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Sikhumbuzo Moyo, Senior Sports Reporter
CLAIMS that Pumula’s mystic martial arts king Ndodana Gonde, better known as Master Ndo, was a violent street thug and gang leader, who took advantage of his karate skills to harass and terrorise innocent residents have been vehemently dismissed by one of his former students.

Master Ndo, who rose to fame in the late 1990s as a teenager before forming his martial arts club, Master Ndo Martial Arts School, left Zimbabwe for the United States of America in 1996 at the age of 23 and has never returned, but reportedly regularly visits Malawi where his family originally comes from.

Master Ndo was born in Zimbabwe and attended Robert Sinyoka Primary School and Gifford High School in Bulawayo.

He later changed his original birth name to Walter Grahams, according to his once loyal student, who was a member of his inner circle, the Black Shaolin Guards, Simbarashe Simango.

After Chronicle Sport carried Master Ndo’s story on Saturday, a reader using the name Gomane commented, claiming that he together with other boys from Pumula East endured constant bullying and harassment by Master Ndo and his violent gang.

He said Master Ndo formed his karate club during a rise in gangsterism in Bulawayo in the 1990s and terrorised Pumula residents.

“I grew up in Esphakeni myself and I can tell you Master Ndo was nothing but a thug. His gang terrorised people (in Old Pumula). We from East (Pumula), couldn’t watch movies at Old (Pumula) unless we went there as an armed group. He even terrorised his own family. The early 90s saw a rise of gangsterism in Bulawayo, Terror Ten, Star Force etc. Master Ndo led his too in Pumula,” wrote Gomane.

Another reader Bird Eye Chilli, responded to Gomane, saying he too had heard such stories about Master Ndo and his ‘gang’.

“Very interesting, you must have had quite a drama and event filled childhood. Ya, I heard about that side of him and his ‘gang’ or followers,” wrote Bird Eye Chilli.

However, Simango rubbished the claims and said Master Ndo was a man of the people and the whole of Pumula adored him.

Simango challenged anyone claiming that Master Ndo was a gang leader to provide proof, saying the only extreme and dangerous side about Master Ndo was his martial arts talent.

“Those claims are rubbish. I can authoritatively tell you that no one who lived and lives here in Pumula can say Master Ndo was a violent character. It will be interesting to have anyone come out here and say Master Ndo was violent or a thug who terrorised residents. You can even check with the police if they ever had a docket opened against him. Master Ndo was a people’s person and what I can tell you here and now is that when it came to martial arts, the man was deadly; he was an animal I don’t want to lie,” said Simango.