JUSTIN Daka travelled across the border from Zambia in a quest to improve his chess rating at the 2025 Minerva Zim Open Chess Championship in Harare.
The tournament was held from August 20 to 24.
Daka whose current rating is 2226 was not here for the flashing cameras or the empty rhetoric of grand speeches, he was a man on a mission, a relentless journey, a gradual ascent toward the elusive ELO rating mark of 2300 by the end of the year so that he could earn the title of a FIDE Master.
“I came for rating. That’s what brought me here,” he revealed to EnterSportNews.
“The issue of winning comes in when you are competing and that only comes when you start to see your opponents falling against you. I want to increase my rating to 2300 plus by the end of the year.”
This was not his first time on Zimbabwean soil. He had come once before, to a tournament in Kwekwe, tied for first at the JR Mawere chess tournament.
For a man who said he came for rating, his victory hit like a thunderclap.
“This is my second time in Zimbabwe,” he said. “The first, I tied for first in Kwekwe at JR Mawere event. This time, I wanted to see where I stood.”
But chess is like a mirror, and mirrors do not lie.
As the second top rated player inside the 6th-floor playing hall, Daka beat top seed and fellow countryman Interntional Master Gillan Bwalya. He also dismantled Tapiwa Jele, Zimbabwe’s reigning national champion, and took down Emarald Mushore, a former Zimbabwean champion.
The oppenents who survived him didn’t beat him, instead, they clung to their hard-won half-points like shipwrecked sailors grasping at driftwood in a stormy sea. Spencer Masango of Zimbabwe fought him to a draw. So did battle-hardened Dion Moyo and fellow Zambian Timothy Kabwe.
The rest fell.
Daka reflected on his match against Masango, acknowledging it as the most challenging encounter of the entire event.
“Spencer,” Daka said. “The game was tough. I’ve faced him maybe four times. We’re about fifty-fifty.”
Nine rounds later, the 37 year old, father of three and a member of the Zambian police force walked out of Joina City with more than rating points. He left as the man everyone was whispering about, being hailed as champion of the 2025 Minerva Zimbabwe Open A section.
He won $1,500. A gold medal and a trophy.
Masango finished second, Jele third, Moyo fourth in the Open A section.
Open B went to Tawanda Moyo with 8 points, his lone loss against runner-up Simbarashe Chikoya on 7.5. Pledge Kwaramba followed in third with 7.
The Ladies Section came down to tiebreaks, Linda Dalitso Shaba claimed it over WCM Kudzanayi Charinda, both on 7. Botswana’s WFM Natalie Banda took third with 6, sharing that score with South Africa’s Kajol Naidoo and Zimbabweans Refiloe Mudodo and Colleta Wakuruwarewa.
The Corporate Section belonged to Solomon Chimuzura of Zinara with 7.5 points, edging Walter Mukundwa and Milton Marime by the slimmest of margins.
The Minerva Open had teeth this year. Over 200 players. Sponsorship consistent under Todd Mapingire’s new presidency of the Zimbabwe Chess Federation. Minerva Risk Advisors, New World Properties, Pro Bottlers such big names backing a big fight.
“Zimbabweans might have relaxed because they were on home turf,” Mapingire said.
“But a Zambian has won, and as Zimbabweans, we have won the experience.”
