Pan African Visions

Zimbabwe, Cuba Sign MoU for transfer of   Military Equipment to Museum of African Liberation

June 17, 2025

By Wallace Mawire

 The Institute of African Knowledge (INSTAK) and the National Council of National Heritage of the Republic of Cuba on 10 June 2025 signed a Memorandum of Understanding for the transfer of Military equipment used in the momentous Battle of Cuito Cuanavale to the Museum of African Liberation in Harare. 

 The MoU was signed in Havana, Cuba by the Chief Executive Officer of INSTAK, Ambassador Kwame Muzawazi, and the Director-General of the National Council of National Heritage, Ms Sonja Perez Mojena.

 The agreement formalises how the two parties will coordinate collaboration in the Pan-African Memorial Park and the Museum of African Liberation, which are projects being implemented by INSTAK. 

 Present at the landmark signing ceremony were Brigadier-General Million Ndlovu of the Zimbabwe Defence Forces (ZDF), and Cuba’s Vice-Minister of Culture, Ms Lizette Martinez Luzardo.

 After the ceremony, Ms Perez Mojena said Africa and the Caribbean island had an unbreakable bond, sealed by the blood split by Cuban fighters in support of the continent’s liberation. 

 She said Afro-Cuban unity had helped defeat one of the greatest enemies of humanity in the form of colonialism and apartheid. 

 Ms Perez Mojena said the MoU would help facilitate the preservation of this important history for all generations to come. More specifically, the outcome of the agreement would ensure both the people of Cuba and Africa appreciate better who they were and where they had come from.

  She said Cuba and Africa would always be friends, and that her country was highly appreciative of the work INSTAK was doing to deepen ties while recording and disseminating important knowledge at the same time.

 The Museum of African Liberation is the centrepiece of Liberation City, a 101-hecatre multipurpose development being spearheaded by INSTAK in Zimbabwe’s capital city.

 Earlier, Ambassador Muzawazi described the donation of the military equipment as an immensely generous gesture by the people of Cuba to the people of Africa, which would transform the Museum of African Liberation into a five-star museum.

“This is equipment that was used in the Battle of Cuito Cuanavale, which really was a defining moment in the history of Africa. It signified the beginning of the end of apartheid, the independence of Namibia, and the victory of the Angolan people in their struggle for self-determination, peace and development. 

 “So we think that the transfer of the equipment will mark a very significant milestone, which is the transformation of the Museum of African Liberation into a five-star museum. A five-star museum carries the spirit and the soul of the times gone by through tangibles. The Museum of African Liberation will not be an information centre masquerading as a museum. These are the real artefacts that carry the spirit and the soul of Africa’s glorious past,” Ambassador Muzawazi said.

 The signing of the MoU is the culmination of a series of formal and informal high-level engagements between the two countries.

 The first of these was initiated by His Excellency the President of the Republic of Zimbabwe, Dr Emmerson Dambudzo Mnangagwa, when he dispatched his Special Envoy, Ambassador Simbarashe Mumbengegwi, to present the Museum of African Liberation Project to H.E President Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez of Cuba in 2022.

 Several engagements followed, resulting in the notable handover of a variety of artefacts to the Museum of African Liberation by Mr Esteban Lazo Hernández, the President of the Cuban National Assembly on March 3, 2025.

 The agreement on the transfer of military equipment from the Battle of Cuito Cuanavale, and for collaboration on the Pan-African Memorial Park, represent the crowning jewels of this diplomatic engagement. 

 Cuba is the only non-African country that deployed its own troops to confront apartheid in Africa, and the Museum of African Liberation has set aside space to memorialise this noteworthy contribution. 

 The highlight of Cuba’s military support for Africa’s independence was its involvement in the Battle of Cuito Cuanavale from November 1987 to March 1988. In that battle, Cuban soldiers got into the trenches with Angolan and Namibian freedom fighters to first stop the advance of apartheid forces, and then to repel them and send them retreating to South Africa.

 That colossal victory greatly weakened imperialist-backed rebels in Angola, speeded up Namibia’s quest for independence, and paved the way for majority rule in South Africa. Today, the SADC region observes 23 March, which was the last day of the Battle of Cuito Cuanavale, as Southern Africa Liberation Day.

 Though physically based in Zimbabwe, the Museum houses material from all African countries that waged armed struggles to liberate themselves, in addition to documenting the contributions of African and non-African countries and organisations that supported the liberation struggle politically, militarily, diplomatically and morally.

 The Museum of African Liberation is conceived as a monument to the epic struggle to liberate the African people from European colonialism and apartheid.

 The Institute of African Knowledge (INSTAK) is a Pan-African think tank established in 2017 and is based in Harare, Zimbabwe. Among its landmark projects to date are the Book of African Records and The Africa Factbook, the latter produced with support from the Government of Zimbabwe and the African Union.

 INSTAK is currently building Liberation City in Harare, whose marque project is the Museum of African Liberation. Liberation City also encompasses Heritage Village, Liberation Mall, an Animal Park, an African-themed Amusement Park, a five-star hotel, and Presidential Villas.

 The Project is being undertaken with support from the Government of Zimbabwe, and in collaboration with other Governments and local and international partners. 

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