Border Gezi (17 December 1964 – 28 April 2001) was a

Zimbabwe file:Zimbabwe, relief map.jpg, upright=1.22, Zimbabwe, relief map Zimbabwe, officially the Republic of Zimbabwe, is a landlocked country in Southeast Africa, between the Zambezi and Limpopo Rivers, bordered by South Africa to the south, Bots ...

an politician. He was a close ally of

Robert Mugabe Robert Gabriel Mugabe (; ; 21 February 1924 – 6 September 2019) was a Zimbabwean revolutionary and politician who served as Prime Minister of Zimbabwe from 1980 to 1987 and then as President from 1987 to 2017. He served as Leader of th ...

within ZANU-PF and served as Minister for Gender, Youth and Employment from 2000 having previously been a provincial governor. Gezi was brought up in

Mvurwi Mvurwi, originally known as Umvukwesi, is a town in Mashonaland Central province in Zimbabwe. Some of Mvurwi's schools include Holy Rosary Primary and Secondary School, Mvurwi Primary and High School and Umvukwesi Primary School which is one o ...

and attended Holy Rosary Secondary School. He first worked as an accounts clerk for the Zimbabwe Electricity Supply Authority before being elected to the

House of Assembly of Zimbabwe The National Assembly of Zimbabwe, previously the House of Assembly until 2013, is the lower house of the Parliament of Zimbabwe. It was established upon Zimbabwe's independence in 1980 as one of two chambers of parliament. Between the abolition ...

for Muzarabani in the 1990 elections. In 1993 he was elected as ZANU-PF chairman for Mashonaland Central, and the government appointed him Provincial Governor from 1996. At the 2000 parliamentary election, Gezi was in charge of recruiting and organising groups of young ZANU-PF supporters into a militia. The militia groups he led were implicated in violent attacks on supporters of the

Movement for Democratic Change Movement may refer to: Generic uses * Movement (clockwork), the internal mechanism of a timepiece * Movement (sign language), a hand movement when signing * Motion, commonly referred to as movement * Movement (music), a division of a larger co ...

, and in invasions of white-owned farms. At a special ZANU-PF congress later that year, Gezi was appointed Secretary for the Commissariat, with responsibility for organizing Robert Mugabe's re-election as President two years later. Gezi won the

Bindura Bindura is a city in the province of Mashonaland Central province, Zimbabwe. It is located in the Mazowe Valley about 88 km north-east of Harare. According to the 1982 Population Census, the city had a population of 18,243. This rose to 21, ...

seat at the 2000 election and was appointed as Minister for Gender, Youth and Employment. He was identified as a close ally of

who had the potential to hold high office in the future. However, he was killed when his Mercedes-Benz E-Class W210 skidded off the

Harare Harare ( ), formerly Salisbury, is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Zimbabwe. The city proper has an area of , a population of 1,849,600 as of the 2022 Zimbabwe census, 2022 census and an estimated 2,487,209 people in its metrop ...

Masvingo Masvingo, known as Fort Victoria during the colonial period, is a city in southeastern Zimbabwe and the capital of Masvingo Province. The city lies close to Great Zimbabwe, the national monument from which the country takes its name and clos ...

road after bursting a tyre and crashed into numerous

Eucalyptus ''Eucalyptus'' () is a genus of more than 700 species of flowering plants in the family Myrtaceae. Most species of ''Eucalyptus'' are trees, often Mallee (habit), mallees, and a few are shrubs. Along with several other genera in the tribe Eucalyp ...

trees on 28 April 2001.

References

Minister Border Gezi dies
(ZBC) {{DEFAULTSORT:Gezi, Border 1964 births 2001 deaths Zimbabwe African National Liberation Army personnel ZANU–PF politicians Members of the National Assembly of Zimbabwe Government ministers of Zimbabwe Provincial governors of Zimbabwe Road incident deaths in Zimbabwe People from Mashonaland Central Province Members of the 5th Parliament of Zimbabwe