and a recent pre- and post-colonial past, in which a distinct group of “liberators” died for the country and used this real and metaphorical death as the defining source of their right to perpetual power and rule. inconvenient truths about the brutal and bitter wars of the pre-colonial Mutapa Empire, the two Shona-Matebele wars, and the black-on-black violence of the Second Chimurenga, including the summary killings of those considered traitors; the appropriation of livestock from poor communities to feed eligible soldiers, whose role in the "bush" was considered more critical to the country's liberation than simple resistance within the borders, the rape of women as spoils of war, and the forced abortions that female fighters endured at the hands of their male counterparts. The version of history presented as a single intrinsic and intractable truth denies the fact that Zimbabweans, not ZANU PF, bought their country's liberation with blood, sweat and years of torturous detention, isolation in Moscow tsetse infested reserves and denial of fundamental rights. They are Zimbabweans who have stood up for their rights to freedom, dignity and equality. This version excludes women because it has forced the nation to adopt a conception of colonialism in its political and economic sense, paying little attention to the social and cultural impact, particularly how the marginalization and profound silencing of women's voices they are a product of the misogyny and male domination that characterized colonial power. Traditional customs regarding women's behavior, both in public and private spaces, are presented as rigid.