Zimbabwe’s Untouchables: a Signature, a Bribe, a Blind Eye
Dear Family and Friends,
On a hot summer morning I sat for a bit watching a black-headed heron sifting through the golden stubble of a newly harvested crop. It was a beautiful day, a deep blue sky, very little wind and trees, alive with birds. I lingered a while, letting the peace and beauty soak in, gathering my wits to face the whispers of what I suspected lay ahead.
Zimbabwe is being chipped away, one shovel at a time, one excavator scoop at a time, one mine truck at a time. It’s the second land invasion, people say, but is that really what’s going on or is it really the orgy of self-enrichment, corruption and plundering by people in positions of power and authority?
On a 14-kilometre stretch of road just beyond Darwendale village most signs of normal life are gone. No sign of farms, crops, villages or homes. This 14-kilometer stretch of road leading to the boundary with National Parks’ Darwendale Dam is an ugly, scarred waste land.
Huge mine dump trucks loaded with soil and rocks roar across the plains leavings clouds of red dust in their wake. They don’t slow down as they reach the tar road so watch out because these are the Untouchables.
The Chinese are mining here and their chrome pits, trenches and mounds of black soil, red soil and rocks stretch as far as the eye can see on both sides of the road. Across the plains, up the hillsides and even underneath the main electricity pylons feeding the national grid; the devastation is everywhere.
An excavator is at work up a steep hill swinging its long arm again and again as it scrapes up our precious earth and dumps it into waiting trucks, suffocating dust hanging in our beautiful blue sky. The sight of it makes you heartsore, so heartsore.
A couple of brave souls are trying to graze their cattle amongst the abandoned mounds of rocks and between the trenches but it’s a treacherous place. People say that when a cow or calf falls into one of the pits or trenches, they get stuck or break their legs and there is no way to get them out.
A woman tells me that when the Chinese do their blasting at night the explosions shake their windows and crack the walls of their houses two kilometers away. “It’s awful, so awful,” she says, “everything has been completely destroyed. These people don’t care. No one can stop them.”
You can see the march of the Chinese and their yellow excavators along this 14-kilometer stretch of road by the trail of destruction they leave behind. There is no sign anywhere of any attempt at reclamation of the land. They dig their holes, pits and trenches, extract our minerals and then leave, doing nothing to fill holes, flatten mounds or re-establish vegetation.
Take this picture and replicate it in Hwange, Mutoko, Shamva, Makoni, Haruni, Magunje, Chihota, Mazowe, Chiadzwa, Uzumba and so many other places. Take it into mountains and escarpments such as at Boterekwa in Shurugwi, Muvaradonha Wilderness in Muzarabani and now even in Christmas Pass. Nowhere is safe from the mining scourge now.
It’s easy to blame the Chinese miners, who have a bad human-rights track record in Zimbabwe, but the real question is how are they getting away with it, why are they untouchable, who is protecting them?
Former Energy Minister Fortune Chasi this week spilled the beans when he said: “Local officials sign the licences, local elites pocket the ‘facilitation fees,’ local silence allows rivers to turn into sludge…. Every destroyed riverbed tells a local story, a signature, a bribe, a blind eye. … This isn’t a ‘Chinese problem.’ It is a governance problem. … The Chinese did not destroy our mountains and rivers. Our signatures did,” he said.
Stark honesty from an ex- Minister but it’s a shame he didn’t say it when he was still in office. But its not just the pits, mounds and trenches in Darwendale or the sludge in rivers, it’s the cyanide and mercury poisoning our rivers and devastating aquatic, bird and wild life; the long-term soil contamination, the loss of biodiversity and habitat and the widespread erosion, siltation and pollution.
Everywhere communities are losing their ancestral homelands and being silenced with short term, cheap ‘compensation’ such as a fence or a pump or a few dirty dollars. Long after the Chinese miners have left we will all feel the effects of this out-of-control mining.
While people say nothing, do nothing and look the other way our beautiful country is being torn apart, ravaged, looted and destroyed by the untouchables, and by those in power in Zimbabwe who give them permission to do so. Please use your voice to share this news and help us to stop this before it’s too late.
For 25 years I’ve been writing these eye witness accounts of life in Zimbabwe. It is your support and contributions that enable me to continue. Please visit my website to donate.
Until next time, thanks for reading this letter and my books about Zimbabwe, a country in waiting.
Ndini shamwari yenyu (I am your friend)
Love Cathy 9th October 2025.
Copyright © Cathy Buckle https://cathybuckle.co.zw/
My new Photobook “Zimbabwe’s Timeless Beauty The 2025 Collection” and my Beautiful Zimbabwe 2026 Calendar are now available. They can both be ordered from my website or from LULU. Click here to order www.lulu.com/spotlight/cathybuckle2018