HARARE – A woman claiming to be Oliver Mtukudzi’s former flame is pleading with relatives of the late great musician to help her get identity documents for a 45-year-old man who she says was fathered by Tuku.
Rosie Makumbe (69) has revealed that she only had one child with Tuku because she was too crestfallen to give her heart to another man after the two of them broke things off.
In fact, she claims that the musician penned the classic song, Hazvireve Rudo Handina as a dedication to her son who was born in 1979.
Mtukudzi married Melody Murape in 1978. The musician later divorced her and married Daisy Mtukudzi, to whom he was wedded until his passing in 2019.
In an interview with H-Metro, Rosie revealed that she wanted her son, Aaron, to get proper documentation proving that he was from the Samanyanga clan.
Rosie, who claims to be the sister to Jane “Jeri” Sadza, Tuku’s late friend and manager, said she did not harbour any resentment towards the musician. She described the days they shared together as a blissful fairy-tale.
“I remember vividly how Oliver would come to Jeri’s place and that is how we fell in love and I fell pregnant. Back in the day, I was very beautiful and I think that’s what attracted him to me. Pamvura yekugeza tainyatsokuwanza, yokumwa ndoyaiita shoma.
“He used to take me to his shows and our love was a fairytale, he was also the first person to take me on a train ride when he came to get me in Gweru where I had gone after I ran away from home.
“After that train ride, that is when he composed his song Right Direction arimo achiimba kuti usaseka akwira mbombera,” she said.
She said she only ever had one child because of the way her affair with the music had ended.
“Isusu takambofara, pamari taisaverenga mazuda (coins), we would count notes and since I was just a young lady hapana chaaisandiitira, haaa, mari takamboidya.
“After Tuku, I was never romantically involved with someone else, ndakabva ndafinhikana zvachose nemhaka yokuti the way our issue was handled did not sit well with me. I only have my one son,” she said.
She said while Tuku was alive she had repeatedly tried to get proper documentation for her son, who has an interest in music, to no avail.
“When Tuku was still alive, I tried to get him to acquire a birth certificate for our child, but he would always claim that he was busy so I ended up putting my maiden name on his birth certificate.
“He once told me to bring the child so that he could teach him how to sing because he said that was the only thing that he was good at and was able to teach his son.
“My child was even taken to Alick Macheso so that he could teach him how to sing, and he went there three times. However, he was no longer able to go back because my child’s wife got sick and died,” she said.
Meanwhile Aaron Chaka has since spoken out saying he felt H-Metro was not the kind of media outlet in which he wanted his story to be told.
“My mother left home saying that she was going to ZBC and Star FM, I don’t know how she ended up at H-Metro,” he said.
“I would have preferred that the story be published in other media outlets and not H-Metro due to a number of reasons.
“Right now I am in the process of trying to change my surname so that I can have my father’s name so I don’t want anything to jeopardise that.”
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