By Rex Mphisa
ANYMORE Zvitsva, the multiple murder, attempted murder and rape suspect arrested in a Guruve, has joined the long list of men whose title of “most wanted criminal” grabbed headlines in Zimbabwe since 1980.
He was caught during a Saturday January 4, 2025, joint operation by the Zimbabwe Republic Police and the Zimbabwe National Army.
More often than not, this title is associated with the notorious armed robbers Stephen Chidhumo and Edgar Masendeke.
These operated in the mid-1990s and send chills across Zimbabwe with their crime spree and repeated prison breaks.
The two became a national top priority for the Zimbabwe Republic Police (ZRP).
Their reign of terror was between October 1994 to September 1997 spanning three years of anxiety.
Chidhumo and Masendeke had a series of armed robberies, murders, and rapes across Zimbabwe’s Manicaland and Masvingo provinces to their names.
Their ability to repeatedly evade and escape police custody, including a jailbreak from the maximum-security Chikurubi Prison, captured national headlines and the public’s imagination to the point where children in townships used their names as nicknames in games.
The ZRP launched significant operations, including “Operation Masendeke,” to capture them, and at one point, a $60,000 reward was offered for information leading to Chidhumo’s arrest.
Both men were eventually captured in Mozambique in 1997 and extradited back to Zimbabwe.
They were tried, convicted on multiple counts of serious crimes, and sentenced to death.
They were executed by hanging at Chikurubi Maximum Prison in 2002, becoming some of the last hangings.
While other notorious criminals like the current Vumbunu armed robbery gang or serial killer Bright Zhantali have emerged, none captured the same level of widespread public attention and “most wanted” status as the Chidhumo and Masendeke duo in the post-independence era.
But the arrival of Zvitsva, and the amount of attention he captured, the resources used to track him down brings him among the top most wanted.
In less than a year, Zvitsva, who surprisingly kept his crime at home, killed more people than Chidhumo and Masendeke’s three year escapades.
Police on December 15 announced the killing of five members of the same family – a mother, her two children and two grandchildren – an act which cast a spotlight on Guruve amid reports that 17 people had been murdered in cold blood in the area this year.
Others claims were the actual number of people murdered is 14.
Grace Zvitsva, Loice Chiringaushe, Takudzwa Kariva and Tatenda Chirenje, all his relatives, were found dead to which he confessed.
“I heard them talking about me so I said I must kill them so they never talk about me again,” he said during capture.
That night he spared Grace Zvitsva, his auntie’s five grandchildren slept in a spare bedroom he may not have entered in his bloody attack.
His uncle Tendai Zvitsva was not lucky and was rushed to Guruve Hospital, where he died upon admission that same day.
Police intensified the search for Zvitsva employing drone technology and manhunt teams comprising Support Unit, Criminal Investigations Departments, Canine, horse patrols and intelligence units to conduct close surveillance in the forest and mountains to no avail.
He was now suspected to be mentally challenged.
Police were also linking Zvitsva to several recent murders in Zimuna Village, involving victims Pamela Chipangura, Kudzai Chipangura, and Tawanda Chipangura, whose cases were being investiunaed, a cording to a statement by ZRP spokesman senior commissioner Paul Nyathi.
Pamela, 39, at the time of her death, was killed together with her two children Kudzai and Tawanda.
Then the Army was deployed.
They simply cut his food supply by isolating relatives and he showed up.
But Zvitsva reminded Zimbabweans of Sampson Kanderayi, the axe killer who confessed to 50 murders just after independence.
More like Zvitsva, he preyed on women.