News / National
Nehanda Heritage Tree in Third Accident
30 Dec 2011 at 23:47hrs | Views
The third vehicular victim of the ‘Nehanda Tree’ December 29, 2011 - Zimbojam
On Thursday night a Nissan Elgrand cruising along Harare's Josiah Tongogara Avenue became the third vehicle to interact closely with the controversial 'Nehanda Tree' within the space of a month, ZimboJam reported on Friday.
The vehicle, which was heading towards Sam Nujoma Street, seemed to have been travelling right in the centre of the road before it rammed into the stump that remains after the much talked about tree was knocked over by a construction truck earlier this month on December 7, 2011.
The tree, which is said to be the one upon which Zimbabwe's legendary spirit medium, Mbuya Nehanda was hanged in 1898, was moved to the Heroes Acre, where it still lies today, just inside the entrance.
After it was knocked down, Memory Chari, a traditional healer who resides in Harare's Avenues area and is a member of the Zimbabwe National Traditional Healers' Association (ZINATHA) spent most of the next day there, in meditation and weeping. According to NewsDay, she warned against people touching the tree.
Another member of ZINATHA who declined to be named said that there needs to be a cleansing ceremony done at the site of the tree otherwise "bad things would continue to happen."
On December 18, 2011, barely two weeks after the tree was knocked down, a truck carrying sand rammed into the stump in the wee hours of the morning and overturned. The occupants of the vehicle were unhurt.
Then last night, December 29, 2011, at about 9.30pm the Elgrand bumped into the stump. Again, there were no visible injuries to the driver and his passenger.
While on Facebook and Twitter some Zimbabweans reiterated the call for a cleansing ceremony, one motorist commented, "It's obvious that there will be many accidents here now. You can hardly see this stump at night. They either need to mark it clearly with reflective signs or to remove it completely."
The vehicle, which was heading towards Sam Nujoma Street, seemed to have been travelling right in the centre of the road before it rammed into the stump that remains after the much talked about tree was knocked over by a construction truck earlier this month on December 7, 2011.
The tree, which is said to be the one upon which Zimbabwe's legendary spirit medium, Mbuya Nehanda was hanged in 1898, was moved to the Heroes Acre, where it still lies today, just inside the entrance.
After it was knocked down, Memory Chari, a traditional healer who resides in Harare's Avenues area and is a member of the Zimbabwe National Traditional Healers' Association (ZINATHA) spent most of the next day there, in meditation and weeping. According to NewsDay, she warned against people touching the tree.
On December 18, 2011, barely two weeks after the tree was knocked down, a truck carrying sand rammed into the stump in the wee hours of the morning and overturned. The occupants of the vehicle were unhurt.
Then last night, December 29, 2011, at about 9.30pm the Elgrand bumped into the stump. Again, there were no visible injuries to the driver and his passenger.
While on Facebook and Twitter some Zimbabweans reiterated the call for a cleansing ceremony, one motorist commented, "It's obvious that there will be many accidents here now. You can hardly see this stump at night. They either need to mark it clearly with reflective signs or to remove it completely."
Source - ZimboJam
