WINDHOEK – The Namibian media yesterday awoke to the news of the passing of journalist Patience Nyangove who died in a local hospital in the early morning hours.
The Zimbabwean-born Nyangove was until the time of her death an employee of the weekly Confidénte where she served as both news editor and senior investigative journalist.
She was 37. She joined Confidénte in its inception years in 2011 and was a key figure of the editorial team. Announcing her passing, Confidénte editor-in-chief Max Hamata described Nyangove as an award-winning, hardworking and passionate investigative journalist, who covered several beats with particular interest in politics and health. He said her investigative work included several criminal enterprises, stemming from the GIPF multi-million dollar fraud saga, investigations into racketeering illegal abortions by several doctors and Chinese government scholarships for children of the elite. “Some of her investigative work led to official state investigations while others got muted responses. We have indeed lost a precious asset in investigative reporting,” Hamata said.
“We have lost one of our own and we can only honour her legacy by building on the foundation that she has left us with. Certainly journalism is poorer without her and we offer our deepest condolences to her family.” Nyangove was born on 17 January 1982 in Masvingo, Zimbabwe.
She started her career as a journalist 16 years ago in Harare where she was a reporter with AMH Media Holdings. Before she joined Confidénte, Hamata said, Nyangove endured several arrests at the hands of the Zimbabwean security forces.
“Her most prominent arrest was a few months before she joined Confidénte when she was charged with criminal defamation and ‘publication of false statements prejudicial to the state’ for reporting on the tension between the coalition of President Robert Mugabe’s Zanu-PF and Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai’s Movement for Democratic Change (MDC),” Hamata said. Nyangove was also remembered by her colleagues yesterday.