Human Rights Soldier dies

I just wanted you to know that Runnart Kambudzi died recently. Runnart was one of the pioneer staff members of Civil Liberties Committee.

She was an administrator and Gender officer. I preferred to refer to her as assistant director because the two of us did the donkey work with help from the founder members and dedicated members of CILIC. Whenever the wind turned against me personally, which could be nasty, she would manage to sooth me. She would convince me to go and meet people I thought I should not meet. She would do her job seven days a week, 10 hours a day and sometimes we would work in the field 8 hours a day and drive four hours a day for a one week field visit. She would work the accounts, help in the organisation and lecture, and work on our sentiments in such a calm manner.

She was a chronic asthmatic, so that travelling in the cold could have contributed to her early death. For some time we would go without salaries, yet she was a widow with so many dependants and her 2 children, one of them an adopted niece. She was a gallant Human Rights Soldier with no provisions for the battle.

I hope you can pass this on to people who knew her, most of whom admired her guts and her beauty.