The Diocese of Mutare & The Carmelites in Zimbabwe - the Irish ...

men’ from Zimbabwe and was very reluctant to let them into the house as Amilton and Severino were
not there when the visitors arrived!! It took some persuasion on the part of Simplisio and Norbert to
convince Telesforo that they were his brothers from Zimbabwe!! During February 2003, Martin
O’Regan and John McGrath visited our brothers in Gorongoza and spent a few days with them and
then left to travel on to Beira. Before they left Gorongoza, they were aware of flooding on the road
outside Beira and sure enough the whole area was flooded and was impassable. The only way to Beira
was by ‘goods train’, vehicles were loaded onto the wagons of a ‘goods train’ and off one went!! At
around noon, a ‘goods train’ arrived and the ‘unloading’ of the vehicles from Beira began and then
the ‘loading’ of the vehicles for Beira. As there were vehicles of all sizes, lots of skill was required to
manoeuvre the vehicles off and on to the wagons!!
We spent about six hours at the ‘station’ before we moved!! The train started, stopped, started again,
stopped again, it was now 8.00pm, we still had another three hours of travel to Beira!! We arrived at
11.00pm, the unloading began and off we went in search of where we were to stay. We found the area
but at such an hour we could not find the ‘house’ and with nobody around, we had to search for
accommodation for the night. Well, we thought all the drama was over but there was plenty more to
come!! As we searched for a hotel, with a Zimbabwe vehicle registration, all the ‘ladies of the night’, in
their hundreds, thought that here are two rich tycoons from Zimbabwe on the prowl!! Anyway, to
make a long story short, we found a place to stay, one room, we were exhausted after sixteen hours on
the road. After about an hour in the room, all hell broke loose!! Perhaps a guest ‘invited’ his
girlfriend to his room and the security were trying to get him and the girlfriend out of the room!!
Well, what a racket, between dogs barking and people shouting, such commotion, Martin heard
nothing!! Next morning we headed for ‘the house’ in the Makuti area which we found with no bother
and the people in the house were wondering where we were the day and night before as they were
expecting us!! We had a nice few days in Beira and enjoyed the ocean, the fish and the Manica beer.
After a few days we headed back to Mutare, the flood waters had now receded and traffic was able to
pass. The journey from the house in Makuti to where the flooding was took 90 minutes, a far cry
from the fourteen hours a few days earlier!! (‘Carmeletter Zimbabwe’, October 2009, pages 15 to 18
gives a more graphic account of this trip!!)
There was an armed robbery at the Priory Mutare during February 2006. The Provincial, Father
Fintan Burke who had just arrived from Harare an hour earlier was together with Fathers Simplisio
Manyika, Martin O’Regan and John McGrath when six men entered the Priory by the kitchen room.
Mr Timothy Kwenbeya and Mr Campion Nyamustwa were the first to encounter the robbers who
forced them to keep silent and forced them to march with the robbers to the community room at the
Priory. Three were armed while the other three searched the house. Between all the shouting, all the
noise, their demands for money and cell-phones and ordering everybody to lie face down on the floor,
they began to search us on the floor for the money and cell-phones. Not having too much luck they
demanded where the money was kept and John McGrath went with four robbers to the office and
opened the press where we kept the money and gave them all that was there but they were still not
satisfied.
They started throwing things around the place and becoming aggressive, after a lot of shouting, we all
returned to the Community room and back on the floor. All went quiet then for some time until
Campion felt that they had gone, sure enough they had left leaving, the travel cases of Father Burke
on the passageway. The cases were too bulky for them to carry onto the street outside. The Police
were called so the place was a hive of activity of the next few hours, with police, police dogs, and God
knows what!! No shots were fired, a few of the brethren received a few kicks and fist punches!! We
were all very lucky!!
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